Kerala Bamboo House - Bliss in a Beach Hut

Another taxi ride later we arrived at our beach hut paradise. A little peace of heaven on a cliff top looking out at the Arabian Sea. Once again, we were in a place with amazing sunsets, friendly local people and waterfront restaurants. A perfect reminder of my favourite place in Bolivia - Lake Titicaca. I don't want to leave.

We're filling our days with yoga in the mornings (which we're not very good at, but you have to start somewhere), breakfast looking over the sea, an hour on the beach, a dip in the wonderful warm waters of the Arabian Sea and then pottering about on the internet a bit in the afternoon. Dinner is again looking over the sea at a hazy sunset and sharing some Kerala fish curry with Stu.

It's low season here as they come into the monsoon season at the end of the next month. It's very hot and humid. I'm loving the heat (around 30-35 degrees), but not enjoying going through two to three tops everyday with the sweating. The only thing bothering us are pesky little ants that like to nip you. No mozzies (yet).

There's not very many tourists or travellers here and the locals are shutting up their shops, preparing for the monsoon. It's great for us as the beach isn't very full and you're not sitting on top of people in the cliff top cafes and restaurants. Bliss.

We've been here two nights and we're going to leave tomorrow or the next day. Whenever we feel like it really. Off further north to sample more of the delights of Kerala.

Welcome To India

We made our way from Trivandrum airport right in the tip of Kerala up to Varkala, a small town 60km away. We decided it was best to get a train, even though we were offered the pleasure of a road trip with a crazy taxi driver the 1 journey. We were hoping we would get used to Indian style train travel in preparation for our many journeys to come. We felt we had the energy.

To get to the train station from the airport you drive through the arse end of town, then I realised, it wasn't the arse end of town, it was actually what the town was like. A visual feast of people washing; carrying large items on their head; taxis and mopeds fighting it out on the roads; and everyone just everywhere. Hundreds of people - all wafting their sarongs to cool down from the humid heat.

As we arrived at the train station, we were greeted by about 20 men in red nappies (shortened sarongs - but look very nappy like), all wanting to carry our luggage. Unfortunately for them, we surrended to none and carried our own luggage into the ticket office where we tried to work out which train we needed.

We queued in line and discovered that sharp elbows and a wide stance were needed to prevent the locals pushing in - a standard custom, only allowed by women, who get priviledges over men. Unfortunately, if you're not clearly stood right behind the person in front, it is assumed you're not queuing at all. There goes personal space for the rest of our trip.

The train to Varkala was a standard passenger train. Wooden seats with all the locals and with stops at every stops. Ideally we would have gone tourist class, but there's nothing like getting stuck into travelling with the locals. The 1.5 hour trip was painless. The only difficulty was knowing where we were and when to get off. It nice to say, we didn't really care. What if we missed the stop? No problem, we'd just jump in a taxi and pay about 15 pence to get back to our destination. It's good we both have this attitude - it allows you to deal with everything India has to throw at you.