Day 31, 32, 33 - Kovalam -Wednesday 16th, Thursday 17th and Friday 18th November 2011

Before we set off, we woke up and had breakfast back at the Indian Coffee House. Back to our rooms, we packed our backpacks ready for some beach life in Kovalam, I swear our backpacks are getting lighter and we must be leaving some stuff behind, but I think we are just finally getting used to them! We checked out at 12pm and half an hour later we arrived and began our walk along the beach and up the steepest hill in the world to the hotel. As with nearly all places so far, checkout is at 12pm which is the hottest part of the day, so when we are moving on and having to walk for some time its always when the sun is at it hottest! Our arms and faces are a nice brown colour yet the rest of our bodies are like Casper the ghost!! However, this should hopefully start to change now as we are heading to the beach for a month! It was baking hot when we arrived at our hotel, so we checked in and laid on the balcony until sunset. It was so nice and relaxing and for once there was no dogs, car horns, traffic noise or people trying to sell you something, just pure peace and quiet - it was lovely. With all this lying around, we were pretty tired! So we grabbed an early dinner downstairs at our mini guest house and shortly after headed for bed.

Next day, we had breakfast at a German bakery which was awesome, as it was right on the beach front. So we had our breakfast whilst watching some guys surfing. It all seem just perfect so we went straight back to the room to get our shorts and bikini - I did get some strange looks in the bikini but we're travelling so who cares!!! Literally the second our feet hit the sand, the sun went behind some clouds and didn't come out again for the rest of the day, just our luck! It was still really warm so we just stayed there, Soph read her book and I did some people watching… Whilst doing my people watching, I came to the conclusion that most people travel to see the world, some do it to party and some do it so they can get in touch with themselves - this obviously requires them to grow dreadlocks, big beards, have every part of their body pierced and wear necklaces make from shells and whilst looking for themselves, they get so lost that they can't remember why they started! (I joke of course!!). We next head for Varkala, where the Lonely Planet describes it as "A place that plays more Bob Marley music than you can poke a dreadlocked backpacker at!" So I best keep my jokes to a minimum!!

The rest of our time in Kovalam followed as before - lots of sleeping, eating and chilling out! Perfect.