Arrived in Kumily near The Periyar Wildlife Sanctuary in the state Kerala. Since my last blog post a lot have happened...

In the evening on the 23rd I went to dine with Joeri, the dutch guy I met on the train heading towards Kochi, and at the restaurant a Swiss guy came to us and asked if we would like to join him and to koreans on a houseboat .....the day after (because of a tight schedule)! I really wanted to do the houseboat thing and the fact that the Swiss guy just came and approached in that way was really cool. However, I'd like to have one more day in Kochi.. Well, later on that night we decided to go with them and in the meantime two other persons joined us. Therefore we ended up meeting each other at 7am next morning and went by bus to Alleppey from where we found a huge houseboat for us 7 people (of 6 different nationalities, all single travellers). And this houseboat tour was amazing. The Backwaters are sooo beautiful and we had a really good time on the boat, which contained three bedrooms, three bathrooms, a diningroom, a firstfloor with sunbeds, a kitchen and three persons to do the cooking and sailing. All inclusive we ended up paying 1400 rupees each (arround 150 DKK) so that is actually a quite good price for this overnight journey with 3 meals and snacks and so.
The day after I went to a small village in the Backwaters to do a homestay, while the six others went to Varkala. The food was amazing at the homestay! So delicious. And lying in the hammock by the river was really relaxing :) The homestay was however more modern and more guesthouse-like than expected, but that is hard to avoid I think. It was a really nice family, though, so that was perfect.

On Monday I went back to Alleppey bus stand to go to Kumily where Periyar Wildlife Sanctuary is. The bus ride was terrible! The driver really drove badly - and then it started to rain... Crap! When I realized that the bus began to drive up a hill cold memories from Ooty appeared... However it isn't that cold here. But it is rainy which sucks. It doesn't rain all the day, though, but anyway I am looking forward to go towards Varkala beach :)
I have met two single women travellers, one from Austria and one from The Netherlands, whom I am spending time with here in Kumily. Today we visited a tea factory and tomorrow we are doing a fullday hike in the sanctuary.

On my way to Varkala I plan to do a stop at Amma's Ashram. It is really cheap and I am looking forward to do some yoga there and feel the atmosphere.

Hope you are good at home - I am very well here in lovely India :)