Local transportationWe arrived at Cochin around 7 am 21 st March ,by flight from Bangalore..a friend of ours had sent his car and a driver to pick us up ..we had planned to spend a day in Cochin however we were not sure how we would go about the place.As we got to know about the car and a driver at 
our service we were quite pleased as well as relieved as we would not have to spend time finding the places.We checked in at a hotel and got refreshed then went for breakfast to a nearby joint...dosa's were awsome,we stuffed ourselves with dosa,iddli,pongal and a good cup of coffee.Our day started with a visit to the Church where Vasco da gama was buried, on the way we stopped to check out the chinese fishing nets,and checked how they use those huge nets to catch fishes,after the sight seeing and visit to the palaces we reached the Mattancherry Jetty from where we took a very cheap ferry ride(7 rs 1 hour) against a very expensive boat ride (200 rs 2 hrs)ha ha that was so cheap and we had fun we did manage to see few dolphins as well in the 
sea. We visited the mattencherry palace,photography was prohibited so we could not take snaps inside we just had a few takenoutside the palace.However the jewellery on show were beautiful reminding us of the majesty of the byegone era.We did a little bit of sight seeing and shopping ,this concluded our day in Cochin Next day the driver was asked to drop us to the next pit stop(this word i got from the amazing race) that was Alleppy where we were to start our boat ride.We started towards Alleppy with so much high spirits,however everything did 
not go as we had planned as our travel agents through whom we booked cheated us and extorted extra from us if we were to take boat ride from Alleppy to Kumarakum...at this point all our holiday moods were off !!!however we had a good bargainer with us my friends sister,who sorted out the mess by paying the boat owner instead of the agency little lower than they had asked for, so here we missed the first hour of the ride,as soon as our ride started our spirits soared as it was 
a wow experience(i come from a hilly area so i had no experience of beautiful coconut trees bordering the canal)mostly people travel by local ferry .We lazed around the decks had good refreshing black tea as we had requested it on the upper deck,rest of the day flew by admiring mother nature........ The day just slipped by and we had to moore our boat for the night.We got to check the local village and the sunset and sunrise view was breathtaking,the photographer was ofcourse my dear brother and he spent all the time trying to catah the essence of kerala,I 
think he did a good job,the house boat ride was over by 9 am.We proceeded to Kottayam to catch a bus to Kumli(Thekkaddy),we travelled by local bus the journey was long and tiring,but we enjoyed all the way.We could see the rubber plantation,i was quite surprised by the rubber trees as all my life I had seen only those big leafed ornamental rubber plant.As I am the nature lover and know little more about the plants,I kept my commentry on all the way showing the coffee,tea bushes ,cardomum plants etc I guess my friends were excited to see them as well,for the first time I saw the pepper climber.We did not get time to do the spice garden walk,but more interesting was the night walk at the Periyar sanctuary.It was fun as well as scary we were given a torch light each to carry with 
instructions from the forest guard not to focus light towards the jungle but the way we were walking, I was trying to be cautious and slowly followed his light path(i was just trying to save myself in case something jumped out from the forest floor ha ha)the next morning was the streamer ride.It was bit of a let down,and the most funny part was we got the ticket for the upper deck of the streamer and by the time we had breakfast we lost those tickets,sad had to get a new ticket for the lower deck coz we did not want to spend too much,guess what happened then.!!..no no we did not get the lost tickets back,we went ahead with the boat ride however when we were back in our hotel that is where we found the tickets tucked at my friends pocket.I just could manage" bless our stupidity"!!...From there we moved to Kottayam again as we had to catch the train the next day to Kovalam.............. We boarded the train at around 5 am,as still sleepy from getting up early,all of us went to sleep as soon as we located our seats.All I remember is one of us, dont know who 
saying guys varkala!! do u want to get off here,without any questions all of us got up carried the bedsheets we were using to cover ourself,as well as our luggage and like a reflex action ran towards the door.We just had time to jump off the train as it had already started to move from Varkala,lucky us at least we were able to jump off the train,and our decision to change plan was for the better,as Varkala was awsome.Lots of tourist around,we went to the cliff side beach we were given the name of this hotel by one of the foreigners who were staying there.The shops were on top of the cliff and below the beach,it was my second time on the beach but I consider this my first beach experiencs as the earlier one was Marina beach,Chennai,where we could just wet our feet ha ha.At varkala we had a great 
time ducking the waters so that we were not swept away by the huge waves As this was the first experience with wated I was a bit scared and apprehensive but later summoned up my courage and enjoyed myself..Ginger beer was great****recepie pinapple juice with a dash of honey and ginger***it tastes really good...... Finally our hell of a trip came to an end,.and all had to get back to the same daily routine,until we organise another trip.Which I know for certain will be after few months and we know where we are heading for...... the beautiful Leh**........so till then bye....Kerala 21st march-26 th March.
our service we were quite pleased as well as relieved as we would not have to spend time finding the places.We checked in at a hotel and got refreshed then went for breakfast to a nearby joint...dosa's were awsome,we stuffed ourselves with dosa,iddli,pongal and a good cup of coffee.Our day started with a visit to the Church where Vasco da gama was buried, on the way we stopped to check out the chinese fishing nets,and checked how they use those huge nets to catch fishes,after the sight seeing and visit to the palaces we reached the Mattancherry Jetty from where we took a very cheap ferry ride(7 rs 1 hour) against a very expensive boat ride (200 rs 2 hrs)ha ha that was so cheap and we had fun we did manage to see few dolphins as well in the 
sea. We visited the mattencherry palace,photography was prohibited so we could not take snaps inside we just had a few takenoutside the palace.However the jewellery on show were beautiful reminding us of the majesty of the byegone era.We did a little bit of sight seeing and shopping ,this concluded our day in Cochin Next day the driver was asked to drop us to the next pit stop(this word i got from the amazing race) that was Alleppy where we were to start our boat ride.We started towards Alleppy with so much high spirits,however everything did 
not go as we had planned as our travel agents through whom we booked cheated us and extorted extra from us if we were to take boat ride from Alleppy to Kumarakum...at this point all our holiday moods were off !!!however we had a good bargainer with us my friends sister,who sorted out the mess by paying the boat owner instead of the agency little lower than they had asked for, so here we missed the first hour of the ride,as soon as our ride started our spirits soared as it was 
a wow experience(i come from a hilly area so i had no experience of beautiful coconut trees bordering the canal)mostly people travel by local ferry .We lazed around the decks had good refreshing black tea as we had requested it on the upper deck,rest of the day flew by admiring mother nature........ The day just slipped by and we had to moore our boat for the night.We got to check the local village and the sunset and sunrise view was breathtaking,the photographer was ofcourse my dear brother and he spent all the time trying to catah the essence of kerala,I 
think he did a good job,the house boat ride was over by 9 am.We proceeded to Kottayam to catch a bus to Kumli(Thekkaddy),we travelled by local bus the journey was long and tiring,but we enjoyed all the way.We could see the rubber plantation,i was quite surprised by the rubber trees as all my life I had seen only those big leafed ornamental rubber plant.As I am the nature lover and know little more about the plants,I kept my commentry on all the way showing the coffee,tea bushes ,cardomum plants etc I guess my friends were excited to see them as well,for the first time I saw the pepper climber.We did not get time to do the spice garden walk,but more interesting was the night walk at the Periyar sanctuary.It was fun as well as scary we were given a torch light each to carry with 
instructions from the forest guard not to focus light towards the jungle but the way we were walking, I was trying to be cautious and slowly followed his light path(i was just trying to save myself in case something jumped out from the forest floor ha ha)the next morning was the streamer ride.It was bit of a let down,and the most funny part was we got the ticket for the upper deck of the streamer and by the time we had breakfast we lost those tickets,sad had to get a new ticket for the lower deck coz we did not want to spend too much,guess what happened then.!!..no no we did not get the lost tickets back,we went ahead with the boat ride however when we were back in our hotel that is where we found the tickets tucked at my friends pocket.I just could manage" bless our stupidity"!!...From there we moved to Kottayam again as we had to catch the train the next day to Kovalam.............. We boarded the train at around 5 am,as still sleepy from getting up early,all of us went to sleep as soon as we located our seats.All I remember is one of us, dont know who 
saying guys varkala!! do u want to get off here,without any questions all of us got up carried the bedsheets we were using to cover ourself,as well as our luggage and like a reflex action ran towards the door.We just had time to jump off the train as it had already started to move from Varkala,lucky us at least we were able to jump off the train,and our decision to change plan was for the better,as Varkala was awsome.Lots of tourist around,we went to the cliff side beach we were given the name of this hotel by one of the foreigners who were staying there.The shops were on top of the cliff and below the beach,it was my second time on the beach but I consider this my first beach experiencs as the earlier one was Marina beach,Chennai,where we could just wet our feet ha ha.At varkala we had a great 
time ducking the waters so that we were not swept away by the huge waves As this was the first experience with wated I was a bit scared and apprehensive but later summoned up my courage and enjoyed myself..Ginger beer was great****recepie pinapple juice with a dash of honey and ginger***it tastes really good...... Finally our hell of a trip came to an end,.and all had to get back to the same daily routine,until we organise another trip.Which I know for certain will be after few months and we know where we are heading for...... the beautiful Leh**........so till then bye....Kerala 21st march-26 th March.
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