Amritapuri

Last Wednesday we had the great fortune to visit the Amritapuri Ashram in the Kerala backwaters.  The founder of the ashram Mata Amritanandamayi Devi or Amma is a gura famous the world over.  The Ashram is the headquarters of Amma and her spiritual empire :-)  Her singular claim to fame is that she spreads the power of eternal love through hugging...yes HUGGING.  She has hugged hundreds of thousands of visitors from all over the world.  The ashram itself is a fascinating place.  There are people from all over the world visiting, working, and living at the ashram.  The many foundations created by Amma provide charitable donations, education, and spiritual leadership globally.  We arrived around 11AM in the morning and the Ashram was in full swing!  Breakfast was just finishing and devotees were busy performing seva throughout the compound.  We waited in line for our darshan or "sight of the holy mother" tickets...in other words you need to wait in line to get a ticket to wait in line to give this woman a hug.  Needless to say we would have had to wait 5 HOURS to hug Amma...so we just decided to go to the beach instead.  But we plan on heading back to stay a night or two it is a pretty amazing place :-)

Allepey

Monday evening last week we arrived in Allepey to board our houseboat home for the next two days.  It was absolute serenity on our houseboat.  We ate and slept on the boat as it lazed its way around the canals of the backwaters. This part of Kerala is often called the Venice of the East and with good reason.  There are over 700 canals in this part of Kerala bordered on each side by small, colorful houses, each with its own rice paddy growing behind it.  Almost every fruit you can imagine grows readily here.  There are palm trees, mangos, papaya, and jackfruit trees almost everywhere you look.  Life along the canals seems unchanged in the last hundred years and the farther you drift along,  the more you feel that you are drifting into another time….  Men in lunghi bathe, women wash laundry and clean dishes seemingly indifferent to your presence, curious children wave at you excitedly from the river-bank.   We buy fresh fish for our meals from fisherman who come gliding up to the boat in long, thin traditional canoes with coolers bursting with tiger prawns, freshwater lobsters, and black pompano.  I think the pictures speak for themselves :-)

Riding the Elephant

We arrived on Sunday in the town of Thekkady.  We are staying in the Periyar Tiger Reserve…the name is a bit deceptive I think very few people have ever seen a tiger there :-).   When we arrived in Thekkady we were able to take a bareback ride on an Elephant through a short jungle trek…very fun but also very crowded.  The elephants looked as wilted as the tourists sweating in the sun and we felt a bit sorry for them.  After the Elephant ride we headed over to the Aurvedic center near the reserve.  Matt and I both got a massage and a steam bath which was a bit less than relaxing.  It seems both of our masseuses were a bit over-zealous and we left feeling pummeled, sore, sweaty, and oily.  Needless to say I think that is the first and last Auryvedic massage Matt will ever have….

This hairy British tourist chose to bathe with an elephant...in a Speedo.  A picture is worth a thousand words.

I love Kerala

We spent Christmas day sightseeing around the town of Munnar.  We bumped and jolted our way out of the plantation in view of thousands of acres of tea bushes.  Then we spent the day sightseeing around the tea plantations of Munnar.  We were even able to visit the Munnar tea museum (more interesting then it sounds :-) ), where we learned how tea if farmed and processed.   We are lounging by the fire now listening to Abba’s greatest hits blasting from the club house (I know, who could ask for more!?) and drinking giant Kingfisher beers.  We ordered 4 beers only to find when they arrived that they were LARGE Kingfisher bottles…so that means we ordered about 8 beers :-).  I love Kerala.  Check out the pics below!  MERRY CHRISTMAS!

View from outside our window...

Our cozy little cabin :-)

The "road" we drove in on...in the dark!

Children from the local village celebrating Christmas.  They were VERY excited to be photographed :-) 

God's Own Country

Christmas eve day we arrived in Cochin, Kerala.  Kerala is a state in the southeastern part of India.  Our first stop on our vacation was the isolated mountain village of Munnar.  On our drive from Cochin airport we passed plantations growing every possible type of fruit and vegetable as well as some beautiful waterfalls (see below).  After quite a long drive we arrived in the city of Munnar. The scenery in this part of Kerala is absolutely breathtaking.  There are tea and spice plantations blanketing every possible stretch of land as well as beautiful flowering trees and shrubs.  However, our arrival in Munnar was only the start of our trek out to our hotel, Camp Noel.  It was just getting dark when we left Munnar and when the sun finally sank completely we were left to drive in total darkness, the kind of darkness that simply does not exist in Mumbai.  We drove about an hour, straight uphill, past the city.  The road grew narrower and more perilous as we inched along narrowly avoiding collisions with sadistic motorcyclists and rickshaw drivers seemingly intent on sending us hurtling downhill to our imminent doom.  We finally arrived on the top of the mountain and were then transferred from our car to an aging but sturdy jeep.   Our driver bid us a fond adieu as we nervously stepped into the jeep with two ominous looking Indian men smoking glowing bidis.  What followed was 40 minutes of white-knuckled anxiety holding on for dear life as we bumped along following a dirt path at a 90-degree angle.  It was COMPLETELY dark and for a while we figured we would probably be robbed and left for dead in the middle of millions of acres of tea.  Every few minutes the lights of a small village of plantation workers would come into view and we would think, “We are here!”…but alas.   When the hotel finally did come into view we were overjoyed!   It is a little piece of heaven in the mountains (like Dollywood, only it's India and there is no amusement park, no funnel cakes, no TV, and no cell service).   We had our own little cottage complete with two fireplaces to keep it cozy since it is only 40-degrees at night during this time of year!  We had a lovely buffet complete with tandoori goodies and jelabi.  Come Christmas Eve we were lazing in front of a roaring fire and thinking of all our wonderful friends and family and wishing they were here to share in our Indian adventure!