Alappuzha

As suggested by most travel experts, the best time to visit Kerala is during winters (but sadly there is nothing known as cold weather in kerala, it only cools down a little bit. The average range of temperature for costal regions is 22-32 degree Celsius, the region we are interested in). I guess for poor people like me, a little hot and humid weather can be compensated for big bargains on bookings and easy availability of bus tickets. Moreover, for ones, who have gone though many North-Indian summers, this shouldn’t be unbearable?



Our point of interest in Kerala was Alappuzha(the most difficult word I have ever tried to pronounce, actually it is neither “zha” in the end nor it is “ra” in the end, it is somewhere in between if you hear it from the locals. I tried it many times; it is a full blown tongue twister. For the record I am still trying, and Ajith next time, when we meet, I will spell it correctly). The last character in the name is a character which is not present in Devanagri script, it is a sole property of malayalam language. Whenever you try to spell it in front of locals, they will always say, you cant, you got to learn it in childhood. Anyways my quest is ON for it.



Backwaters.

Alappuzha is better and thankfully known as Alleppey. It has the best backwaters in India. Many have asked me, what are backwaters? Let me fetch a definition from wiki (The Kerala backwaters are a chain of brackish lagoons and lakes lying parallel to the Arabian Sea coast. The network includes five large lakes linked by canals, both manmade and natural, fed by 38 rivers, and extending virtually half the length of Kerala state. Backwaters do meet and empty themselves in the sea, but it is controlled by barrages to keep the sea at bay.). In kerala, Alappuzha, is the best place to experience them. So we decided to go to the “Venice of the east”. This time as well, I headed with the same Gokarna trip gang.



Backwater cruise started.

Alleppey is around 575 kms from Bangalore and approximately 450 kms from Mangalore. I took a 12 hr bus ride to the place and Mangalore folks were lucky enough to get hands on the train tickets. Raj Lodge, near Alappuzha bus stand was the meeting point for us. It is wise to book the House Boat in advance and we are. We had booked a fully furnished 2BHK house-boat. The house configuration sounds like a real concrete house, it is indeed in many ways better than that.



House Boat Drawing Room.

The house-boat had 2 bedroom with double beds and attached washrooms with showers :D. A separate kitchen area towards the end of the boat. The drawing room with no walls lies towards the start of the boat. Well, our drawing room had a Sofa set, a glass table with chairs for 4 and bingo!!!! A home theatre system. What else do we want from a house. And the best thing about this house is that you can take it anywhere you want. How good is that?



House Boat bedroom.

But guys, this aint cheaper than a normal house. For a house boat like the one we had, it took the owner 25lacs to build. A plum amount.

Before boarding the boat, we had our breakfast at a local restaurant. For the ones who like beef, your breakfast will be as good as it can be. Beef curry with idiyappam(a very thin noodles like preparation). And on top of it, instead of normal or cold water, you are served warm water that has some ayurvedic ingredients in it. It tastes good as well. Try it.
Our boat cruise started at 11AM, when the boat first started from the parking bay and began to crawl in the winding backwater lanes, the whole experience was awesome. You really feel as you are in God’s own country. The wonderful ride is coupled with equally pleasing wind. For the first half an hour we couldn’t stop but to appreciate the house-boat and the backwaters.

Every house has their own personal back water.



The house-boat is generally equipped with an onboard cook and believe it or not, the food he served on the entire trip was heaven like. In the lunch, we had Fried Fish and Fish Curry made in local style. If you request, cook can catch a fish in front of you and will cook it for you as well.



Fish.

We stopped a few times for the boat supplies and for some supplies for us.



Todi Shop.

We spotted this big group of ducklings, look at the symmetry.



Ducks.

In some areas backwaters are pretty deep, more than 10mts. But still there are many spots where it is 2-3 mts deep (that is still enough to get drowned). We took life jackets and went for swim. Being fresh water, it was a much better experience than we had last time at the Malpe beach. We snapped some good diving pics as well.

Meanwhile it was evening time now; boat was tied to a tree on the shore. At this time of year, they don’t anchor the boat in the middle of water due to high winds but during winters they do so. Many other boats were also anchored along the shore. Meanwhile our cook was busy preparing delicious chicken for the night, we wandered in the nearby paddy fields.



Paddy Fields.

Todi is a local drink very common among the locals and a delicacy for the tourists. We too tried it. It is a sourly in taste and should be drink in one big gulp rather than taking small sips. It can be a little unpleasant in taste for some but if you develop a taste for it. It is heavenly afterwards.



Sunset Pic. (Trying with Manual Focus)

The best part is that the wind blows all the time but still mosquitoes will not spare you. It is good to take mosquito coils with you. Try not to sleep in the bedrooms else you will loose the amazing starry night sky.
It was an early morning for all of us. The boat headed towards a vast expanse of water. It looked as if there was no shore. It was immense. It was partly cloudy with few water drops falling here and there. A perfect time to take the morning tea. With the tea we came to know that our wonderful time had to come to an end. We were supposed to vacate the boat by 10AM so that they can cleanup the boat and prepare it for others.



Morning Pic.

They even have waterway signs.



Before vacating we took bath on the house boat, in the shower :D. The cook had made delicious and soft idlis for the breakfast.

And finally our boat was docked in the parking bay.



Parking Bay.

This was all about the 24 hr heavenly experience on the house boat.

Gokarna

So far it has been a good start of Bangalore Summer. Only few days back, I came from Lucknow after spending a good 15 days at home. It was a real good vacation after a very long time. I guess this was the first time that I lost track of dates and days. After 4-5 days at home, I just wasn’t able to recollect which date or day it was anymore. I tried real hard, even I calculated the number of days I had been in Lucknow, but for no good. After scanning all my natural memory, I couldn’t locate the day. In the end, very very reluctantly I looked at the newspaper, to get a hang of the days passing by. It was a real treat to get lost in the vacation.
I had no idea that within a week of coming back, I would get another opportunity to chill. One of my very good friend and his Mangalore gang invited me for a trip to Gokarna. No one from the group except one had visited Gokarna before. All we knew was that it has one of the most scenic beaches in Karanataka. Gokarna is 240kms from Mangalore. On its way, there are many worth visiting beaches and some very scenic backwaters full of mangroves.
It is not the first time that I have been to Mangalore. When I was kid, I had come here with my parents, but I don’t remember much of that trip, except that I had a good time at the beach. I have heard that Mangalore is a much better place than Mysore(I can compare Mysore because I go there very very frequently), that it sees a lot of money from outside India, not mainly but some part from Smuggling as well. After all it is expected from a port city. Mangalore is a very quite and very small place as compared to Bangalore. It hardly takes 30 mins to cover the length and breadth of the city. It is indeed small. You can imagine that, when I had to catch my return bus at 10:50PM, I left the house at 10:40PM, unlike here, where I have to leave atleast an hour before.
Anyways, On 4th evening I left Bangalore by bus for Mangalore. Being a long weekend and because of my super lazniness in booking the bus tickets, I could only manage tickets from a private bus operator (KSRTC is the best). Booking tickets on Manjunath Volvo proved to be a huge mistake. Private bus operators drive through the ghats(I guess shayadri) and the roads on these ghats are insane unlike western ghats where you find one of the most amazing ghats and equally amazing roads. From all 8 hour bus journey I could only manage 1 hour of sleep. Even though it was a Volvo bus, I could feel the suspension hitting the full compression each time. I was on a decent bus ride to another city, I was not there for some offroading adventure. I think this was the most treacherous bus journey I had ever taken in my life. Okay, let us move on. I reached Mangalore by 7AM, Saturday and after getting fresh, our gang started off from Mangalore.
I think idli wada with very spicy sambhar is the best morning breakfast. Our ride for the trip was a Scorpio SUV with 7 of us in it. Our first stop was Malpe beach near Udupi, for a short swim( I readily agreed for it because I hadn’t taken bath in the morning…..). Once you enter the water, it is difficult not to realize that the beach holidays are the best.



St. Mary's Island (effect of excessive sunlight).


Saint Mary’s Island is in the backdrop of the pic, it is a 45 mins ride from a ferry. A place worth going if you have few hours to spend. Take caution at the island rocks, I came to know that many people have lost their lives while taking the perfect shot from the rocks. In the middle of sea, a big wave can very easily throw anyone off the rock.

Banana ride and Scooters are available on the beach. To make it exciting we did the MTV Roadies banana trick. It is good fun to change positions on the banana while it is going on full speed. It did give a slight adrenaline rush. Without tricks, it becomes too boring. If planning to do one, do it here as it is not available on other beaches on the way Gokarna.




My savior.


Udupi is a good place to stop by for a wholesome lunch. A good place for tea break is the Turtle bay, better known as Marvanthe beach. It is right on NH-17, no need to take any narrow roads. It is one of the few places where the sea and the backwaters run parallel. On one side, it is the majestic Arabian Sea and on the other, very scenic and very green backwaters.



NH-17 keeps the sea at the bay.




Awesome backwaters.


It was already 5 in the evening, we drove non-stop to Gokarna and reached there by 8PM. Btw Gokarna is a very small place with a very old and historical Shiva temple. Ironically the place is more famous for the temple rather than the beautiful beaches. The beach of our interest was not the Gokarna beach, but a nearby Om beach. As you would have guessed, it is called Om beach because its shoreline is shaped like Om (ॐ). The only form of accommodation available on Om beach are the huts, apart from that there is a super luxury resort SwaSwara with a night’s rent of 10K. So, it was time for us to look for few huts for our gang. A very disturbing thing we came to know there was that some hut owners just don’t give their huts to Indians, only to foreigners. After getting refusal by 4 shacks, we finally landed a place for us with some good negotiation skills.

Saturday morning was exceptionally good as I had slept under the stars with wonderful sounds of crashing waves on the shore.



This was the bedroom with the most amazing view on the planet.


As Gokarna is on the Arabian Sea (Western Coast of India), so sun doesn’t come out of the sea, but leaps its way from behind the small hills.



Sunrise (remember MS windows wallpaper).


It was cloudy but still a very good time to take some nice pics.



Best wall of the morning.


This dog followed us for the whole morning (well deserved pic).


The destination for Saturday was Yana, a place famous for Volcanic Rocks. The rocks are not so famous because they were formed by Volcanic explosion but because of the shape, which reminds you of the birth place of Superman. You guys will come to know when you see the pic.

Yana is good 50 kms from Gokarna, the roads are okay, except for a horrendous stretch of 1.5 kms where there is actually no road. It looks like Public Works Department ran out of money while building the road. The last km or two provide good place for offroading as well. It is a wise idea to take a SUV preferably 4WD, though we had a 2WD scorpio, it coped the conditions pretty well with its good ground clearance. Our ride was exceptionally bumpy as it was an old scorpio with leaf spring suspensions. Initially when Mahindra had launched scorpio, I don’t know for what reason they fitted it with Leaf springs. Can you imagine an SUV with leaf springs? Anyways, we reached the end of motorable road and now it was a little trek of 1.5 kms. On the way up, a small river (I don’t know what to call) runs along with you. The trek ends with couple of steps (definitely more than 50 but less than 100).
When I saw the rock formations for the first time, I was really amazed, as how the hell, nature came up with something like this.



Superman Birthplace.



Another Rock formation.



Looks like a castle.

On top of the hill there are two main rocks and few small ones as well. There is a small temple as well, at the foothill of the rock. There is a Pradikshina (for people who don't know, it is a path around the temple, in circular or in any shape) around the temple. It is a must go place, it shows some very interesting rock formations.



Razer sharp edges.



Some kind of rock (can anyone help?).


It is definitely a place, worth the effort of talking a bumpy ride and the trek. On the way up, it took us almost an hour to reach the top, but it took only 15mins to walk back. It is a hot and sweaty trek, so do take lot of water.


In the evening, we went to Half-moon and paradise beaches, near our base beach (Om beach). These beaches are not accessible by any motorable road. Only option is a 25min trek over few small hills or take a boat ride. As expected, we preferred boat ride over a yet another hike. Some huts are available here as well, but there is no power on the beach. So, kindly manage.



Some huts are available, right on the hill face as well.


The coastline of these beaches is so mysteriously formed that neither can you see the Sunrise nor the Sunset.



Sunset.


I really liked this pic, imagine the speed of waves as they relentlessly hit the rocks.



Crashing waves.


After spending two nights on the beach, it was an aweful Sunday, finally we had to start our way back. Only destination worth stopping was the Murudeshwar beach. It has a wonderful beach + a temple with a very very very huge Shiva Statue + Asia’s tallest Gopruram (this recently came in TOI).



Scenic Murudeshwar Beach.



Huge Shiva Idol.



Asia's Tallest Gopuram.


Finally, we were on the road again for the last stretch of 100 odd kms. After that, it was home sweet home. Last wonderful thing of the trip was the awesome Fried Fish from Narayana (Mangalore).

While others crashed to the bed, I started my bus journey back to Bangalore.