December 30th From Pollethai to Kovalam

Today we drove from the Pollethai to the Taj Green Cove in Kovalam. It was a bit of a rushed journey because a Kerala wide strike (or bundh) had been called from 2pm until 11pm to protest against the hanging of Saddam Hussein. Having experienced strike behaviour in Bangalore we decided that getting to the hotel before we had the chance to discover whether this was a peaceful or a non peaceful strike was a priority. After the Pollethai it was a bit of a disappointment, it felt cramped and we were horrified to find that a bottle of mineral water cost Rs90!

We had a relaxing afternoon - Bethan slept - and ate in the hotel in the evening.

December 28th Paddies and ducks

As we had a driver provided for us we felt we had to use him and, for the first time in four days, left the resort for a couple of hours. We drove past paddies and saw workers in the fields. We passed several duck farms and saw people in canoes herding thousands of ducks along the backwaters. We intended to stop and have lunch in Alleppy but the restaurant we stopped at was full and so we scurried back to The Beach at Pollethai.

Working in the paddies

It's better being in management!

The day after this we concentrated on yet more relaxing!

December 27th More relaxing…..

Today we did more of the same!

The restaurant and pool

December 26th Another relaxing day

We had another excellent breakfast and then decided to have a walk along the beach and have a look at the Marari Beach Resort. Andy had warned us that we would have difficulty getting into the resort and he was not wrong. We were intercepted shortly after we entered the grounds by the life guards. We explained that we lived in Bangalore and wanted to have a look round because we were likely to come back to Kerala in the future and might want to stay there.

Crabs on the beach

In contrast to other hotels we have visited and were warmly welcomed and shown round, the reception at the Marari Beach was decidedly chilly. Initially we were told that we couldn’t walk through the resort to reception but would have to enter via the road. After a phone call to someone in management we were permitted to walk through the resort to reception. Eventually they somewhat reluctantly gave us the Indian resident ratfor the resort! It seemed quite a pleasant resort but with 63 cottages compared to eight at The Beach at Pollethai it felt very cramped and crowded!

Bethan relaxing too!

In the afternoon, after Bethan had wached her VCD of Oliver and John and I had played Scrabble on our porch, we wandered for about a mile south of the resort and watched the fishermen preparing their boats for the night’s fishing.

We ordered the restaurant’s special Keralan dinner which was served on a huge banana leaf and was absolutely delicious. We plan to have at least one more of these before we leave.