Kumily

So we arrive in Kumily after 6 hours in the early evening. We met up with an English guy, Roland, on the bus, and so the 3 of us strolled about looking for accommodation. Our guidebook has no map, so we have to stroll about fairly aimlessly, but ended up going the right direction and the first hotel we try turns out to be nice, clean and cheap, so we take it (Roland also ended up staying there, as his original place messed him about a bit).

The 3 of us went for dinner that night, and myself and Sarah decided to join Roland early the next morning for a boat ride at 7am in the nearby Perivar National Park. So the next morning we were up at 6am, rickshaw at 6:15 and in the queue for boat tickets by 6:35.

The boat cruise was lovely, although it only lasted about 1.5 hours and didn't do a loop, just an out-and-back. We saw 2 groups of otters though, which was cool because they came out of the water and one group was feeding on the bank. Otherwise we saw lots of glorious kingfishers, wild boar, a couple of buffalo (which I initially thought were elephants), but that was about it. As usual boat trips are generally about just relaxing and taking in the surroundings, which here were lovely.

It was here too that the colours of Indian struck me as being different than anywhere else I've been. It's not a major difference, and it's not like the colours are blindingly dazzling or anything, but they are subtley different, and with the grasses, trees and soil all definitely more richly colourful.

After the cruise we wanted to check about doing some hiking in the park. Ideally I would want to just go on a self-guided walk, but it turns out you can't here, and they don't even have any maps of the park. You have to book a guided hike, so after a spot of breakfast (very nice and extremely cheap in the local cafe that was constantly raided by cheeky and aggressive monkeys), we managed to organise a 3 hour hike. The place is terribly disorganised though, and even 3 Indian gentlemen in our group where complaining about the lack of information around.

Anyway, our hike started straight away - although first we were told we'd have to wait 30 minutes, then an hour, and then suddenly we all just left! It turned out to be a really fantastic hike though, I really loved it. There were only 8 of us in the group, and although the 3 Indian guys kept talking (and one guy's mobile phone going off!), they were actually really friendly and quite funny really.

We hiked through beautifully varied landscapes and towards the end entered lovely open savannah where our guide talked to a couple of rangers, who pointed encouragingly into the distance. After another 5 minutes we came across a pair of elephants foraging in the long grass. At first they were largely concealed, and of course since we were walking we had to keep our distance. After watching for about 20 minutes our guide told us all to move on, but the German couple in our group simply asked if we could stay a bit longer, and the guide just shrugged in agreement. It was great that he did too, because after another 15 minutes or so the group began to move on. It then became clear there were more than 2 elephants, and as they gradually moved into the open we got fantastically clear views of the whole family of 5, including a 1 month-old baby.

So it was really cool to have now seen both African and Indian elephants in the wild, and it really was the highlight of the hike to come so close to the elephants. The park is also billed as a tiger reserve, but the chances of seeing a tiger, especially in daylight, are extremely slim (in fact I've read a few articles in the local papers about just how bad the tiger situation is in India, it really is shocking to read just how badly the needs, or 'wants', of humans affect the poor tigers).

After our hike we decided to head back to the town and try and get on a tea plantation and spice tour (they didn't have any other options in the park anyway). That turned out to be very easy of course, as the touts are everywhere, and every hotel organises them. So we hopped in a rickshaw and off we went.

First stop was a tea plantation, which was interesting and beautiful (although it was really hard to understand our guide's English). Then we went to the factory to see all the machines (it was actually a holiday though, so there were no workers, and in fact our guide had to convince the guard to open the factory up for us). Then we drove to a Government spice garden place, and the guide showed us all around. There were loads of different spices, chillis, flowers and trees (like the cool cinnamon tree), and it was great to see where the likes of cardamom comes from.

The tour lasted 3 hours, and after a short stop for some cardamom tea on the way home (which was really lovely), we just relaxed before getting dinner, again with Roland.

Next morning we got up at 8am and after getting copies of Roland's photos (my camera seems to have died completely now!), we all got the bus to Kottayam from where the plan was to take a local ferry boat through the famous Backwaters of Kerala to the town of Alappuzha.