Lake Palace - Thk Hotel Thekkady

... morning to the before dawn prayer that lasts 15 minutes). I go see the local caves, which turn out to be overpriced and super crowded, much to my dismay (after climbing a mountain for an hour), so I return and try to go to the Wayanard Reservation (again overpriced). I arrive only to see it's also super crowded, so again I did not enter and after talking to the warden, he advises me to come at 6:30.

The ...

... in a taxi only and I get whisked off to the Beach Hotel due to the lack of selection. The hotel turns out to be quite beautiful, and I get a room on the second floor with a separate room facing the Arabian sea filled with windows. Hardly believing my luck, I quickly put my things away and run down to the beach to watch the sunset. The beach is full of Indians, and there is a loudspeaker booming with some man speaking who knows what. As I watch the sunset, I reflect ...

... is much better to drive. When the time struck around 5.30pm we were still driving and don’t know how many kilometers to sholiyar damn. Finally a road walker confirmed that it will take another ½ hr drive and no guarantee we can see water as the mist was moving very heavily and sunlight has already down for the day. We decided to give up, since we have to travel the same route and it is too complicated and afraid how we gonna cross those difficult bridges. I am not ...

I don't have much time but Thekkady is the bomb with a capital B. I've been on a 1.5 week tour of south India and have made many stops in Tamil Nadu and am now in Kerala. We are in a hill station which means cooler weather, less people, and higher prices (relatively speaking). All in all, a Indian paradise of sorts. Today I rode an ...

The drive up the South Western Ghats felt like it was out of an Indian Jones movie. The scene is prefaced by the little transitional scene of the little airplane moving across the map with the infamous red line from point A to point B and then jump cut to the epic jungle scenery of the mountains of Kerala. I have never in my life witnessed such ...

... and discovered it was quite hard to explain the point of such a speculative trip to Cameron who is more used to 'spotting' his wild animals in London Zoo - and even harder to justify travelling for two hours on a boat that just ends up back in the same place. Eventually he entered into the spirit of the endeavour, took a few good photos, and was even the first person on the boat to spot a turtle. At one point, someone on our boat seemed to have seen an elephant, causing a ...

... birthday, and she cut me off from darshan. I at least did prasad seva and touched her had as she left. Just another chop at my ego-me me me-right? It's not as if she never sleeps, barley eats and sacrifices every bit of her time for selfless service for the devotees and poor. Man, why does she deserve a break? HA! Anyway, we went on a field trip to a town in Kollum about two hours away yesterday and they were celebrating a great saint of Kerala who died a couple of hundred ...

... Lake in search of wild life on the banks. Sadly, we did not see Elephants or Tigers, but plenty of Deer, Bison, Boar and beautiful birds were spotted in the distance. We then spent a day exploring plantations, taking in a visit to an amazing spice plantation to see and learn about the many varieties of spices grown in this area. Incredibly inspiring to grow a tropical garden in the future! The Tea factory was a highlight, from leaf on the tea plant to sacks of tea we wandered ...

... materials. Most of these homes were completely devastated. Many of those that were made of stronger materials, such as cement or stone, were not totally destroyed-but very badly damaged (ex: roofs removed, half of home destroyed/opened up). At first I felt a bit intrusive, especially when people began to take pictures. I tried to ask some of the adults (in the best way I could due to the language barrier) if I could photograph them, and they let me. The first time I took a picture with ...

... out Chelsea had beaten United and were top, hoorah), we went next door for dinner at Spice Village, the resort we were mistakenly taken to before. We asked the receptionist about dinner and it was an all-you-can-eat-buffet-fest for 500 rupees per head. All-you-can-eat is one of my very favourite sayings. "Let the cat see the mouse" I beamed. The restaurant was very busy and decked out in a Safari theme. Apparently this place is well promoted in France and Italy and it showed ...