Up and out early! We thanked Bashan and set off into the early morning madness (you have to be careful not to get hit with banana leaf brooms and stay out of the firing line of people's spit). We said our goodbyes to the Australian family the night before as they were leaving a little later. One five hour bus costing around £1 each was the cheapest option, we had front seats and two tickets to watch our potential demise. Heading east through Kerala, up into the Ghats the scenery was unbelievable, post card worthy views of mountains, tea, coffee and banana plantations, however the roads were narrow and full of severe bends, the driver not taking this into consideration was driving like a maniac! Hardly sounding the horn and speeding round the corners we had so many near misses, he drove like big Will at the end of the original Italian job!
We survived the five hour roller coaster ride thankful for our lives, and found our homestay (it was a large room and cheap for the location) with ease which made a change! It felt like quite a peaceful town (named Kumily, very close to the national park),
we pretty much were left alone, it was obviously busy but without the usual chaos! With everything we needed on our doorstep, a fairly large room with intermittent Wifi and quite a few activities to do, we booked five nights by the luscious forests of Periyar! After reading through some leaflets and a little chat with the owner of our room, we put together a little plan of action, first thing on the agenda was a place called Elephant Junction. There were a lot of options like elephant bathing, log pulling and extended rides however we opted for the bog standard thirty minute ride. Whilst waiting around we saw at least five elephants strolling around, they're surprisingly light footed for their size and weight! From the raised platform we swung our legs over and in the exaggerated straddle position we set off. Swaying slowly from left to right, it was uncomfortable but pretty amazing at the same time, it's hard not to be in awe of these incredible creatures, for once we actually got what we paid for, we got a full thirty minutes! The ride through the forest trail (it was fun bobbing and weaving through the trees) was a relaxing one despite the uncomfortable siting position! Kirsty was utterly besotted and overwhelmed by the experience, she loved stroking the wirey beard type hairs on the elephants head and repeatedly commenting on how baby soft the ears were! Because of how well disciplined, intelligent and gentle the elephants were, we read up on how they're trained, apparently they're hooked by the ears and chained at the ankles, the elephants seemed happy, but we couldn't help feeling guilty after, and it'll probably be our first and last ride!
Bamboo rafting and hike
The magic leaflet also advertised bamboo rafting and hiking in the national park, it was around £24 each however it was a full day trip with breakfast and lunch included! The rendezvous time was 8am but in the typical Indian fashion we started walking around 9, there was about twenty people in our group in including three park rangers and a rifleman! The cloudy morning cleared up and the sun was strong early on (it was less humid here but just as hot!), after about half an hour the rangers told everyone to keep the noise down and look over to an area of high grass, tension was building as nothing appeared for about three minutes, then a little family of elephants (mum, dad and baby) eased there way out of the trees, they were around two hundred metres away but you could see them clearly!
A great start to the day made even better as we stopped shortly after for breakfast! It was incredible to see these giant souls in their natural habitat, walking around without a care in the world. Periyar National Park is home to around four thousand elephants, twenty eight tigers, thousands of bison, monkeys, snakes, mongooses and pretty much anything else you can think of, the total area of the park is almost a thousand square kilometres, most of it is off limits (there are tribes deep in the wilderness) with only twenty six square kilometres open to visitors!
After breakfast the hike continued, we were shown many different plants, trees and tiger markings, with our guide having a low husky voice and everyone crowded around it was hard to see and hear what he was saying, the deep lacerations on the tree however were easy to see and made you realise how huge and powerful tigers are, unfortunately unless they're extremely famished the tigers don't come out in the day, because of the huge numbers of bison (they've been known to kill tigers)! After a while we approached the lake (little did we know it was man made) and boarded the flimsy looking but strong bamboo rafts! The men were given oars and off we paddled, other then the disturbance caused by the rafts, the lake was like a mirror, unbelievably still. The dead trees rising above the water looked looked like something post apocalyptic and gave the calming afternoon row an eery feel.
After the morning and early afternoon events and exercise, the rafts were tied up and we had almost two hours by the lake for lunch. You could hear a pin drop it was so quiet! We ate, had a walk around then a quick dip to cool off before clambering back in the rafts to get back. We paddled back rather lazily on bloated stomachs and relaxed muscles. The boats were tied up at the starting point and we began the walk back. It was early evening and the heat of the day subsided, so the route back we saw lots of bison and a black tailed mongoose! The bison were in a group of about sixty, we didn't realise how large and agile they are, no wonder the Tigers stay away from them! Seeing the mongoose was interesting they move like foxes but have long black tail with a face to match! We had been lucky to see the animals we did, the ranger said sometimes on these trips people don't see anything because of the heat!
That same leaflet mentioned a traditional South Indian martial arts demonstration, they say it dates back centuries! It was cheap to get in and because of this there wasn't an empty seat! In one corner of the dojo, lots of candles were lit, and along the back wall were various
weapons from flexible swords and shields to wooden sticks and rope! You could feel every everyone getting restless with the traditional music slowing building and becoming faster, then, all of a sudden two men came running out with a sword and shield each and started fighting! It was an explosive start, the sounds of the swords hitting the shields was deafening and sparks flew every time their weapons scraped the floor (you can understand why battles at the Coliseum were popular, even this action was gripping to watch)! It was like Achilles vs Hector in Troy, in the end one man was forced to surrender after a lot of shouting! The show lasted for around an hour and various things were demonstrated, from spear vs rope to hand to hand combat, all was impressive (apart from some of the fights which seemed to have half hearted attacks), we think the most talented act was the body control, one man was contorting and holding all kinds of back breaking positions!
The town of Kumily itself was pretty much two main high streets, a massive bus stand, and a barrier at one end marking the Kerala and Tamil Nadu state boarder, it was close to everything and obviously a popular place in season, as we saw quite a few tourists scattered around even in the low season. We spent a lot of time here relaxing and working on the blog, also deciding what we should do next with our time in India (a lack of hosts has dented our funds however we have flights to Nepal booked with a host to stay with, plus we've booked flights to Vietnam, where we also have hosts confirmed, with this in mind we've decided just to do our own thing in India until we leave on the 30th May). Sometimes it's good to do nothing but people watch and relax (there's a lack of alcohol though unfortunately, the government have banned and closed a lot places down mainly due to drink driving).
One night whilst sleeping we were rudely awoken by ear bone breaking, sacrificial sounding drums! Looking out of our window we could only see one man prancing around in a drunken trance style way! The next day we asked about the drumming, it was a festival weekend for a nearby temple, and there was a big parade to finish off, we decided to add to the mass of people gathered either side of the road, in the distance we saw flatbed lorries and great spinning towers slowly approaching with the sound of drums gradually becoming louder! Before we knew it the parade was upon us! Those spinning towers were people with horse like saddles across their shoulders turning round and round with twenty foot Christmas tree shaped towers decorated with hundreds of lights! People in head to toe elaborate make up dancing in a possessed and determined way, there were small groups (dressed normally) with usually a young teenager in the middle decorated with flowers and face paint moving erratically and being egged on by the others and the drummers arms moving like Jack hammers on the animal skin! On the flatbed bed lorries were enormous plastic but moving Hindu gods, slaying enemies and riding lions! All with super sized speakers blearing haunting beats and chants! It was a crazy half an hour and we left after the parade past us, it was an eventful little show you just couldn't take your eyes off the almost demonised performers!
After a fantastic five nights of mixed activities we crossed the border into Tamil Nadu, and hopped on the bus to the city of Madurai! Madurai
We spent one night here to break up the journey to Pondicherry. With it being the third largest population in the state of Tamil Nadu, it was densely packed! People, mopeds, tuk tuks, bull and carts and buses everywhere! Begrudgingly (because I have new found hate for lying, rip off tuk tuk drivers) we took a tuk tuk to our hotel, on route we realised how big of a city Madurai was! Our hotel room was basic but modern and we appreciated the late check out! After the four hour bus (it was a lot less dangerous than the previous journey, pretty much one straight road from Kumily) it was early afternoon and we decided to head for the Gandhi Museum, we didn't know much about the 'father of India' before we went, so it made it even interesting to hear about the recent history of this vast nation! The building itself was grand and had Taj Mahal style architecture. The museum had all sorts inside, from the books that he read to the letters he wrote (he even wrote to Hitler) to the cloth he was assassinated in! It also had a detailed timeline of the British rule in India which was also thought provoking read. We left feeling rich with knowledge and was a great couple of hours, especially because it was entry free (result!).
The next day we went to visit the main attraction, Temple Town (we could also see it from our hotel room, and at night they light up in all different colours, we wasn't sure if it look cool or tacky, seeing as it's a holy place)! It's a series of temples built in the shape of a lotus flower! Walking around Temple Town didn't compare to hampi although the main towers were undoubtably rich with history, intricately built and painted and pleasing to the eye! It wasn't that busy inside Temple Town, probably because of the heat. We tried to enter one of the temples however neither of us were wearing appropriate clothing (I was wearing shorts and Kirsty had her shoulders exposed) and access was denied. We did managed to get an aerial view from the rooftop of a shop, which gave a good view of the all the temples! After checking out we had a ten hour wait for a sleeper bus to Pondicherry, we spent a few hours waiting in the hotel reception then headed to the bus station. The time went quick but there was the usual rushed confusion when it was departure time, but after a darting run across the terminal we climbed on and settled in for night!
Madurai was okay, but we were glad we only spent one night, we were looking forward to arriving to a place we have heard such good things about!
