Wednesday 27th February - Position 13
The Hotel Nani has suited our purpose. Decent AC, comfortable bed and not too noisy. Breakfast is a buffet, advertised from 07.30 but this comes as a bit of a surprise to the restaurant staff. Still they switch the lights on and scurry round to assemble the buffet. While they do this we content ourselves with a couple of small Indian bananas. The buffet is not too bad and the hard boiled eggs look like favourites to scoop R's Boiled Egg of the trip awards. Amazing what subjects arise when one shares a breakfast table every day for five weeks. Today is the last planned train ride for this trip, although D does have his eyes on a Kochi Metro outing. In years gone by we have usually finished off with an overnighter to the capital, or on one occasion a steam hauled trip out of Delhi. This year it will be a bit more low profile, a three hour trip from Kollam to Ernakulam Junction. The auto from the hotel drops us in good time and we learn that we need to be on platform 2, across the overbridge.
D is unsure of whereabouts in the train our coach will come to a stand and goes in search of info. There are a couple of computerised assistance points that look a bit like bank ATMs. After entering the train number and pressing the button for Coach Sequence he is informed that our coach will be at position 13 on the platform. He also learns that the train is reported as running 17 minutes late. More by good fortune than anything else R is already seated on a bench, guarding the luggage right at position 13.
R's heart sinks when she sees the Northern Railway markings on the coaches as train 12483 Kochuveli - Amritsar Weekly Superfast pulls in. Looking on the bright side, Sleeper class passengers are not entitled to grubby bedlinen or pillows with footprints on them. She looks positively distraught when D explains that this train will travel about 3,300 km and arrive at its destination at 7.45 in the evening, the day after tomorrow. By Northern standards coach S1 is just averagely insanitary. Three consecutive days of Southern Railway coaches have rather spoiled us.
Our journey is north, running parallel to the coast, and provides tantalising glimpses of the lakes and creeks of the Kerala backwaters. The train takes the route via Alleppey, where we have stayed twice before. This time we remain on board. The line is single but work has been going on to double it since 2015 and probably earlier. There are long stretches of completed new track, rusty and overgrown, with odd gaps because a building has not been demolished. Some of these will have been built illegally on Railway owned land but now are subject to interminable legal proceedings. The single line means that we have a couple of waits at crossing stations and get further behind time.
Even D begins to notice the miasma, which is pretty much inevitable as we are downwind of eleven and a half Sleeper coaches on a hot, sweaty day. Unlike Unreserved we are not entitled to just up sticks and move. A man appears with several stacks of books and tries to sell D a History of Mossad and then the Michelle Obama Story. " Discount for English Books".
We enjoy sole possession of our inside bay for the entire journey. The coach is probably at 20% occupancy as we approach Ernakulam. As we get off there is a sizeable crowd waiting to board. The train stops at every town up the coast to Mumbai and then goes on to Delhi before heading to the Punjab. The station exit takes a little finding but once on the forecourt the Prepaid Auto Booth is easily found. Again a nominal Rs 2 fee means that there is no shenanigans about the fare or stopping to renegotiate halfway there. We always give these drivers a tip. D spent a few minutes this morning perusing Radinja 5, for the entry that covered travel out to Kochi Island. This time he avoided the mistake of joining the Ladies' queue.
At Rs 4 the ferry cruise out to Fort Kochi is up there with the value for money greats. Think seven rupee Kolkata tram ride, Rs 10 pat on the head by a temple elephant, large bag of orange boiled sweets ten rupees. We have to cross a moored boat to get to our ferry and D almost falls between them as he recoils from smacking his forehead onto the steel lintel above the entrance to second boat. No harm done as it was only his head.
The crossing takes just over ten minutes. At the far side an auto driver knows where we wish to go and asks for fifty rupees, which was the fare four years ago so we take it. The SajHomestay is just as we remember it and Saj greets us effusively. This time we were given a choice of room when we booked and opted for a room on the second floor. We miss out on the four poster bed but gain a balcony. Saj shows us the upgraded bathroom, of which he is justifiably very proud. They were OK four years ago but are now very much 5*.
We sort out what we will need laundered and what can just fester at the bottom of a rucsac until we get home. The bathroom is not only smart, it has proper, reliable hot water, the first we have had since Bangalore. Tepid showers in hot sticky weather are OK but a decent hot sluice down cannot be beaten. Once sorted out we head off to explore the Kochi Biennale. This is a special cultural event that they arrange to coincide with our visits.
It isn't really but it does get D off the hook as far as the art thing goes. We ride back down to Biennale HQ, at Aspinwall House. This complex of buildings on the waterfront was originally the headquarters of the Aspinwall Company, traders in spices and other commodities originating in Kerala. The site is now used as galleries for the Biennale, which takes place every two years. There are other sites spread around Fort Kochi. This year the theme is "Possibilities for a Non-Alienated Life".
Day tickets are 100 rupees each so we decide to dip our toes in straight away. R wants a programme so we finish up buying a Short Guide that runs to 544 pages and which would break bones if you dropped it on your foot. Pages alternate between English and Malayalam so there is not quite as much to get through as it appears on first sight. We take in the offerings in the first building. Some of it is a bit odd, some slightly disturbing, but a few displays are very interesting. We particularly liked the large room devoted to pieces based on Gond tribal art.
Some of the other exhibits were on show in a gallery in Mumbai a couple of years ago. They were so bizarre that we could not possibly have forgotten. There was another striking exhibit of sculpture, created by a Dalit man from Kochi, which homes in on the iniquities and inequalities of the everyday moral code in Kerala. The best stuff was all in rooms with fans to move the air a bit. Some of the other rooms were too hot and stuffy to linger in. By chucking out time we were ready for a beer and sat by the water at the slightly shabby Seagull Bar for pakodas and chilled Kingfishers. R deemed it acceptable for refreshment but not for dining so we set out in search of somewhere smarter.
The Fort House is on Saj's recommended list and looks very smart. They have a sort of jetty lined with tables and we are soon seated twenty metres west of where we were drinking beer. It was all so much smarter, not to mention more expensive, and they didn't stoop to selling booze. But the sea breej was wonderful and the food delightful. We strolled back to base through quiet streets and saved ourselves Rs 50.
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