Busing + boating Kerala's backwaters

Travelling from Kumily to Kochi

India. Days start at tea stalls and train stations with small sips of scalding-hot chai. Afternoons are punctuated with stops for cardamom-spiked mango lassi, young coconut juice and the curious Kannur cocktail – a sweet-tart papaya smoothie studded with pomegranate seeds, cashews and tooth-sticking halva. At dinner, water is poured into metal tumblers from metal jugs and uneaten condiments are returned to a communal pot. Conversation stops as fingers travel around stainless steel trays, moulding mouthfuls of spiced rice…

I’m writing about a recent trip to India over four instalments. Read the first part, which covers the Nilgiri Mountain Railway, the second part, that’s all about Madurai and wildlife spotting in the Western Ghats, or start here…

Kumily to Kumarakom, changing at Kottayam

We’re sitting up front for the first leg, watching a driver with immaculate hair charm the women squished on the bench alongside his cabin. A comb is tucked into his top pocket, and with every hairpin bend, near miss and game of chicken, he glances over to check they’ve seen his steering skills. One hand confidently wrestles the wheel, the other reaches for the small lever that sounds the horn, his fingers tapping out an ear-splintering Morse code message: yield to me. We stop and start, pick up and set down, and with every new passenger, he starts a conversation. This means he tackles some of the steepest sections of the downhill route while looking to his left.

The bus conductor moves up and down the aisle, banknotes carefully folded between each finger, a colourful fan of different denominations. He shows us his Instagram, the grid populated with pictures of Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation’s fleet of tan-and-red buses and their brown-uniformed drivers. Aside from the windscreen, marbled with cracks, there’s no glass in the windows, just metal shutters concertinaed as high as they’ll go. A man directs traffic at a roundabout, elevated on a concrete plinth, holding a battered stop sign like a shield. We switch to a smaller bus in Kottayam, the rearview mirror revealing a sea of pressed-together bodies behind us, swaying in unison, hands reaching to hold on, bracing for every bend.

Having checked into Kumarakom Wood Castle – an austere-looking but welcoming family-run guesthouse – we head for a late lunch. Spicy prawn fry, whole kingfish charred over coals and metal plates piled with crunchy anchovies – “small fish”, says the waiter, gesturing to the tip of his little finger. In the heat of Tharavadu’s portacabin, condensation collects on our fridge-cool clay jar of fresh toddy (fermented coconut juice). We could have opted for the air-conditioned dining room, but decided to sweat it out under the slowly rotating ceiling fan. A faded sign tells diners that the toddy is non-retrievable, but we’re keen for more, and we take an Uber to Thengumthoppu-Keerikkuzhi Toddy Parlour that evening, where we sit at a plastic table under a mini metal bandstand, jumping each time a coconut crashes on the tin roof.

Before dinner, we’d cycle a circular route along the backwaters – crossing bridges, overtaking school kids, passing rice paddies. We stop for tea at a newly opened cafe, and while we’re sitting there, a houseboat pulls over to buy refreshments for the French family onboard. At dusk, we skirt the edge of Coconut Lagoon – a resort so smart, the guard demands we cycle down a muddy little path on the other side of a metal fence rather than risk one wheel touching its manicured lawns.

We follow the same route early the next morning, this time by vallam, a small boat made by binding together wood with coconut fibre coir rope. Kingfishers perched on electrical cables flash lapis lazuli as they plunge into the water; fuchsia-pink lotus blossoms float on its surface. We see tiny bee-eaters and cormorants opening their wings to welcome the day. The sun climbs above the leaning palms and the mist lifts on ducks splashing amid a carpet of lilac water hyacinth.

A few hours later, after breakfast back at the castle, we’re on another boat – the government ferry that, when it finally arrives, takes us from Kumarakom’s sleepy jetty to Muhamma Junction. As we glide across the water, bags leaned against the life belts stacked in one corner, the guy next to me finishes his peanuts and drops the empty plastic bag out the open window. He disembarks on his Royal Enfield motorbike; we take a bumpy tuk-tuk ride to the far end of Marari Beach.

Was Marari a mistake?

For us, probably yes. But that doesn’t mean it has to be for others. Perhaps we didn’t nail the location, perhaps we should have spent more on accommodation, perhaps we weren’t realistic about what we wanted from our time by the beach. But no regrets. Our homestay – Marari Xavier’s Inn – was comfortable. We ate the most delicious dinner there and drank toddy poured from an old two-litre water bottle.

That afternoon, we walked along the sand in the blistering sun and climbed over concrete tetrapods for a few hours before realising the beach shacks and fruit shakes and sun loungers we’d hoped for weren’t going to mirage themselves into existence. That evening, we dragged plastic chairs from the carport-dining room to the water’s edge, stared up at the sickle-shaped moon and listened to the waves.

Breakfast – kala chana chaat (black chickpea stew) – was also delicious, but we’d already decided to keep moving. The owner called for a tuk-tuk to Alleppy train station, but failing to find anyone free, he took us in his car for the same price. Crossing the train tracks, we walk under an in-progress overpass to a juice stand for a couple of sweet-salty fresh lime and sodas.

When we board, there’s a woman asleep in my seat, so I find a spot in the opposite compartment. The conductor checks my ticket, eyes flicking to the number above my head, then to my assigned seat. She shrugs and moves on. The journey has only just started. The 16332 departed Thiruvananthapuram Central a few hours earlier and will cover almost 2,000km before arriving in Mumbai two days later. For now, everything’s orderly. Just-pressed, Indian Railways-stamped bed sheets are stacked at the entrance to each carriage. Foil trays of biryani, cardboard lids damp with steam, are packed in a large plastic box that’s hoisted onto a man’s head, his call mingling with that of the chaiwalla who follows in his wake, carrying a thermos and a bucket of clinking glasses.

Marvellous Mattancherry
Crushing on Kochi’s faded grandeur

For all of India’s chaos, paperwork is highly prized. There’s lots of meticulous record-keeping. Our passports are photocopied when we check into Walton’s Homestay in Kochi, but we still have to fill out forms requesting the same information and wait for the owner to enter our details into a huge ledger. He asks our professions, adding this information in pencil beneath our names. Earlier, at Ernakulam Junction, we could only book onward transport once we’d queued, had a harried conversation through a plastic screen, collected a form, filled in the details we’d just discussed and queued again. We hand over our money and the form is added to a growing pile at the cashier’s elbow, presumably to be filed away in one of the boxes lining the walls. Some people manage to buy tickets from a machine, but only the station guard is allowed to press the buttons. I don’t know who makes the rules, but they’re everywhere. Lengthy terms and conditions and cancellation policies loom large above the ticket desk; a sign says a complaints book is available at the station master’s office. Words of encouragement are painted along the platform: ‘Play your part to be clean’; ‘We can all make a difference to the journey’. Part public service announcement, part motivational poster.

On the surface, Kochi is what I call a time-off town. Everywhere I’ve travelled has a place where everyone, no matter how they travel and for how long, passes through. They’re the gateway to somewhere spectacular (Cusco, Siem Reap) or simply a pretty place to spend a few days (San Miguel de Allende, Luang Prabang). Catering to all these tourists turns them into slightly sanitised versions of the country they’re in. Everything’s a little bit easier. There’s less hustle and hassle, but everything looks kind of homogeneous – coffee shops and cocktail bars have that made-for-Instagram aesthetic, which makes it impossible to differentiate one destination from another. I always feel conflicted when I arrive somewhere like this because, as much as I appreciate a decent latte and an afternoon’s shopping, I’m not here to replicate the rhythms and routines of life back home. Of course, providing local people with employment and somewhere to sell their crafts is a good thing, but those same people are being priced out of their homes and their culture flattened and packaged in the service of our insatiable appetites. There’s more to be said on this, but I’m not eloquent enough.

As for Kochi, we’re shown to our room and given a photocopied hand-drawn map of the area around the fort, a handful of streets sandwiched between River Road and KB Jacob Road. We’re told where we can order French toast and where to stand for a tuk-tuk. We don’t need this kind of hand-holding, but I appreciate some might. Just as some might not stray too far from the perceived safety of a tourist enclave. But please remember, once you’ve bought your handloom linen shirt, seen the Chinese fishing nets and snapped some street art, there’s lots more to be discovered.

To do this, we hire a scooter and spend a happy day following the curving coastal route across Thoppumpady Bridge, the harbour’s cranes and shipping containers always in view, towering over fleets of wooden fishing boats. The city’s infrastructure is being overhauled – the Kochi Water Metro promises a 78km network of 15 routes with electric hybrid ferries connecting 10 islands. Defunct wooden jetties left in the wake of the upgrade are home to sleeping street dogs and fishermen seeking sanctuary from the afternoon sun. It’s still a work in progress, though, because when we arrive at the smart High Court terminal, the only service running is to Vypin, so we make the crossing and drive north towards Cherai Beach.

A single lane of cracked bitumen takes us through fields, over waterways, past tumble-down shelters. We stop at a cluster of fishing nets (not a tourist in sight) being lowered and raised by hand or by lawnmower engine. We order sweet-salty fruit juices and watch a group of women gaze out to sea, red-orange saris fluttering in the breeze. Further along the sand, a wife wearing a burqa bends down to collect her husband’s shrugged-off sandals, holding them in her gloved hand as he marches ahead. A black shadow to his breeze-rippled white shalwar kameez.

Rather than head back to the fort area, we spend the afternoon in Ernakulam, soaking up the serenity of Subhash Park before exploring its two markets – a bright multi-storey building and the rows of squat stalls it replaces. The bright corridors of the new site are all bustle and business, but the men unloading sacks of onions – balancing on them on their heads with the help of deflated footballs – have time to stop for a photo. At the old site, we peer into produce-splattered partitions at abandoned tables and butcher’s blocks, a 2024 calendar still on the wall.

And then there’s Mattancherry, a crumbling reminder of the port city’s once central position on the global spice trade. A far cry from Singapore’s shophouses, which are preserved to the point of Disney-fication, the buildings lining the roads radiating from the spice bazaar are all peeling paint and sun-bleached signs. The neighbourhood is the definition of faded grandeur. I love an exterior that’s past its prime (perhaps I can identify), but I wonder what will become of these relics. We passed family homes and administrative buildings in the process of being cleared out, their contents piled alongside wooden shutters and coloured window panes leaning outside.

Further on, the Church of Our Lady of Life’s forecourt doubles as a driving test site. As we gaze up at the bright white structure, palm trees mirroring its curved roof, a woman on a motorbike slowly weaves between metal poles stuck in the ground – most pointing upright, some veering to the side. A car reverses into a bay marked by fluttering orange fabric. More vehicles await at the end of the day – a fleet of Kerala’s beautiful hand-painted trucks parked in a grungy layby before Thoppumpady Bridge. Not where I expected to spend the final hours of daylight, but that’s Kochi – plenty to see, if you’re willing to go off map.