Last night I stayed in a really wacky hotel right at the top of Ooty. Everyone thought it was a 1930s hotel because of the style but in fact it s only 16 years old and owned by a Bollywood film star. It has a huge picture of Napoleon on the wall and has an enormous atrium as you enter. It also has a discotheque downstairs called 'Midnight Cowboy' which six of us discovered later in the evening. There were only three Indian guests but the DJ was playing all sorts ...

I took the early morning train at 7.10 from Mettalayum to Udagamandalam but this is no ordinary train - it is the world famous toy train to Ooty. There are three narrow gauge trains to Indian hill stations in Darjeeling, Shimla and Ooty and they are fabulous! The British built the line in 1897 as they moved their summer capital for South India from Chennai on the 'plains' to Ooty in the Nilgiri Hills. The first three hour part of the journey sees us being 'pushed...

Today has been a gentle day. A three hour train journey has brought us to Mettalayum which is the rail junction for tomorrow's toy train journey up to 'Ooty' in the Nilgiri hills. It is pretty hot here but tomorrow should take us up the relative cool air of the former British hill station.

At midday, I hired a rickshaw driver for a couple of hours who took me around all the sights of Fort Kochi. We passed many churches and temples, old colonial houses and streets. Two particular places of interest were the local laundry where all the washing is done by hand, including my own today! It is then hung out to dry in the warm sun and finally ironed using old heavy implements. The other place I enjoyed seeing was the spice market still using the same buil...

Last night was spent at a home stay along the banks of the river. We had an enjoyable evening eating home made food, having a beer and good conversation around the dinner table. Christianity is popular in this part of Kerala and, as it is Sunday, large numbers of people are gathering at the churches which we pass. The other big feature is the huge display of Communist Party banners and posters featuring pictures of Mao,Stalin,Lenin, Marx plus the local Indian lea...