I went to South Kerala on a short tour during the weekend of March 3rd. We went by train (Trivandrum Mail ). We took two packs of playing cards with us, so that we could play during the train journey. I would like to share a sour experience which we had on Saturday morning in the train. When we were playing, a policeman came to our cubicle and just talked something in colloquial Malayalam (we could not understand anything). May be he asked whether we were students. We said no, but he was so arrogant that he took the cards from us and threw it out of the train. We did not want to retaliate because we did not know the language and we also did not want to get into any serious trouble on the very first day of the trip. We were upset by the incident but luckily, the scenic beauty of Kerala en route to Trivandrum is great and our mind was kept occupied. I took some snaps of the backwaters when the train was crossing it.

We reached Trivandrum that afternoon and went to Hotel Regency about 5 minutes from the station - a very nice place to stay, for 2 days - room service, restaurant and maintenance was great. The next day we planned to go to Ponmudi, (supposed to be a hill resort near Trivandrum). We arranged for a rented car and the route was cool and scenic (increased our expectations of the destination). Ponmudi is the best example of an under utilised tourist attraction. For its location and the scenic mountains around it, it can be made a major attraction, but we could not find even a single cafetaria/restaurant and the place is totally neglected. 

The next day, we planned to go to Veli (backwaters near Trivandrum). This is a nice place to spend an evening. But the pedal boats are poorly maintained and it is very difficult to go long distances in them. But the place is is well maintained at least with nice coconut trees on the shores, cranes, eagles and ducks on the marshes - a very good place for photography. Then we left to Kanyakumari and the train journey between Trivandrum and Kanyakumari is one of the best scenic stretches which I have seen. A lot of mountains and paddy fields on the way - with some small tunnels too!

We were surprised to see Kanyakumari as an isolated undisturbed village. A very nice place to visit on a holiday. We stayed in Cape Residency which is about two km from the sea. The sunset and sunrise were great. The Vivekananda rock is maintained very well and this place can be taken as a role model to maintain tourist attractions. So many people visit this place everyday, but still it is kept very clean. The journey between Kanyakumari and Maniyachi is also pretty scenic. Overall, I would rate the whole trip as great, with only Ponmudi letting us down. Kovalam and Kanyakumari are the best places which we touched on this trip.

Balakrishnan