2011 India, Aleppy, Backwater houseboat

On the train from Trivandrum, luckily Sankar spotted Aleppy station for us because the signs are very small on the station. 
Despite it being a reasonably large town it's a small staion and we quickly got an autorickshaw to out hotel 'The Palm'. This autorickshaw was a bit new, I hadn't seen those before and the're slightly bigger which was good.



The hotel turned out to almost brand new and very nice.
I didn't like the guy who received us much initially, he was one of those people that always seem too serious, but he seemed to lighten up with girls influence and seemed ok in the end.

We booked an overnight trip on a houseboat for the next day ( 5000 Rp) including food, and then went down the road for a very cheap and nice local meal( about 300 Rp and we were all full). One of the guys from where we were staying took me on his motorbike to see the houseboat and I was really impressed. It was one of the smaller ones of the dozens parked there, but they are so nicely done with the whole canopy made of woven bamboo, and part of it was like an open veranda with tables and chairs and 'laughing mats', and then a single bedroom with a double bed and bathroom with shower.

The next morning we set sail with the two crew at a very sedated pace of about 4 mph. Apparently there is around 500+ km of these backwater channels that connect some lakes with the sea many miles to the north at Kochin. We whiled away the day with a few beers and food cooked bu one of the crew which included fish and rice and vegetables. 
At one point we stopped and bought some extra fish, prawns and some other fish for the evening meal.



We had to abort a stop at one of the Ayruvedic massage centres due to massive overcrowding of houseboats.
It was unbelievable just how many these houseboats ply these channels.
Every direction you look you can see an endless procession of them in various shapes and sized. Some are enormous, probably over 100 feet. Ours was probably more like 40 feet.
As the evening drew in we could see people who live in little settlements along the water's edge taking care of their washing and bathing, and as darkness approached the crowded parked the boat against the bank and then cooked up the prawns and fish we'd bought.

Afterwards we got the girls to sleep and had a few more beers before retiring ourselves.

The crew were clearly pleased because that allowed them to finally doss down in the outside seating area. We'd spoken to these guys and it turned out the earn about 4000 Rp per month, not a lot when we'd paid 5K just for a night.
We gave them 500 Rp tip each at the end of the trip, but still We felt a bit mean. 



It was very peaceful night with just the odd bird call and the sound of the water lapping the hull. I woke quite early and wandered along a trek to spot birds and saq some with bright yellow plumage and some with these very long tail feathers that across at the end.
After breakfast we spent the day chugging our way back to where we started taking a slightly different set of channels.

We said our goodbyes to the crew and caught an autorickshaw back to the bus station in town. Eventually worked out where to get the bus to Kochin which is about 1 1/2 hrs further north. Somehow the bus turned up chocker full despite just coming out at the depot, so we had a crush and push to get on, fortunately a young English couple let us on first.





We ended up standing in the aisle with our backpacks as the bus lurched its way from one stop to another. A very heated exchange between the ticket collector and a man who wanted to get on despite there being on space seemed to hold us up for about 10 minutes.
Throughout the journey the ticket guy traversed the length of the bus having to literally clamber over people, luggage, etc.
Eventually we did get seats near the end of the trip but still had to shuffle around as people got on and off. Makes rush hour tuke in London look tame!