Onboard GLORY - Backwaters of Kerala

I was bit sceptical about this in the beginning when S had this idea of spending couple of days in the back waters of Kerala @ Alleppey. Nevertheless, we made up our mind and decided to go ahead. It was really a memorable and a wonderful experience.

The House Boat

After getting the details from our family friend, who had been there last year we dialled to Mr Alex from Seasons Cruise. Nice gentleman he is... he took care of A-Z of our travel. As soon as we alighted from the train, a cab was waiting to pick us up and he dropped us to a homestay where in we could refresh ourselves. Houseboat -stand (If I may call so) was at the walking distance from homestay and we started our journey in the morning.

A Lone tree

As we moved away from Alleppey, nature started unfolding itself, from the coconut plantations, to picturesque paddyfields and the life near the banks of back waters. It's actually quite interesting to watch the surroudings as people get on with their daily lives. It was as if life is moving in slow motion relaxed manner. As Alleppey being the starting point, we had a lot of hosueboats making a beeline when we started, but as we chucked along, our driver made sure that we were lost in the serenity. Inside the Houseboat Steering Wheel and the Gear

As we camped for the night near a village, we had an opportunity to go around and see the life around. Local boat men offered us a small ride in along the "backwater gullies" of the village. As our chef prepared snacks for us, we bid farewell to sun for the day at far west muching crispy onion pakodas. As the night set in, cool wind started blowing along with mosquitos :-). Yes, during evenings, sitting around in lobby of the houseboat is quite trouble some as loads of mosquitos will attack you. You need to be well prepared for it or get used to :-)

A church and the station on the banks

Next day was great as we woke up with sun rays beaming across, we made our way back to Alleppey. We were dropped at the place where the famous Kerala Boating Race happens. This place looked like as if there was a sea of house boats and it was truly a "HouseBoat Stand". As we were alighting, we had to cross at least 3 house boats to reach the shore and Alex was there to make sure we reach our next destination.

Ashtamudi – The perfect getaway!

After a monotonous, stressful couple of months during the fag end of 2008, we had decided to have a leisure trip to Ashtamudi and planned everything towards that. Come January! Series of bad news started flowing in! First the recession, then the uncertainty about being jobless  and of course a worry some future! But eventually we decided to move on since everything was planned well ahead and we thought it should be the perfect break in the midst of all happenings around us.

Hmm… I must say! Ashtamudi, the eight cornered/branched lake didn’t fail to deliver on this!. Approximately around 10 Kms from Kollam, Asthamudi is the second largest backwater lake in Kerala. The club Mahindra Backwater Retreat @ Asthamudi situated in the unique spot, offers the great views of the lake, the fishing nets , view of green coconut trees and the calm back waters of the lake.

As the motive was, not to move around too much we didn’t plan much to move around and decided to spend the time in the resort itself. The major achievement of this trip was that, first time in my life I played Scrabble with S and won them with my super natural abilities and divine intervention:-) . The nature around the resort is beautiful, that our evenings were simply spent by sitting near the lake shore, facing the cool breeze from the waters.

This time I also managed to do some fishing in the lake. As with Photography, fishing needs tones of patience, otherwise you will keep wasting your baits :-). The most difficult part was to fix the prawns as baits to the fishing rod. But nevertheless at the end I had 4/5 fishes in my kitty :-).

The resort really offers a fabulous view of the sunrise. Having missed the sunrise on the first day, we decided to go spot on the next day to see the sunrise. Believe me it was really one of the magnificent sunrises I have ever seen! Take a look at few wonderful pics of sunrise.

I must admit that the chef at the Resort is one of the best that Club Mahindra folks have and the food here really beats the likes of Coorg, Munnar resorts of Club Mahindra. The one thing that we gave a miss was the house boat ride in and around Kollam and to the confluence of the lake with sea offered by Club Mahindra folks. With around 16~18 hrs of train journey from Bangalore, I must say this was one exhilarating trips I had ever been to! Cyao!



Other important things to do: Overnight house boat ride to Alleppy, Candle light dinner on house boat, Ayurvedic Massage
Best time to travel: Right after monsoon till January
Useful Links: Club Mahindra Backwater Retreat