Day 31 - Backwaters

The 90-minute drive from Kochi to Alleppey was another step in my adaptation to Indian driving. Under the instructions of our Indian co-pilot (who only got us lost a handful of times) I learned that I “have to honk the horn” and “trust the motorcycle will avoid you”. The answer to the simple question of “what if they don’t?” seemed as irrelevant as my use of indicators, which resulted in a mocking “ha, you’re indicating, so cute!”. Maybe that is why these are on the wrong side of the steering wheel.

Alleppey is all about the backwaters, a series of canals that engulfs four islands and creates an incredibly serene and idyllic setting. As with the delta of the river Tigre near Buenos Aires, which I was lucky to visit a few years back, it is obvious that quite a few people still live along these canals and use them to get around. Despite being decidedly more touristy than the Tigre delta, with hundreds of houseboats travelling or parked along the main canals, there were still a few peaceful strips and there were many smaller paths left unexplored by our Shikara.

All in all, this was mainly an enjoyable relaxing experience, sometimes interrupted by a house boat filled with families or just friends playing “Despacito” out load or, in a stark contrast, glimpses of what the actual life in the backwaters is like - kids playing around in canoes (occasionally overtaking our engine-powered vessel), grown-ups taking their cow for a walk or old ladies washing their clothes on the canal waters. While very aware that we were probably mainly taken through the tourist route along the backwaters, it was still an interesting and certainly very chilled-out couple of hours. The initially strange story told by the owner of the guest house we stayed in, whereby a writer had stayed in a houseboat for a month and a half looking for peace and quiet, did sound quite a bit more plausible after this trip.

Tomorrow the plan is to drive to Munnar, check it out and then drive to Thekkady. Eight hours of driving through the mountains may be a slightly scary prospect, but I am sure my steep learning curve on Indian driving has prepared me for it. At least that is what I am telling myself.

Cheers,
João

P.S. - Apologies for the delay in publishing this post, but my laptop decided to scare the life out of me as I was writing my valediction by switching itself off and refusing to power up again. After a number of resets and twenty-four hours convinced that it was lost forever, it resurrected itself after one last desperate reset. I now have some photo editing to catch up on, but hopefully I will be back on track soon!