Cochin

Seeing as how this train journey was only 4 hours, and during daylight, I just booked us seats in the normal seating class (which has no air conditioning, but of course was super-cheap). After a bit of a panic trying to work out where our carriage was (the trains are generally huge and you have no idea which direction to start walking), we finally find the right one and settle in.

The journey was through some lovely landscapes of rice paddy fields, palm tree forests and backwater canals, and we arrived in Cochin pretty much on time. It was a bit of an ordeal trying to work out how to get a bus into the town centre (the bus destinations were all written in Hindi script), so we just got a rickshaw and asked him to drop us at the ferry terminal. He dropped us at the wrong terminal of course, so it was a bit of a stressful hike to get to where we wanted to go as it was seriously hot and humid. But thankfully the second place I tried turned out to be nice and the cheapest yet (about 3 Euro a night!).

So that first day was just strolling about and checking out the local part of town, the only things of note being the small but good Durbar Hall Art Gallery and finding yet another great local restaurant (upstairs in delicious air-con at Bimbi's).

That evening we finally got to see 'Slumdog Millionaire', which probably makes us the last people in the world to have seen it (I think literally every time I read an English-language newspaper here there is some mention of the 'Slumdog' movie, either slating it for painting India in a bad light, or singing the praises of the actors and producers). We made sure that it was the English version, but of course they didn't subtitle the Hindi parts of the movie, but it wasn't hard to get the jist of things really. I must say it was kinda cool to see all the images of India and recognising lots of them (like the trains, the litter everywhere, the stinking, rotten waterways and the general colour of everything). I thought the movie was good, but a bit surprised to think it won 'Best Picture'.

Our cinema was typically Indian though apparently, with about 6 mobile phones going off (and people answering them and talking!), and a fair bit of cheering and shouting from below us in the stalls (we were up in the balcony). Apparently during Bollywood movies the crowds can get very raucous, so it's just par for the course, and certainly didn't disturb the movie for me.

Next day (after brekkie at the local Indian Coffee House), we got the ferry across to Cochin's main tourist attraction, the area of Fort Cochin. The ferry stops were a bit unclear, so we ended up getting off at Jew Town and exploring from there. It's a lovely area of higgledy-piggledy spice and antique shops (one of which has a fantastically spectacular Snake boat, which really belongs in a National Museum!), and after the synagogue and the Mattancherry Palace (with it's impressive murals), we strolled to the Jain temple and then into the town centre. We popped into the Santa Cruz Cathedral that has fantastic interior decoration and then a nice modern cafe for lunch before checking out the mad Chinese fishing nets. Also strolled about the Brunton Boatyard hotel, which was all nicely fancy (and the restaurant had one of the most expensive menus I've seen in India, although the decor was decidedly plain, and there was no view to speak of).

Then we hopped on a bus back to the town to get to the train station to book our onward journey. This turned out to be the first real headache I've had to endure in India, as the trains I wanted to book (which I'd checked first online), were all full. It was stressful because the ticket queues have people crowding around you and you feel forced to make a decision immediately. But there were lots of options of various trains, various destinations and various seating options, and I couldn't understand the guy's English at the enquiry-desk, and people were constantly pushing past me, so it was just hectic.

In the end I had to book an expensive overnight train 2 days in advance. It means we don't get to see any scenery (travel only at night), but at least we arrive at a reasonable hour (10am). It gave us two more full days in Cochin, which is more than I wanted, but it's certainly not the worst place to be stuck for a day or two.

Next day I picking up my camera, which I'd left into a repair place to investigate getting fixed. It turned out there were 2 problems, the first was trivial to fix (the camera wasn't powering-up into photo-taking mode), but the second would require an expensive new shutter, so I skipped that expense hoping the camera will kinda work well enough - which it seems to be. Then we hopped on a bus to a nearby town to see a palace.

We had to walk a couple of kilometers from the town to the palace, but it was cooler today thank god. The palace was pretty good, with an interesting cage they used to kill people in (apparently picked alive by birds whilst hanging in the cage from the limb of a tree!), and nice big executioner's knives. After a nice thali lunch there and a stroll around the small deer park and dusty heritage museum we hopped on a bus back to town (that of course pulled up as we exitted the palace grounds). But we needed to get another bus to take us back to our hotel-area (after quite a bit of bewildered walking about the bus station asking people 'Excuse me, but where am I?', as as usual there were no street signs, or even a sign to name the bus station we were standing in).

So then it was catching up on the Internet for a couple of hours before dinner in Sealord's. Here again I seemed to taste 'the best curry yet!', as the prawn curry really was delicious, and the exposed roof top setting presented a very welcome cooling breeze.

Next morning was a late start as we had the whole day at our leisure. First was a rickshaw to the train station to leave our rucksacks in left-luggage. Then down the road to another branch of Bimbi's for a fantastic lunchtime thali, then a spot of Internet and then hopped on a bus back to the Fort Cochin area to wile away the afternoon in cafes and sitting on the sea front by the fishing nets.

Then a ferry back to the 'mainland', a stroll to the train station and our 4th overnight train in India, this time on the luxurious Rajdhani Express.