A treat once in a while never harmed anyone and with this in mind we hired a houseboat for a night in kerala. While it is definately not cheap (5000Rs/24 hours- even after lengthy negotiations!) it was certainly worth the money in my opinion. We took the trip around Alleppey and were slightly dissapointed we couldn't go any further a field but with it being high season-and-all this was the best we could manage. We ended up with a 2 bedroom boat which was of course uneccessary but we were not complaning about the extra deck space. The crew included Captain, engine driver and thankfully a good cook who served us a table full of stuff including fish at both lunch and dinner. The setting I think made the dining experience all the better.
With it being a large boat the rivers and canals we navigated were rather wide but you could still get a good sense of the lives of people living around the backwaters. Workers in the rice fields (tough job), washer women, fishermen/women, school children taking a lunchtime swim, taxi boats amongst others. Everything went well and was a relaxing and comfortable experience. However, I did get pretty pissed off when we were parked up for the night. After eating and watching the sunset, another boat docked near by and they chose to spend there backwaters trip watching tv at full blast which ruined the tranquil atmosphere somewhat. I am not sure how they thought that this was appropriate. Anyway was all good and got a load of memories and photos to enjoy so well worthwhile!
