We finally left Varkala the next day and took the train and bus to get to Kumily. We didn't have any train tickets book which was a bit of a risk but we were pleasently surprised when we bought tickets at the train station, were told we could sit anywhere, and ended up having the whole carriage to ourselves! I didn't think that was even possible, but it was really nice. We spent some time wondering if we were supposed to be there, but the ticket inspector didn...

We have been in Varkala for 5 nights now... a little longer than we wanted to stay, but we have been doing absolutely nothing here, and are even more tired for it! We've been getting up late, and just going to the beach and eating which is great! We took a cooking class last night which was nowhere near as good as the other ones. The kitchen was a bit gross, the veg not fresh and the people teaching were less than enthusiastic because they'd already done about...

We arrived in Kollam after 2 hours on the bus, to discover that Kollam is worse than Allepey! We found a hotel (which had the hottest room we have had so far, and we had a powercut in the night making it unbearable! I had a shower in my pyjamas, hopeing that the wet clothes would cool me down - no, i was still as hot, but also uncomfortably wet, and my bed was soaked!) we didn't get much sleep that night! In the evening we booked our trip to the backwaters fo...

We got up the next morning and went for breakfast. All the restaurants in Kochin have terrible service, and it took an hour just to have toast and tea! We went to look for the bus to Allepey, and as usual, none of the locals knew anything. You ask for the bus to Allepey, and they point at a bus and say 'bus' but it's never going in the right direction! Eventually we discovered we were in the wrong place, and went to wait further down the road to where we woul...

We left Palolem on the night train to Kochin - not in as much style as the previous trains, as there were no AC class available, so we were in the sleeper class. We still had beds but there were no sheets, so we had to use sarongs and towels, and our bags for pillows! It wasn't too hot as the windows are always open and it was night time anyway. We had a surprisingly good sleep, and the noise of the train becomes comforting after a while! We arrived in Koch...