Varkala - Kerala, India

Time for some beach time!

From Monroe Island we happened across a friendly tuktuk driver (who was also an excellent salesman) who convinced us to let him take us via the scenic route to Varkala. It turned out to be a great call as he showed us temples, churches, beaches and colourful local fishing villages along the way.

The beaches were golden and unspoilt all the way down the coast and it was great to cut out the main towns, transport interchanges and busy main roads on a direct route to our next destination.

Varkala is a small town with a string of golden-sand beaches set up against a high cliff.

Perched right along the cliff edge is a narrow road of shops and restaurants. It’s a very pretty setting, and a lovely stroll along the street to browse the shops whilst simultaneously looking out to sea - and what a view! However it is certainly an accident waiting to happen with it being so precariously balanced on the edge! 

Apparently in the recent heavy rains and floods that Kerala experienced, there were a series of landslides and so the shops are even closer to the edge now than they were earlier in the year. Some shopkeepers even lost an area of their shop used to hang clothes outside.

The beach is the main attraction in Varkala and is popular with locals and tourists alike, especially as it’s tropical weather in Kerala in winter - compared to cold weather in the north of the country (and even snow in the mountains at this time of year).

The beach is also very popular with westerners so the dress code and modesty rules for ladies are a bit more relaxed and it’s ok to wear a bikini without a constant consideration of whether I should be covering up! To be fair, I am sure I should technically be covered up, as all the Indian ladies were swimming fully clothed (as we saw in Alleppey), but it’s a lot more relaxed here and I selfishly enjoyed having the chance to work on my tan for a few days!

The sea is safe for swimming and there are lifeguards on duty - though there are constantly big waves crashing into shore from across the Arabian Sea.

I couldn’t quite figure out what the lifeguards were up to, however, as at regular intervals, they would get up and blow their whistles, seemingly pointing at Indian men and telling them to get out of the sea, or move further down the beach. They weren’t telling tourists or families to get out of the sea, just the Indian guys and especially groups of lads! I should point out also that everyone was keeping themselves to themselves and it’s not like the groups of boys were being intimidating or a nuisance, so I’m not sure what the lifeguards were up to - or whether I have just got the wrong end of the stick and imagined this!

In any case it was lovely to be able to frolic in the waves and cool off in the sea.

Our hotel was away from the cliff area on an adjacent hill and we also had a sea view from our room. Breakfast was served on our own private balconies each morning - a very pleasant was to start the day. 

Most days fell into a similar rhythm, mainly involving sunbathing and reading on the beach, swimming and when we weren’t doing that, we were enjoying the local seafood (huge swordfish, barracuda or grouper on the grill), or a drink and enjoying the view. 

Happily, the alcohol rules are slightly more relaxed here and most restaurants serve alcoholic drinks, though whether they are doing this discreetly out of sight of the authorities I am not sure! It’s nice to enjoy a refreshing sundowner after a hard day on the beach in any case.

The town was lively in the run-up to Christmas, though still fairly quiet in terms of tourist numbers, as we have seen throughout our entire trip. 

There’s a tradition here for teenagers to dress up as Santa with red robes and masks and take to the streets with loud drums, dancing and wishing people a merry Christmas along the way. We must have seen five groups of Santas in one evening.

We decided to try one last Ayurvedic massage and, fortunately for me, I had a better experience than the previous time in Cochin. We were sold a 45 minute treatment, which confusingly went on for 90 minutes - for a princely sum of £10 each! This treatment was a deeper tissue massage than we had previously and involved massaging heated oil into the back and shoulders using herbal compresses. It was pretty good, though it sounded like they were heating the oil in a frying pan - and as I was lying face down I couldn’t see what the therapist was doing - so I was a little nervous they were about to scald me with boiling oil - but it was fine!

Whilst I was there, I also got my haircut for £2, which certainly beats having to pay the extortionate London prices!

From Varkaka it was homeward bound, flying from Trivandrum to Delhi, then from Delhi back to London. 

Fun fact about Trivandrum: the zoo there is the zoo that book ‘The Life of Pi’ was based on.

It was a chilly 11 degrees Celsius when we landed in Delhi, late in the evening on Christmas Day - good preparation for our imminent return to London! It makes you realise what a huge country India is, to experience such a broad range of temperatures.

So, now we’re back home to open our Christmas presents, try and squeeze in a Christmas dinner or two, and stock up on discounted mince pies before they leave supermarket shelves!

Happy new year, everyone!

Vang Vieng

Our journey from Luang Prabang turned out to be seven hours, rather than the four we were quoted! For a 268 km trip, that works out at an average speed of 38 km per hour, which describes perfectly how mountainous and bendy the roads for the entire journey. I later found out that there’s an old road and a new road. The new road is steeper and scales just one mountain, however, the old road scales three, so I guess we must have taken the old route! The overcrowded minibus that we took was pretty old, so perhaps the steep new road was more than it could have managed! It was, however, a very scenic journey – absolutely stunning mountains clad with dense jungle.

Vang Vieng is party central – full of western backpackers celebrating Christmas, but even more Koreans in town for a music festival, which just so happens to coincide with the Christmas holidays. There are so many bars, all with loud music blaring out and competing against each other, resulting in a total sound clash. It’s loud, brash and full of twenty-something-year-old backpackers. We did feel a little old and out of place at times, not being big into the dance or K-pop scenes, but the town had a good laid-back atmosphere and was good fun.

Vang Vieng riverside

Fortunately for us, we stayed just outside the centre, in a more peaceful area so we couldn’t hear the pumping music as we went off to sleep. We did, however, have to put up with a very confused rooster on the property next door, who only crowed between midnight and seven in the morning. I’m not sure why he slept all day and woke up in the middle of the night, but it made for a terrible night’s sleep! 

There’s quite a lot of nature in the area – lots of chickens, ducks, pigs and cows wandering around on the road, so we had to be careful when walking back to our accommodation at night – there were no street lights and I almost walked into a cow at one point! 

Vang Vieng is most famous for ‘tubing’ – floating down the Namsong river in a big inner tube and stopping at riverside bars along the way. As the river is quite fast-flowing in places, some of the bars throw you a rope, then reel you in. Others, you just paddle to the bank.

Tubing

The tubing scene has apparently calmed down quite a lot in recent years as it was getting too loud and people were getting too drunk and having accidents – but it’s still a must-do activity if you’re visiting Vang Vieng. We had a lot of fun and enjoyed taking in the mountain scenery as much as the occasional beer on the way downstream. We did avoid the ‘buckets’ of locally brewed ‘Lao Lao’ whisky, though I dare say they claimed a few casualties throughout the day!

Keeping on the theme of alcohol, every evening, our host, Nouth, would bring out one of four bottles of her mother’s home-brewed spirits and invite everyone in her restaurant to do a shot with her. It was pretty potent stuff – apparently made by fermenting sticky rice – and tasted a bit like homemade plum brandy. For added decoration, each bottle had a creature in it: the four we tried over the duration of our stay had a scorpion, a giant centipede, a snake and ants in them! Not terribly appetising, but also rude to refuse our host!

Can you spot the scorpion in the bottle?

Following our day of tubing on Christmas day, we booked in for a traditional Christmas dinner at the Irish Bar in the town. As much as we enjoy spending the odd Christmas in the sunshine, we always miss the big family dinner, so it was a real treat to have a proper roast with all the trimmings and to celebrate with other homesick westerners.

On our last day in town, we hired a scooter and visited two of the Blue Lagoons (there are three in the area) and Tham Phu Kham Cave. It was tough going on the scooter as most of the way was on unpaved dirt tracks, but worth the effort as the lagoons were beautiful, deep turquoise water pools, with platforms to jump off and a series of rope swings going into the water. I couldn’t resist doing a few acrobatics whilst I was there!

Somersault!

Kev's leap!

Tham Phu Kham Cave involved a climb up a steep cliff, which lead us into an enormous chamber. Inside the cave is a large Buddha shrine as you enter, then with a head torch you can descend further into another deeper, big chamber. I must admit we got a bit creeped out and we only had one torch between us, so we decided not to venture too far inside. Apparently, the cave goes in quite a long way and down to a maximum depth of five hundred metres, so we didn’t want to venture too far in, in case we got lost and couldn’t find out way back out!

Tham Phu Kham Cave

Next up, we’re back on the minibus and heading south to Laos’ capital city, Vientiane for a couple of days before we go back to Thailand in time for new year. I’ll write again soon!