We stayed in the lovely holiday resort of Kovalam for one week, we had to stay an extra day due to a strike on all public transport, it was against the price of oil charges rising. Kovalam was nice and relaxing but i started to get a little bored in the evenings, most things closed at 11pm. It was a nice break though. Our resort was just back off the main street where the beach was set with a lovely red and white light house in beautiful scenery. As we left with our rucksacks, all the local people in the narrow streets that we had been passing every day saw us off with waves, smiles and wishing us happy travels, safe journeys and other similar things, the people hear are so nice and friendly as of everywhere else in India.

We headed North to a backpacking resort called Varkala. It was quite different to anywhere else we had been and i would like to visit again one day. The resort was based at the top of a cliff overlooking the sea and the beach was at the bottom of some steep steps which were littered garbage (quite a familiar sight now). The waves are huge in Kerella so we had lots of fun in the water. At the end of the beach there are some natural spring waters falling from the cliffs, it was so nice to stand under in the muggy heat of Varkala. Local people showered, washed their clothes and filled up their water bottles there. I learnt how to play back gammon here and tought the others how to play chess, got a bit competitive though expecially at drafts! The evenings were a lot of fun here, we didn't have to make our own fun for a change. The first night out we danced a lot, the bar was using everyon'es ipods and cd's so we danced to everything from prince, george michael, salsa, funky house and techno! The place we stayed in for the first wo nights was not great with lizards and small cockroaches so we moved on to a nicer place. Another night out saw us sitting in a bar with some very energetic Indian men getting the party going. Two Indian men were singing songs from Indian classics to Justin Timberlake 'sexy back'! One man pretended to play the guitar and a couple danced; one of the dancers looked like his influence was a cross between Michal Jackson's thriller and the famous ricky Gervais dance from the office (keep an eye out for the video i recorded). One of the dancers then went outside and did lots of fire eating and throwing. Loved it here and could have stayed longer but there were other places we wanted to reach before our long journey North to Nepal.

We headed North again to Allapey where we wanted to experience the backwaters. We caught a local train on the local seats, it was quite comfortable for the 4 hour journey. As soon as we stepped off the train we were invited to a view a guest house which we snapped up as it was just for the one night, however the cockroach in Varkala now seemed like a tiny baby one compared to what we saw here. The next day we caught our house boat, just the four of us shared this with a lovely old Indian man who steered (and let us steer once on a big lake), the manager who cooked all of our meals and another man in charge of the engine. It was a lovely day on the backwaters with great food and plenty of it, it was here that i experienced eating the Indian way; with only my right hand, it is quite an art but i got the hang of it soon enough. Annie and Emily braved a swim in the water but struggled to get back on the boat. We stopped to buy some local brew called toddy, it is coconut beer; it tasted like sweet, warm, flat beer, nice ay! The boat stopped over night and we had another issue with cockroaches, this time in our rooms, not much sleep i'm afraid. We left the boat in the mornning and headed east to the moutains.

We traveled on a local bus, again bumpy roads but better than the night bus. We had already booked accomodation which was very comfortable with warm water and a TV, we needed this after a few nights with not much sleep. We speant the first day strolling round a tea plantation just behind the hotel, it took a couple of hours and we got to see and hear lots off workers picking leaves and gossiping deep within the tea plantation. That night we walked up to a view point to watch the sun set and got hassled by a coach tour of men from a village near bombay. They were all very polite but amazed by us, we are quite used to the stares, smiles and head waggles but this was intense. They all wanted their picture with us as a group and then individuals, a politly declined the offer of an arm round my shoulder several times. They take the pictures home and tell their friends that we are their girlfriends apparently. The next morning we were up at half five am on a treck to see the sunrise up a huge mountain. It took us about 3 hours to reach the top. I have have never walked such a steep mountain before at such a pace, it was great exercise though and enjoyed looking back at it. We had breakfast at the top and rested before making our way down a very steep mountain. We did wonder if they had done their risk assessment! I'm sure we should had had harnesses for part of the treck.

We are heading back to Kochi and then taking a train up to Bombay. We then start our journy north east to Nepal stopping off at the Holy town of Varanesi on the ganges.