"Explore" Kerala: I wish I'd had more time

Two days after touching down in India, after our grueling trip from USA, we joined three friends and boarded a plane to the southern most tip of India, the state of Kerala. 

To be standing where the explorer Vasco da Gama landed, and was later buried, really captured my imagination.

Let's keep the politics of colonization out of it for a minute.... Just imagine the will, the determination and the sheer maddness it took for explorers of that time, to leave the safety of their homes for the open sea and the possiblities of new lands.

The state of Kerala is very different from northern India. I hope I don't offend anyone when I say that it seems more "civilized." It is definitely cleaner and all-in-all, it seems more orderly. From clothes, to food, to the weather, language and terrain, everything is different from northern India, which I have grown accustomed. 

Kerala is definitely a tourist state, with good food, facilities and roads that are easy to travel. We hired a driver for our 8-day visit, which I highly recommend.... while the roads may be good, the driving habits are foreign to a westerner.

We spent three nights at Uday Samudra Leisure Beach Hotel which is within walking distance of the Arabian Sea, and located in the nearby town of Kovalam. The morning view from our window was of fishermen casting their nets for the daily catch.

I certainly got my fill of prawns, and on at least two nights, the head chef came to our table to display the day's catch and tell us how it would be prepared. I was definitely in the lap of luxury.

Sad to say, this is when I started feeling sick and even though I made time for an Ayurvdaic massage, I spent a lot of time in bed, trying to kick what was causing my digestive disorder.

Thank god for Pepto Bismol, as I was able to withstand the five-hour drive to Kochi, also known as Cochin. It is a large port city known as the Queen of the Arabian Sea. 

On the way, we visited Padmanabhaswamy temple, which is an architectural marvel located in Thiruvanthapuram. Only Hindus are allowed into the temple and men must be shirtless and wear the mundu (sarong) to enter.  It was, even from the outside, a stunningly beautiful.

Once we got to our hotel in Kochi, I crashed for two days while my travel mates took in the historic sites, which included the old city, where Portugese influence and trading history was apparent in the old architecture.

Then, it was off to the hills and the lush greenery of the jungle. We stayed in the rural town of Munnar at the Ice Queen resort. Strange name for a place that has probably never seen snow and ice. Anyway, I was really impressed with the efforts the owners are making to keep the carbon footprint low, and run a sustainable operation. 

Again, because I was still sick I spent one day in bed, while others visited the large tea plantation and museum. 

My absolute highlight, and is not to be missed, was the Kathakali dance performance. If you ever have the chance, please, please see this. The skill of body movement and muscle control (especially facial) is mesmorizing.

And then it was time to head back to the Kochi airport, which has the most comfortable seating I've ever experienced at an airport.

And then it was time to fly back to Delhi and then on to Dharamshala.... our homebase in India. It took we another week, but I am now fully recovered from the travel and illness.

International travel: S**t's gonna happen.

We had three objectives in mind for our travels to India on Nov. 3.

1. No checked luggage; 

2. Connect through Lisbon, Portugal, as we intend to spend March 14- through April 12 there before returning to the USA.

3. Reach Delhi by Nov. 5 to meetup with our friends for a trip to southern India.

We had so many connnections this time to accommodate the Lisbon connection and our timeframe, that we knew there would be a good chance our bags would not make it to our final destination, Delhi. 

Our planned itinerary began in Minneapolis then to Chicago, Chicago to Paris, Paris to Lisbon, Lisbon to Dubai, Dubai to Delhi. 

It turned out to be a very wise move on our part to have only carry-on, as once we reached Paris, we got hung up in security (so short -staffed) that we missed our flight to Lisbon. And that, caused a cascade of issues. The next flight to Lisbon, would have had us miss the Dubai connection, and then possibly the Delhi connection. So, as we sometimes have to do, we had to suck up the financial loss and rebook a direct flight the next day from Paris to Dubai (skipping Lisbon) which meant we had to spend the night in a Paris hotel near the airport.

Pretty confusing! We reached Delhi about 2 a.m. on Nov. 5.

Take-away lessons:

• Go non-stop if at all possible, when flying international;
• Make sure your phone is charged at all times;
• Log into the airport wifi, whenever possible;
• Carry airline customer service numbers with you. You may not be able to locate a "live" person to help you at the airport, especially if your connections involve multiple airlines. You will save a lot of time and headache trying to work out connection issues;
• Be sure to carry water and some snack, your "dollar" may be no good in the foreign airport terminal.
• Most important- stay calm, take it from me getting worked up will get you nowhere. Shit's gonna happen when you travel, it is best to just stay calm.