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London, United Kingdom
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Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates
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Kochi, India
3-5 Feb Josey's homestay Bishop Kureethara Road, 682001 Cochin. Look at Trip Advisor under see and do. Fort Kochi. Mattancherry Palace, Paradesi mosque,
Backwater trips community based tours from Kumbalanghi. Ernakulam new and old. Ikathakali dance. Ferries.
1 Chinese Fishing Nets
2 Dutch Cemetery
3 Indo-Portuguese Museum
4 Santa Cruz Basilica
5 St Francis Church
Fort Cochin has a couple of small, sandy beaches, which are only really good for people-watching in the evening and gazing out at the incoming tankers. A popular promenade winds around from Mahatma Gandhi Beach to the Chinese fishing nets and fish market.
Look out along the shore for the scant remains of Fort Immanuel, the 16th- century Portuguese fort from which the area takes its name.
Mattancherry & Jew Town
About 3km southeast of Fort Cochin, Mattancherry is the old bazaar district and centre of the spice trade. These days it's packed with spice shops and pricey Kashmiri-run emporiums that autorickshaw drivers will fall over backwards to take you to for a healthy commission - any offer of a cheap tour of the district will inevitably lead to a few shops. In the midst of this, Jew Town is a bustling port area with a fine synagogue. Scores of small firms huddle together in dilapidated old buildings and the air is filled with the biting aromas of ginger, cardamom, cumin, turmeric and cloves, though the lanes around the Dutch Palace and synagogue are packed with antique and tourist-curio shops rather than spices.
1 Mattancherry Palace
2 Pardesi Synagogue
TO/FROM THE AIRPORT
AC Volvo buses run between the airport and Fort Cochin (₹80, one hour, eight daily) via Ernakulam. Taxis to/from Ernakulam cost around ₹850, and to/from Fort Cochin around ₹1200, depending on the time of night.
BOAT
Ferries are the fastest and most enjoyable form of transport between Fort Cochin and the mainland. The main stop at Fort Cochin is called Customs, with another stop at the Mattancherry Jetty near the synagogue. Ferries also run from Mattancherry to Willingdon Island. The jetty on the eastern side of Willingdon Island is called Embarkation; the west one, opposite Mattancherry, is Terminus. One-way fares are ₹4 (₹6 between Ernakulam (and Mattancherry). Ferries run to Vypeen Island from Ernakulam and Fort Cochin. Ferries to Bolgatty Island depart from High Court Jetty
Ernakulam
There are services to both Fort Cochin jetties (Customs and Mattancherry) every 25 to 50 minutes from Ernakulam's main jetty
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Kumarakom, India
Backwater breeze B & B, also can do river boat trips over a couple of days, bird sanctuary.
BOATING KERALA'S BACKWATERS
The undisputed highlight of a trip to Kerala is travelling through the gookm network of waterways that fringe the coast and trickle inland. Trips through the backwaters traverse palm-fringed lakes studded with cantilevered Chinese fishing nets, and wind their way along narrow, shady canals where coir (coconut fibre), copra (dried coconut kernels) and cashews are loaded onto boats. Along the way are isolated villages where farming life continues as it has for eons.
Tourist Cruises
The popular tourist cruise between Kollam and Alleppey (400) departs from either end at 10.30am, arriving at 6.30pm, daily from July to March and every second day at other times, though it may start running later in the season. Generally, there's a 1pm lunch stop and a brief afternoon chai stop. Bring drinks, snacks, sunscreen, a hat and a good book. It's a scenic and leisurely way - the journey takes eight hours - to get between the two towns, but the boat travels along only the major canals - you won't have many close-up views of the village life that makes the backwaters so magical. Another option is to take the trip halfway (200) and get off at the Matha Amrithanandamayi Mission.
Houseboats
If the stars align, renting a houseboat designed like a kettuvallam (rice barge) could well be one of the highlights of your trip to India. It can be an expensive experience (depending on your budget) but for a couple on a romantic overnight jaunt or split between a group of travellers, it's usually worth every rupee. Drifting through quiet canals lined with coconut palms, eating delicious Keralan food, meeting local villagers and sleeping on the water - it's a world away from the usual clamour of India.
Houseboats cater for couples (one or two double bedrooms) and groups (up to seven bedrooms!). Food (and an onboard chef to cook it) is generally included in the quoted cost, as is a driver/captain. Houseboats can be chartered through a multitude of private operators in Alleppey, Kollam and Kottayam. This is the biggest business in Kerala and the quality of boats varies widely, from ageing boats to floating palaces - try to inspect the boat before agreeing on a price. Travel-agency reps will be pushing you to book a boat as soon as you set foot in Kerala, but it's better to wait till you reach a backwater hub: choice is greater in Alleppey (an extraordinary 100o-plus boats), and you're much more likely to be able to bargain down a price if you turn up and see what's on offer. Most guesthouses and homestays can also book you on a houseboat.
It's possible to travel by houseboat between Alleppey and Kollam and part way to Kochi - though these trips spend more time on open lakes and large canals than true backwaters and take longer than most travellers expect. Expect a boat for two people for 24 hours to cost about ₹6000 to 8000 at the budget level; for four people ₹10,000 to 12,000; for larger boats or for air-conditioning expect to pay 15,000 to 30,000. Shop around to negotiate a bargain - though this will be harder in the peak season. Prices triple from around 20 December to 5 January.
Bus on to Kollam? As trains go back to Kochi.
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Varkala, India
Better to stay here and miss Kovalam? Big train journey to Madurai.
Sights
Janardhana Temple
Varkala Aquarium
Perched almost perilously along the edge of 15m-high red laterite cliffs, the North Cliff part of
Varkala has a naturally beautiful setting that has steadily grown into Kerala's most popular backpacker hang-out. A small strand of beach nuzzles Varkala's cliff edge, where restaurants play innocuous world music and stalls sell T-shirts, baggy trousers and silver jewellery. It's touristy and the sales pitch can be tiring,
but Varkala is still a great place to watch the
days slowly turn into weeks, and it's not hard to escape the crowds further north or south where the beaches are cleaner and quieter.
Despite its backpacker vibe, Varkala is essentially a temple town, and the main Papanasham Beach is a holy place where Hindus come to make offerings for passed loved ones, assisted by priests who set up shop beneath the Hindustan Hotel. About 2km east of here is busy Varkala town.
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Thiruvananthapuram, India
Catch train from here to Madurai. Book as soon as possible.
Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala's capital - still usually referred to by its colonial name, Trivandrum - is a relatively compact but energetic city and an easygoing introduction to urban life down south.
Most travellers merely springboard from here to the nearby beach resorts of Kovalam and Varkala, but Trivandrum has enough sights - including a zoo and cluster of Victorian museums in glorious neo- Keralan buildings - to justify a stay.
Top Sights
1 Museum of History & Heritage
2 Napier Museum
3 Puthe Maliga Palace Museum
4 Shri Padmanabhaswamy Temple
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Madurai, India
Meenakshi -Sundareshwarar temple, most popular entrance east side leads directly to the Shiva shrine. Old city south of the Vaigai River best place to be. Ghandi memorial museum. Banana market, find East tower of SMT Shiva bull statue.
Chettinadu equidistant to southwest. Traditional home of Chettiars, merchant community, lavish mansions. Base at Kanadukathan.
Chennai may be the capital of Tamil Nadu, but Madurai claims its soul. Madurai is Tamil-born and Tamil-rooted, one of the oldest cities in India, a metropolis that traded with ancient Rome and was a great capital long before Chennai was even dreamed of.
Come here for the celebrated Meenakshi Amman Temple, a dazzling maze-like structure ranking among India's greatest temples.
Otherwise, Madurai, perhaps appropriately given its age, captures many of India's glaring dichotomies: a centre dominated by a medieval temple and an economy increasingly driven by IT.
1 Meenakshi Amman Temple
2 Pudhu Mandapa
3 Temple Art Museum
4 Tirumalai Nayak Palace
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Tiruchirappalli, India
Look at Trip Advisor within Stippl under see and do. Jambukeswarar Temple, Rock fort Vinayaka Temple, Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple. Our lady of Lourdes church.
Is it better to do a day trip to Kanadukathan or better to go to
Tiruchirappalli, universally called Trichy or Tiruchi, isn't just a travel junction: it also mixes up a heaving bazaar with some major temples. It's a huge, crowded, busy city, and the fact that most hotels are clumped together around the big bus station isn't exactly a plus point. But Trichy has a strong character and long history, and a way of overturning first impressions.
Trichy may have been a capital of the early Cholas in the 3rd century BC. It passed through the hands of the Pallavas, medieval Cholas, Pandyas, Delhi Sultanate and Vijayanagars before the Madurai Nayaks brought it to prominence, making it a capital in the 17th century and building its famous Rock Fort Temple. Under British control, it became an important railway hub known as Trichinopoly.
Trichy stretches a long way from north to south. Most of what's interesting to travellers is split into three distinct areas. The Trichy Junction, or Cantonment, area in the south has most of the hotels and restaurants and the main bus and train stations. The Rock Fort Temple and main bazaar are 4km north of here; the other important temples are on Srirangam island, a further 4km north, across the Cauvery River. Luckily, it's all connected by a good bus service.
1 Rock Fort Temple
2 Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple
3 Art Museum
4 Rajagopuram
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Thanjavur, India
Here are the ochre foundation blocks of perhaps the most remarkable civilisation of Dravidian history, one of the few kingdoms to expand Hinduism beyond India, a bedrock for aesthetic styles that spread from Madurai to the Mekong. A dizzying historical legacy was forged from Thanjavur, capital of the great Chola empire during its heyday. Today Thanjavur is a crowded hectic, modern Indian town - but the past is still very much present. Every day thousands of people worship at the Cholas' grand Brihadishwara Temple, and the city's labyrinthine royal palace preserves memories of other, later powerful dynasties.
1 Brihadishwara Temple
2 Royal Palace
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Kumbakonam, India
Kumbakonam
At first glance Kumbakonam is just another chaotic Indian junction town, but then you notice the dozens of colourful gopurams pointing skyward from its 18 temples – a reminder that this was once a seat of medieval South Indian power. With another two magnificent World Heritage-listed Chola temples nearby, it's worth staying the night.
Sights
1 Kashivishvanatha Temple
2 Kumbeshwara Temple
3 Mahamaham Tank
4 Nageshwara Temple
5 Sarangapani Temple
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Puducherry (Pondicherry), India
French colonial town near the seafront.
1 Bharathi Park
2École Française D'Extrême-Orient
3 Gandhi Memorial
4 Institut Français de Pondichéry
5 Notre Dame des Anges
6 Old Lighthouse
7 Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception
Cathedral
8 Puducherry Museum
9 Raj Nivas
10 Sacred Heart Basilica
11 Seafront
12 Sri Aurobindo Ashram
13 Sri Manakula Vinayagar Temple
Activities, Courses & Tours
14 Sita
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Mahabalipuram, India
1 Arjuna's Penance
2 Shore Temple
3 Dharmaraja Cave Temple
4 Ganesh Ratha
5 Krishna Mandapa
6 Krishna's Butterball
7 Lighthouse
8 Lion Throne
9 Mahishamardini Mandapa
10Panch Pandava Mandapa
11 Ramanuja Mandapa
Raya Gopura
13 Trimurti Cave Temple
14 Unfinished Relief Carving
15 Varaha Mandapa
UNESCO site, Mamallapuram was the major seaport of the ancient Pallava kingdom based at Kanchipuram. A wander round the town's magnificent, World Heritage-listed temples and carvings inflames the imagination, especially at sunset.
In addition to ancient archaeological wonders, salty air and coastal beauty, there's also the traveller hub of Othavadai and Othavadai Cross Sts, where restaurants serve pasta, pizza and pancakes, and shops sell Tibetan trinkets. The town's buzzing, growing surf scene is another attraction.
'Mahabs', as most call it, is less than two hours by bus from Chennai, and many travellers make a beeline straight here. It's small and laid-back, and sights can be explored on foot or by bicycle.
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Chennai, India
(was Madras) Anna Salai, east Muslim quarter Triplicane, Mylapore (Portuguese) Kapaleeshwarar temple, Santhome cathedral.
1 Fort St George
2 Kapaleeshwarar Temple
3 San Thome Cathedral
4 Armenian Church
5 Fort Museum
6 Luz Church
TTDC bus tour around the city, half day. Walking tour.
Suburban train out to airport.