KERALA-- TOTHE TIP AND BACK

GREETINGS FROM THE SECOND TIME BACK IN KERALA.....

I won't write much as the computer i am using is majorly out of focus and killing my eyes...plus it appears to be in german.


anyway we made our way towards VARKALA in kerala and found an awesome room with a sofa bed for xav for 250 ruppees nd ended up staying 4 nights it was beautiful our room had ocean views....there was not much to do other then walk along the cliff and swim down at the beach but once we relaxed into it and the local shop owners recognised us after the first couple of days and stopped asking us to buy stuff we enjoyed our selves and spent the rest of our time walking to and from the beach and swimming.... it is pretty funny though as they beaches have lifeguards that don't actually let you get any deeper then chest height before they start a chorus of whistling....the sport whistles which make almost unbearable until to just decide to give in and crack up as you try to slowly edge your way deeper.....

it's fun to watch the men walk towards the water and then run from the oncoming wave holding hands and screaming from the thrill of it... everyone swims well flops in the water like bessie fully clothed saris and all.. but everyone fully and throughly enjoys thermselves.


 its lovely to see such joy from life.


we decided we'd better leave and get on with the southern part of india before having to head north to be in nepal in a few weeks so we took a 3.5 hour train ( 6.5HR indian time) down to the southern tip of india the most furthest you can go to KANYUKAMARI... we slept most of the way there which was great and then i awoke to find jon had made some new indian boy----friends they ended up talking with us and then doing the hunt for accommodation and then came out to dinner with us..
it turned out they were both trainers (not teachers) of english and get p[aid 2000 ruppees a mnth and then get a paid holiday once a year they had had 10 days off and were now headed down to KAnyukamari to watch the sunset and then rise the next day before heading back to work. i don't think youd see two aussie boys doing something that romantic...without being called gay....

anyway jon then got up and wtahced the sunrise the next day which was obscured by the clouds and then we all headed out to the temple island where krishnas wife apparently obtained his hand in marriage and her foot print is there in the stone...there is an outline of a foot in the brown rock and theyve made a massive temple over it they also have a temple dedicated to meditation on the aum or om symbol where kids are not permitted and you can sit and meditate on the sound of the om and watch a tacky symbol of it light up repititiously....

anyway we then parted ways with the boys and headed out to baywatch --- a local theme park water world.... although it was overcast we had a blast the boys were allowed on most things and xavo loved the dodgy cars" and got to go on them without getting off as the guys loved him. we then after seeing that sight and being spoiled by varkala headed off the next day and have headed back into kerala to Kovalam beach which is just a beautiful as varkala but much more touristy....nevermind.

we are planning on staying here a few nights to soak up the sand and shallow waters...haha and then making our journey north and east to pondicherry..


missing everyone


WE ARE SAFE, WE ARE WARM AND WE ARE LOVING THE BEACH....SPOILT

happy birthday birthday boy

Thanks to being disconnected and unattached we managed to have jon a surprise birthday and were only alerted to the fact it was his birthday after he received a very enthusiastic "happy new year" from the hotel owner as we departed for our 7 hour kerala backwater cruise it was only after spending the next two hours perplexed and bemused by his parting words that we  thought to ask the date and found out then....
we then celebrating by enjoying a 7 hour cruise hand powered , very slow though relaxing and felt like very rich tourists as the wind came up and they were struggling to push along the 2o something ft barge with two bamboo poles and had to bring out another man to help gets us into calmer waters.

we then ended up going out to dinner with the people on the tours... could you believe we are old fogies now but had a enjoyable night jonsie even got to have a few beers... it was however our most expensive meal here yet costing 1100 rupees jon said lucky it was his birthday...... but we have now made some nice friends and will be able to travell to ireland, france, mexico and collumbia and have places and locals to show us around also... we are apparently expecting some more tourist buddies when we get home!!! not that we have a house to share.

we got a motorbike yesterday and went for a drive packed onto a car/truck/motorbike/tuktuk ferry for 5 ruppees and went to the other side and found an awesome beach to go swimming at toally desserted cause were still at the end of the monsoon season and no tourist... it was however very nice to go for a swim and shallow and warm so the boys loved it too.

weve watched the chinese fishing nets in action and ate fresh fish and prawns which we chose and then they cook for us..

now we are feeling better we are enjoying ourselves again and are now off today to head further south to either varkala or ??????? looking forward to heading north which i always thought i would enjoy as stories sound amazing especially siikh? and eastwards which id say we'll do after nepal....


will post photos when we can a lot of the internet places say no downloading photos or otherwise it is riddiculously slow and times out but will do a mass upload soon..


love you all and having a ball...now




 WE ARE FINE WE ARE SAFE WE ARE LOVING IT.

LOVE THE BOYS AND BANKSIA

onwards and upwards

we then took a train to bengalore(didn't stay as trying to avoid cities) and then onto mysore where we got sick again this time king i think a residual from hampi though it was just temperature and lethargy with king...

saw the museum and art gallery, the mysore palace which was awesome and then got sick as above and king and i spent the rest of our time in the hotel with jon and xav coming and going with supplies and recouperated.

at this point i just wanted to come home was sick and just wanted my mum to look after me...and the boys... but nevermind we mad eit through and area ll better now and loving it again.

we then caught a bus to calicut and a train to cochi...we hired a tuk tuk today hwho showed us all thr touristy attractions for 100 ruppees approx 3 $ so now we'll just relax and hang out here for a few days.. we're nearly down the very south so once we hit the bottom we'll start heading up along the east coast.

we're going on a cruise on the boats tomorrow on the kerrala backwaters.... and staying at a really nice place the best we've had in india with our first hot shower since being here...hooray...

today is Krishna's birthday and apparently this was one of his birthplaces... im not sure how many times he was born? but we were here for the celbrations saw all the kids dressed up and the procession as we were follwing we soon became part of the parade and people gave us peacock feathers and celbratory crowns for the kids as we made our way along.

we are here we are fine and we are safe AND ... we are no longer sick and loving it.


LOVE THE BOYS AND BANKSIA

HELLO, KING OF HAMPI

WELL....WE LOVED HAMPI IT WAS A TIME OF MANY UPS AND DOWNS THOUGH!!

we ended up staying there for 7 nights/ 8 days travelling around on motorbike everywhere.
it was a mystical place and highly recommend it to anyone... we were however very templed-out in the end as wherever you go ,every corner you turn there is another temple.

however the irrigation centuries old and still used on crops today were awesome we took every off road turn we could and took in all the sights and sounds... stunning.

jonsie upgraded to a faster bigger model of engine but alas his driving skills could not keep up with his enlarged head as we soon found ourselves stalling often, revving out and lurching in all directions... jon has since come to the conlcusion the smaller scooters with automatic gears are much "better suited in the local terrain" ( not mentioning his driving skills...)


we fed cows and elephants LAKSHMI the local temple elephant got blessed a few times ie hit on the head by her for money, sat with her in the water while her carers washed her.....although we tried not encouraging the monkeys xavie had one sit on his lap... the animal wisperer......one snuck into our room and stole our fruit, accidently came across the waterfalls and took in the view as the sun went down.... enjoyed independace day with the locals and cooled down in the river with the local washer women ( much to everyone's amusement)

made plenty of friends after staying so long king was known by the locals as the "king of hampi" xavie sat with the local shopkeeper and played shop, we met Ganesh a local boy 13 years old and hung out with him whenevr he finished school.

it's great being in india people seem to enjoy the more simpler things i found jon around dusk late evening with not much light sitting one day very close to ganesh and his cricket match between him and his friend in a very narrow street sitting in what appeared to be his line of bat when i was about to get angry at jon telling him i dont think it's the best place to sit jon quickly stoppped me and told to to sit down and that he didnt think it would be a problem as i sat next to him with king and xav in the game i watched with fear and thought to myself how irrisponsible it was to sit so close as i watched thought and thought some of the balls should be hitting us for sure i realised there was infact no ball and that these two teenage boys and xav were having an imaginary game of cricket with shouts of joy calling the scores and victory dances all inclusive... i thought how awesome that was and how you wouldn't catch teenage boys at home doing that or they'd be dacked.

 having relaxed as we passed the dreaded 2 week goal for "if you dont get sick then ....you won't"  then things took a turn for the worse....


xavo got sick from something not sure what as everyone else didnt get it.... vomiting diarrhoea temp of 39...unbelievable.... what a scare... he also started hallucinating after only having gotten symptoms a few hours prior....arghhh what a hellish night....i nursed him through the night and the next day while i stayed with xav jon with king went into the doctors and returned with something the doctor recommended... they were antibiotics and xavie was looking good by the late evening and much improved the next day....


having passed that hurdle....jon then got sick and king then me ( though nowhere near as bad as xavo.....going on almost a week everyones well except me i now after feling vommity....though not vomiting have a cold...which now king has....and im sure next jon and xav...... but nevermind at least now we are all eating and feeling better.


that's india though...highs and lows.... so thankyou Hampi... we will take away memory of Lakshmi, monkeys, temples, cooling rivers, soaring temperatures, poo stained sleeping bags and viral infections.......ha

it was awesome though.... and would recommend it to anyone..

we are now FINE, WE ARE SAFE AND WE ARE NOW WELL.....THANKGOD


LOVE THE BOYS AND BANKSIA

ps jon would also like to mention that during a visit to a temple with the monkeys and cows wandering free... i was rammed by a cow....who had obviously gotten sick of waiting for everyone to get out of it's way and just wanted to get out of there...it is not as interesting as it sounds though and i am fine as is king who was on my shoulders.

FRESH AIR AND STUNNINGNESS IN HAMPI

GREETINGS FROM HAMPI.

WE TOOK THE 10HR JOURNEY VIA TRAIN TO HAMPI YESTERDAY OH MY GOD... TWO BOYS ON A TRAIN FOR THAT LONG ALMOST....UNMANAGEABLE...I'VE BEEN SICK (UNINDIA RELATED) AND JON HAD THEM MOST OF THE TIME BY THE END THOUGH HE WAS ABOUT TO THROW THEM OUT THE OPEN DOOR OF THE TRAIN... I HOWEVER SLEPT MOST OF THE WAY AND HAD QUITE A PLEASANT JOURNEY!!!

ANYWAY WE CAME TO HAMPI ON THE ADVISE OF A FRIEND AND WOW IS IT AWESOME THE ACTUAL TOURISTY SIGHTS CAN BE SEEN IN A DAY OR TWO BUT TODAY WE WENT DOWN AND HUNG OUT WITH THE WASHING WOMEN AND MEN BATHING AND BEING JON, BANKSIA AND THE BOYS WE TOO JUMPED IN... MIND YOU THE ONLY TOURISTS.


WE'VE ONLY JUST GOTTEN OUT AFTER ABOUT AN HOUR WATCHING THE WOMEN WASH THEIR SARIS AND THE MEN HOLD ONTO EACH OTHER FROM THE BANK AND QUICKLY JUMP IN AND OUT. WE WATCHED THE TEMPLE ELEPHANT THIS MORNING HAVING IT'S MORNING BATH AND SHOWER (LITERALLY SHOWER) PEOPLE WITH BLESSINGS... WE HOWEVER JUST HUNG BACK AND WATCHED I FINALLY DEICDED TO USE THE KIDS AS AN EXCUSE AND PUT THEM IN THE WATER AND SLOWLY EDGED CLOSER TO THE ELEPHANT LYING TOTALLY SUBMERGED UNDER WATER GETTING A WASH BY HER CARETAKER... SLOWLY SLOWLY...WE EDGED CLOSER..SLOWLY, SLOWLY... UNTIL FINALLY WE GOT TO PAT HER AND THEN WATCH HER STEAL THE BOYS BANANAS MUCH TO KINGY'S DISGUST... HE HAS TAKEN TO HOLDING... NOT EATING... BUT HOLDING A BANANA IN EACH FAT LITTLE FIST.

WE WALKED UP THROUGH SOME OF THE AMAZING TEMPLES AND ENDED UP FINDING SOME CHEEKY MONKEYS AND FEEDING THEM OUR BANANAS... LATER ON OUR WALK WE CAME ACROSS SOME MORE AND THOUGH BANANALESS ONE JUMPED UP ONTO XAVO'S LAP..HE DIDNT PAT IT AS WE'VE WARNED HIM ABOUT CHEEKY MONKEY BITES BUT IT SAT THEIR CONTENT ON HIS LAP NONETHELESS.


I THINK WE WILL BE HANGING OUT HERE FOR A WEEK I COULD QUITE HAPPILY SEE MYSSELF JOINING THE WASHER WOMEN CLEANING OUR CLOTHES AND HALF SUBMERGED KEEPING MYSELF CLEAN AND COOL, THE KIDS SLIDING DOWN THE EDGE OF THE ROCKS INTO THE WATER, WATCHING JON CONVERSE WITH THE MEN IN THE SHADE OF AN ANCIENT TREE WATCHING THE WIDE RUNNING RIVER AND HANGING OUT WITH PEOPLE WHO DON'T NECCESSARILY HAVE MUCH BUT WANT FOR NOTHING. WHAT AN EXISTANCE PLEASE ANYONE COMING TO INDIA COME HERE IT IS AMAZING...


XAVIE EVEN SAID THIS MORNING HE LOVES INDIA AND WOULD LOVE TO LIVE HERE ALTHOUGH WHEN PRESSED NOT NECCESSARILY FOREVER.


XAVIE THINKS HES THE ANIMAL WISPERER AND HAS ALL ANIMALS ALL SHAPES AND SIZES COMING TO HIM FOR PATS, CHICKENS, DOGS, CATS, MONKEYS, COWS, AND ELEPHANTS....WHAT A LIFE AND KING DOESN'T KNOW WHERE HE IS BUT IS IN HEAVEN..

WE SHARE A DOUBLE BED BETWEEN FOUR.... WITH FLY NET AND ALL...... AND ARE HAPPY.


WILL KEEP YOU POSTED

LOVE THE BOYS AND BANKSIA

happy birthday to tasmagoo

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU
HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEAR TASSIE
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU.


TASSIE SORRY DID NOT WISH YOU HAPPY BIRTHDAY SOONER ARE TOTALY IN HOLIDAY MODE AND DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT TIME OF DAY IT IS LET ALONE DAY.


SO HAPPY HAPPY BIRTHDAY I LOVE YOU.

HOPE YOU HAD AN AWESOME DAY AND TRY AND ORGANISE A COUSINS NIGHT IN YOUR HONOR IM SURE THEY'D ALL LOVE IT.