Recently I had a chance to visit Kerala - A place of Nature,s Paradise. I always like to travel &explore new places. Like me my Son Sarathi also has the same interest in travelling.so during his visit to India In January2011,he had included a short tour to Kerala as one of the programme in his agenda.He planned for a package tour through" Spice Holiday Tourism company" in Cochin.My Son Invited us to join with him for the tour. I & my husband , joined with my son Sarathi,my daughter-in-law Sangeetha with my grand son Madhav Ojas started our journey on 25th of Jan"2011 by Cochin Express&reached Ernakulam on the next day that wason 26th morning.There came The Spice holidays Tourism Company driver with Mahindra-Zylo car that was big enough to room 7 persons,to pick up us. we went to GeePalace Restaurant in Angamoly to pick up another couple Vasudha &Neeraj,friends of Sangeetha. we senior joined with the young couples and enjoyed ,the pleasures of the tour.
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| gorgeous Athirampilly Falls |
To arrange for a package Tour is not only convenient but also useful in many aspects.Besides being economical,no need to search for accommodation, transportation, the tourist spots,food courts,rest rooms& other conveniences as the tourist company arranges every thing to comply to our budget. Experienced driver knows each &every corner of the place we should visit and acts as a skilled guide also.So he halts at specific places to pacify our needs.So we could enjoy the entire tour without any problem.
we started our Package tour on wednesday 26th of Jan.from Angomoly city in Kerala,at 9o'clock to Adhirapilly Falls which forms in the high forest ranges in the Chalakudi river.we trekked down nearly one and of hours in the natural rocky path in the mountains to reach the Falls.Adhirampilly orAdhirampally Falls is located78 km from Kochin;locatedat the entrance to
Sholayar ranges. It is about 80 ft.high&located in the forest area. Athirampally Falls join the Chalakudi river after plummeting a drop of80 ft..
The charm & beauty of the Falls cannot be described in words. It is just wild and natural.The falls divide &falls from three places while it falls from the height of 80 ft.We can hear the roar,smoky force of the falls from far away distance. The foot of the falls cannot be reached easily as the big boulders are scattered on the way,hindering the easy approach.It,s appearance simply bewitching us. the young ones hopped & jumped ,reached near the falls &enjoyed its wild beauty in closure. Though i reached trekking down the foot of the Falls i could not go near to it as i told before, i could not climb over the big rocks.My husband was very safely sitting on a bench at the top station saying" You all go,i can watch the beauty of the Falls from here it self."we all laughed at him .. but one way it was good.if not he would have screamed in his leg &knee pain if he had followed us.
Soon after reaching the ground ,the Adhirampally Falls flows smoothly as a wide river ,in the shallow surface.it' beauty catches our eyes. If we want to feel , touch & enjoy the chillness of the water we have to walk Half -a - mile from the top. So we went there & spend some time &freshen ourselves returned to the Uphills by 12.30 pm. There we filled our stomach with some barottas ,ice creams& cool drinks in a small restaurant started our journey towards Guruvayur at 1.20 pm.
We reached Sopanam Heritage Hotel(resort) in Guruvayur at 3.30 pm. we freshen ourselves & went to Guruvayurappan Deavasthanam to worship the Lord. There was a big que & we waited nearly one hr.to reach the sanctom & we got a wonderful dharshan of the Lord.. We stayed there for that night.
Next morning that was on 27th of feb. we vacated the lodge & again we went to Angamoly ,from there we took the road to Munnar. we were very hungry at the time we reached the base of munnar ghats. Stoped at a hotel & had our lunch &proceeded to Munnar Hill top by ghat roads. It was a thrilling experience to travel on the hill path. we travelled over ups &downs, One way path that is one vehicle can pass at a time ,if any vehicle come in the opposite direction, definitely it will end in a chaos. We all prayed the God for the safety reach to the top station. It was pitch dark &there was no road light also ,but that experienced driver drove the carefully along the deep curves &pinpoint bends of hilly roads. On the way the driver stoped the car by a natural spice&herbal farm to view hundreds of spice&herbs plants &to know about those usages . They charge 100rs per head to enter in . A guide accompanied us introduced each plant & medicinal values, how it grows ,which part of it is used &for what purpose. . two of them attracted me. one is cardomom -it isa root node.the well grown nodes of the cardomom plants are plucked processed in steam &dried up in sun to become a good spice. Another one is black & white pepper. Before it become black ,at a stage the black peppers are plucked & rubbed inside thebig sacks to peel of their black covers &are dried in the machines to make them white . Then these are named as white peppers. Like these we got very useful &unknown informations about the spices& herbs. I saw natural sugarplant which can be useful &an alternate for sugar for the sugar patients. There is a shopping centre also ,selling pure products of the Farms. If we want we can buy but I felt it was expensive.After spending 2 hrs, we continued our journey to the up hills of Munnar & arrived at Munnar" Gateway Hotel"at 9.15. in the night. We had our dinner & hadgood sleep& rest till next morning.
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| In front of the Hotel GateWay-Munnar |
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| Sangeetha in the middle of the TeaGarden |
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| Ojas with his parents on the elephant |
Next morning that was on 28th 0f Jan. as usual we had our breakfast &left the Gateway Munnar at 11A.M.,got down the hills. On the way we had visited many interesting places first we went to Mettupatti dam, on the next curve we had visited a place called View point from there we could see the beautiful scenic views of Munnar Kannan Devan Tea estate valley, &after some distance we enjoyed the Echo Point,Binacular view point of the valleies. Elephant riding is very famous next to boating in the lakes. They all including the little kid Ojas went for elephant riding. Ojas enjoyed &screamed at seeing that big tusker. In the evening we returned to Hotel Green Ridge. Sarathi, Sangeetha,Vasudha&Neeraj went to Massage centre to have oil massage while we relaxed in the hotel.
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| beautiful view of Vembanadu lake |
We vacated Hotel Green Ridge &. . proceeded to Allepy on 29 thof Jan 2011 to stayin the boat house &to have fun of boat riding .There are many ,long&big lakes in kerala like Kashmir where big & luxury boats are involved for transportation &tourists enjoyment. There are single family boats to 4 bedroom boats with AC with all facilities are available according to our needs&means. Food veg or non veg . are also available. The people who like sea foods can enjoy by getting the fresh ones &to have cooked them in front of them instantly. We hired a three bedroom luxury boat &rode on the Vembanad Lake. At one side backwaters of the sea,&two small rivers come & join in this lake & making it a big river. we had good vegitarian food in the afternoon& went to the first floor of the Boathouse to enjoy the beautiful views of that big lake&greeneries on the both sides of the lake extended with a vast Paddy cultivated land &Coconuts,mangoes&goua trees on the other side. Here the Paddy fields are below the see level & so this place is called Kutta nadu. It is said this is the only place in Asia where paddy is grown in the fields .below the sea level.
We enjoyed the nature at its best there,had our dinner & stayed &took rest in the Boat House
in the night.Isaw market boats, garbage clearing boats like that they use these boats for multipurpose functions of the daily routines. I liked this Boat house trip very much on the whole.
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| relaxing inside the boat |
We woke up in the next morning&prepared ourselves to check out the boat sharply at 9.30 A.M. we departed Allepy ,travelled allthe way to Ernakulam city. There are many tou rist attractions& like Dutch palace. Shopping centres etc. Dutch palace is a museum ,housing many life size photos of Rajas of travandrum. and their cultural &historical values &displays. We had purchased some Kerala style mementos&Sarees
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| wonderful view of Sunrise from the boat in the lake in Allepy |
Then we proceeded to kochin.Airport &dropped Vasudha& Neeraj from there they took leave of us to Delhi. Then we returned back to Ernakulam to visit Chottanikara Bhaghavathi Temple. We went in to the temple & got a good dharshan and reached Ernakulam railway station at 7 p.m ..Caught the Chennai Express Train at 9.45p.m of 30-1-'11 & arrived chennai central at 10 o'clock in the morning of31st of Jan'11,Kerala trip with my son &others was a wonderful trip that i will never forget in my life.
