Tea Plantations of Munnar - Nov 16 2014

From the suffocating humidity and vicious Mosquitoes of Kochi we happily escaped to the cool green hills of Munnar. We found a nice guesthouse (SMM Guesthouse @750R a night) that was a bit pricey for our standards at the time but very comfortable and equipped with in room wi-fi and a plasma tv. The next morning we did a quite touristy rickshaw tour to main points of interest around town in which we got to see some wild elephants and enjoyed nice views of the famous and beautiful tea plantations of Munnar. The next day we went on a day trek (organized through the neighboring guesthouse- Green View) with two other couples from New Zealand and Germany. We walked around the tea plantations and also some different spice plantations and learned a bit about the history of tea in India, the life of the tea pickers and about many local plants, trees and fruits.

Left with a taste for more we booked another trek for the next day through the same people. This time we were joined by 5 other friendly travellers from England and one American. we climbed another peak with more wonderful views and finished the day with a visit to the tea factory and also had nice lunch together at Rapsy's restaurant in town. 

In our last evening we had a surprisingly great dinner courtesy of lonely planet at the Sree Mahaveer restaurant, where we discovered first discovered kaju (cashew nut) curry which became one of our favorites. Next morning we hopped on a bus and headed to Alleppey, sometimes referred to as "Venice of the East". 

eating green mango by the dam

 chilli bhaji

trekking buddies #1

cardamon picker

trekking buddies #2

Kathakali in Kochi - Nov 14 2014

We arrived late in the evening to Kochi aka Cochin after a long, uncomfortable and annoying 15 hour ride in four different local buses (it was supposed to be eight hours and two buses only).

We have to say that Kochi is a nice town but a bit overrated in our opinion. The town offers some interesting  sights like ancient Chinese fishing nets which they claim the fishermen still use today, several churches and one of the only synagogues in India. As any touristic town Kochi is scattered with many souvenir shops, travel agencies and backpacker restaurants that are quite the same as anywhere else. We do recommend Kashi Art Cafe, a nice place with a modern look and good western food.

But the "highlight" for us in Kochi was the 3 hour long Kathakali show, a traditional south Indian dance that is preformed only by men that wear a lot of makeup (when buying a ticket for the show you are also invited to view the one hour long makeup session which we came to see but left in the middle). The show itself is interesting at first, very different than anything else we've seen but it was a bit too long and repetitive for our taste. We also saw a local martial arts demonstration at the same cultural center which was interesting and impressive (and thankfully much shorter than the Kathakali).

Madikeri, Mountains and Monks - Nov 9 2014

After a horrifically bumpy bus ride, seated in the infamous back seat and spending most of the time suspended in mid air, we finally reached Madikeri in the Coorg (Kodagu) region of Karnataka. We stayed in Chitra hotel, which was alright but nothing more, the restaurant had pretty good Indian food though. 

The next day we visited the nearby Tibetan colony of Bylakuppe, where we marvelled at the magnificent golden temple and many Buddha statues. The best part though was getting an inside tour from a friendly Tibetan monk who hunted us down outside the temple looking for someone to chat with. After being pretty much forced into rolling every prayer wheel in the premise and seeing some beautiful stupas (which are not a common sight in the south of India), we were invited into his tiny room where he treated us to some home made tea (which tasted like soup) and pieces of stale sweet bread which were lying on his bookshelf by the dozen. He told us about the life of a monk which surprisingly includes some sponsored world travel, and we had an interesting conversation about enlightenment, reincarnation and death- which in his eyes was not much different than falling asleep. We parted ways not before he gave us each a pack of cookies from his rather large stash (of course they contained butter so Daniel couldn't eat them and I was left with the burden of finishing them all).

The next day we embarked on a 3 day trek which we managed to organise through Travel Coorg or Coorg Trails who as it turns out is run by the same people. On the first day our lovely guide Chanapa led us on a climb to a 700 m peak which was a nice walk despite the fact that we encountered some leaches (!) on the way through the forest and that we were caught in a heavy fog so we couldn't see much views. We spent the night at his house in a small village where we enjoyed a hot shower and a lovely meal.  

On the second day of our trek we were joined by a nice French couple in their sixties who hiked with us around some coffee and rice plantations and accompanied us for another night of very warm hospitality at Chanapa's house. The last day of trekking was regrettably cancelled because I was feeling a little sick, but we still had a great night back in Madikheri watching a wonderfully entertaining Bollywood flick "Happy New Year" at the local cinema. The next day we embarked on what turned out to be a terribly exhausting journey to Kochi (Cochin), our first stop in the state of Kerala, proudly called by locals "God's own country".