Our train pulled into Kochin station at around midday on Thursday 4 October. It was boiling hot and we were sweating buckets by the time we had walked along the railway tracks to the local bus station. We grabbed some food before hopping onto a really dodgy-looking the bus to the former hill-station town of Munnar. The bus journey was quite wild with the driver racing up to cars in front of us and then slamming on the brakes while hooting loudly, or flooring it as crossing pedestrians jumped out of the way. That together with awful pothole-filled roads and some skinny roads weaving around the very steep drops made for quite a hairy 5 hour journey!

Fortunately we survived and were rewarded with some amazing scenery and a beautiful sunset just as we pulled into town. We found a place to stay on the edge of town with a good view of the tea plantations and, after a quick bucket shower, headed off to find some dinner. On our way back we stopped to re-stock on water and found that the shop sold homemade chocolate! This was the first chocolate we had come across in the whole of India so, naturally, we felt obliged to try it out :)

Friday we managed to arrange to stay in a cottage a bit further out of town. So we checked out of our room and used the afternoon to visit the Tea Museum which was actually cooler than it sounds. They showed a short video which explains the history of the tea plantations in Munnar, from when the British planted the first tea plants to how the company came to be mostly owned by the workers today - quite interesting history. We were then shown around the factory and got to see the process that the fresh tea leaves go through to get turned into the tea leaves we buy in the shops. After some tea tasting and a quick lunch at the bakery, we took a leisurely stroll back to town stopping to buy some tea and some delicious home-made brownies & cookies. Oh, and some more chocolate! :)

We were able to hitch a free ride through to the cottage in an open jeep, which was pretty cool as we could see the plantations up close as we weaved our way down the steep, narrow road. The driver's friend pointed out bushes that had been planted over a hundred years ago. Our driver decided to save some fuel by cutting the engine and free-wheeling down the hills, which meant that we were going slow enough to take a few photos - never a dull moment in India. We arrived at the cottage to find that we were the only guests that night so, after settling in and enjoying a cup of coffee and some of our cookie stash on our balcony, we joined the manager guy inside the main house where he had cooked up a huge, delicous meal. Once we had stuffed ourselves, Monique headed straight off to bed while Kevin hung around to watch a bit of TV - a pretty bad Nicholas Cage movie, but hey - at least it was in English.

Saturday we decided to go for a walk to explore the countryside. We didn't have a map or a clue where we were going, so just wandered up along the road, past some spice plantations and through villages with lots of curious children waving and greeting us. We got back to the cottage in the heat of the afternoon, just in time to miss the cooling late-afternoon downpour. Later, three more guests arrived (an American artist and two German doctors on internships,) and we spent the rest of the afternoon chatting on the balcony watching the sun go down. That night over dinner the two of us explained the rules of cricket to them while watching highlights of the T20 world cup - I never realised how confusing cricket can actually be! They all seemed to get it in the end though :-)

Sunday was our last day so we were up early to pack. After a quick breakfast we said our goodbyes to everyone and caught a ride up the hill to the nearest bus stop, where we waited to catch the daily local bus down to the sea-side town of Varkala.