04.30 in the morning, brrrrrrrriinnnggggg...! Train left at 5.30 and we got a rickshaw, tutututut......to take us..damned early, but nice because I would actually get to Varkala before the real heat set in.. Wanda and I had a whole compartment to ourselves - well at least for the first 2 hours, then she got off in Trivandrum and changed trains....I went another hour towards the north and by 8.30 I was in Varkala. Then a "real" taxi - not a rickie - took me for the same price to Kerala Bamboo House - some really funky, ecclectic, kitsch bungalows on Varkala's cliff - just next to the beach and with a fantastic view. fairly turistic, but I was lucky because the low season had already started so there was less "hassle"...but I must say that the west side of South India is heavy when it comes the classic "come and see my shop, maam" - ouf!!! But, I enjoyed my bamboo cottage, although it was full of animals and insects - more or less noisy - and quite freaky for somebody like me...but I decided to be strong and said to myself that I am a big girl and no little creepy crawlers would stop me from sleeping... HELP!!!!!!!!! At lunchtime I took a rickie into Varkala village to eat "real Indian food" and to do some shopping for the real price, not a tourist one :-) Then I strolled around in the evening along the beach and spoke to some shopowners. Did some surfing and copied all my photos onto my harddisk - OUFFF! Met a really nice English couple, Sam & Alex - the are on a "aroundtheworldtrip" - sold their house in the UK before the crisis and decided to travel - cool.............before they will once settle and have lots of babies :-) Well, I managed to sleep a few hours & got up at sunrise, and, it was so beautiful...
That second day I spent entirely on the beach - under an umbrella and mostly sleeping, absolutely exhausetd after the last week of sleeping buses and visiting places in the day...
Decided to leave the next morning - found a funky way to get up north, to Alleppey, via ferry through the backwaters all the way from Quilon (Kollum). So, I took a train in the morning to Quilon, only 35 minutes away and a rickie to the ferry...that turned out to be a little boat, on which I was supposed to spend 8 hours with 5 local guys and....no way - I turned around, got my money back and got onto another bus (!!!) to Aleppey where I had arranged to be picked up by Ravi's friend & taken to this beach bungalow...
But, when I got to Aleppey, i received a message from Wanda asking me what's up so we decided to meet n do a half day tour of the backwaters together in the afternoon...what we didn't understand is that we had to change boats half way through it - so, we actually ended up doing the tour twice!!! Jejeje,well, that's life...no worries - we had a great time and took loads of pictures and finally got into town at 7pm...
Coming up next: Beach resort between Aleppey and Kochi...
That second day I spent entirely on the beach - under an umbrella and mostly sleeping, absolutely exhausetd after the last week of sleeping buses and visiting places in the day...
Decided to leave the next morning - found a funky way to get up north, to Alleppey, via ferry through the backwaters all the way from Quilon (Kollum). So, I took a train in the morning to Quilon, only 35 minutes away and a rickie to the ferry...that turned out to be a little boat, on which I was supposed to spend 8 hours with 5 local guys and....no way - I turned around, got my money back and got onto another bus (!!!) to Aleppey where I had arranged to be picked up by Ravi's friend & taken to this beach bungalow...
But, when I got to Aleppey, i received a message from Wanda asking me what's up so we decided to meet n do a half day tour of the backwaters together in the afternoon...what we didn't understand is that we had to change boats half way through it - so, we actually ended up doing the tour twice!!! Jejeje,well, that's life...no worries - we had a great time and took loads of pictures and finally got into town at 7pm...
Coming up next: Beach resort between Aleppey and Kochi...
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