Backwaters Kerala - Periyar National Park

After a refreshing night on the boat, we wake up, somewhere in the middle of nowhere. We enjoy the morning atmosphere, and barely out of the bedroom, we are offered coffee or tea. After leaving, we are served a delicious breakfast, continental but with Indian dishes, which I try. The eggs in a curry sauce are special but not bad.

But at 9:30 am we are back at the starting point and our journey continues by car. We wind our way up the mountains through narrow streets. Eldo, our new driver's rough driving style takes some getting used to. Just before reaching Periyar National Park, where our next hotel is located, we visit a tea plantation. We learn how black tea, green tea, and white tea are harvested and processed. Some of the machines are over 60 years old and the pride of the factory. Vanessa had an optimization variant regarding tea processing, but it didn't really catch on. We were very restrained when it came to buying tea, which was not difficult for us, because what can we do with a kilogram of black tea at home....

And then we arrived at our next hotel, the Spice Village, at an altitude of about 1400 meters. All the hotels we have here in the south belong to the same hotel chain, CGH. They are very eco-friendly. The Spice Village consists of 50 bungalows in a dreamlike garden with many trees, spices, etc.

At the pool, we recover from the nerve-wracking drive before taking advantage of the full program. Cooking demonstration with tasting and information about various spices, followed by a traditional dance performance and then a very tasty buffet with many dishes typical of Kerala.

Happy, full, and very grateful that we can experience all of this, another day comes to an end.