Days 93 - 94 Madurai to Varkala, India

Days 93 - 94 Hers.

 

We spent our last evening in Maurai in the hotel lobby – a bit weird, but actually the hotel restaurant had fantastic south Indian food at a very reasonable price, free wifi, and there was nothing we could do with our luggage before our 11pm train.

We loaded everything on the bus at 9:30 and set off for the train station.  Our overnight train was a bit different this time – we had first class carriages that only had 4 bunks to a cabin instead of 6 – and lockable doors.  This should have enabled us to get a good night’s sleep – and Rob climbed into his top bunk as the train set off and reportedly slept like a log.  His only difficulty was that – because no sheets were provided – he stuck a bit to the vinyl bed as he turned over, a minor inconvenience.  I had rather a different night.  There was a mouse in our carriage – only one, not like the eight mice chasing innumerable cockroaches last time – but not long after I had settled to sleep, it ran over my feet.  I curled up as small as I could and spent the rest of the night trying to convince myself it wouldn’t happen again.  Clearly some part of me wasn’t convinced.  I got almost no sleep and arrived at Varkala station in a complete daze.

Varkala is a jungle seaside resort strung out on a cliff overlooking a lovely beach on the Arabian Sea.  It is quite busy – full of Western tourists (Russians, Germans, Swedes, etc. etc.) – with many shops and cafes and steps leading down to a postcard worthy beach that got quite crowded this afternoon.  We took tuk tuks from the station to our hotel which seems pleasant enough – swimming pool, restaurant, jungle surroundings and a short walk down a strange path through other hotel properties, back entrances to massage parlours and a restaurant kitchen to get to the beach.  We couldn’t get into our rooms right away so we had coffee -which was served in a pot and turned out to be four coffees for the price of one - and then strolled along the clifftop path looking at the shops and choosing a restaurant to return to for dinner.

At 11:00, we got our rooms, stripped off and went to sleep for four hours – a bit of a waste of a sunny day in a lovely location, but I just wasn’t fit for anything else!  When we emerged, we had a swim in the pool, showered and headed back along clifftop path, just in time for sunset.

Dinner was pizza and cheesecake – not at all Indian, I know, but I had been hungry for cheese since Nepal (or maybe even Cambodia) and it was delicious......maybe not quite the same as you’d get at home, but close enough to quell the cravings!  We had another short stroll after dinner and then retired to our little balcony to read until bed, accompanied by the Muslim calls to prayer and Hindu festival procession going by.