Saturday, May 23, 2009
May 2009 Kerala Trip
The trip was to take a break from hectic work life and totally relax. We chose Kerala and it did not let us down in spite of being May summer! Kerala is a beauty. The route we took was
Bangalore - Erode - Coimbatore - Malampuzha - Palakkad - Guruvayoor - Thrissur - Adirapally - Cochin - Munnar - Erode - Bangalore
Visiting Marudamalai and Bharathiar University campus was soothing... All of us who went were from Bharathiar University. And yes we did spot a Peacock in the campus. When we went the boys hostel was empty. Lot of new buildings but the forest feeling is still there (thank god).
I had seen Palakkad fort before but did not recognize it. So worth the visit. The fort had some amazing huge very old mango trees. It is great to realize how old the trees around that fort are standing time. Malampuzha dam was not that pleasing as it was I visited it before. May be due to summer. The dam staff sounded as rude as the ones in Bangalore Lalbagh.
Guruvayoor was crowded. I did not have patience to go through the queue so just prayed from outside. Thrissur was on the way. Somehow we did not plan well to make it to the Vadakkunnathan temple. We saw it just from outside.
Adirapally falls was amazing. When my Dad took us to Kerala tour, this is something we had to give up in our agenda. So I insisted on this in this tour. Going down to the foot of the falls and climbing back was a mini trekking.
We headed to Cochin, stayed there for 3 nights. We booked KTDC tour package to see the backwaters, village life, etc. We had wonderfull Kerala food. The ayurvedic massage was just ok. The ELA restaurant on Marine Drive was good food for reasonable price. Very decent service.
The back waters of Cochin was the key part of our tour. The green, waters, birds and fishes were pleasing to our eyes. I did not concentrate much on my photography. In fact I did not even use my SLR or Tripod. Rather I was just adoring the beauty. But I must do better photography in upcoming tours. It is so good to see the pictures time and again and share with friends.
When we went to Munnar we just realized getting accomodation without reservation is tough. We just changed our mind, roamed a bit seeing the views and headed back to Erode. While crossing Kerala/TN border, the TN check post was collecting Rs 20 from every car. We could not understand what it was for so left without paying it.
Both onward and return we stayed whole day in Erode to spend time with family. Of course we had some good food and shopping in Erode. From Erode we returned to Bangalore.
This is first long trip for my Scorpio. It did excellent. The drive was 1750 KMs. Average mileage was 14.3 Kmpl. Next time I will try to capture average speed between destinations. Kerala roads were really good. The road sense i.e., lane discipline, proper honking, responding to honk was something I should mention. May be it is due to being a highly literate state. But they drive really fast even on narrow roads.
Please leave your comments and let me know what you think
Bangalore - Erode - Coimbatore - Malampuzha - Palakkad - Guruvayoor - Thrissur - Adirapally - Cochin - Munnar - Erode - Bangalore
Visiting Marudamalai and Bharathiar University campus was soothing... All of us who went were from Bharathiar University. And yes we did spot a Peacock in the campus. When we went the boys hostel was empty. Lot of new buildings but the forest feeling is still there (thank god).
I had seen Palakkad fort before but did not recognize it. So worth the visit. The fort had some amazing huge very old mango trees. It is great to realize how old the trees around that fort are standing time. Malampuzha dam was not that pleasing as it was I visited it before. May be due to summer. The dam staff sounded as rude as the ones in Bangalore Lalbagh.
Guruvayoor was crowded. I did not have patience to go through the queue so just prayed from outside. Thrissur was on the way. Somehow we did not plan well to make it to the Vadakkunnathan temple. We saw it just from outside.
Adirapally falls was amazing. When my Dad took us to Kerala tour, this is something we had to give up in our agenda. So I insisted on this in this tour. Going down to the foot of the falls and climbing back was a mini trekking.
We headed to Cochin, stayed there for 3 nights. We booked KTDC tour package to see the backwaters, village life, etc. We had wonderfull Kerala food. The ayurvedic massage was just ok. The ELA restaurant on Marine Drive was good food for reasonable price. Very decent service.
The back waters of Cochin was the key part of our tour. The green, waters, birds and fishes were pleasing to our eyes. I did not concentrate much on my photography. In fact I did not even use my SLR or Tripod. Rather I was just adoring the beauty. But I must do better photography in upcoming tours. It is so good to see the pictures time and again and share with friends.
When we went to Munnar we just realized getting accomodation without reservation is tough. We just changed our mind, roamed a bit seeing the views and headed back to Erode. While crossing Kerala/TN border, the TN check post was collecting Rs 20 from every car. We could not understand what it was for so left without paying it.
Both onward and return we stayed whole day in Erode to spend time with family. Of course we had some good food and shopping in Erode. From Erode we returned to Bangalore.
This is first long trip for my Scorpio. It did excellent. The drive was 1750 KMs. Average mileage was 14.3 Kmpl. Next time I will try to capture average speed between destinations. Kerala roads were really good. The road sense i.e., lane discipline, proper honking, responding to honk was something I should mention. May be it is due to being a highly literate state. But they drive really fast even on narrow roads.
Please leave your comments and let me know what you think
Labels: Kerala, Roadtrip, Travel
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