The train got into Alappuzha, aka Alleppey, around 9pm and after vegetable samosas and two strawberry lassis (yoghurt drink) at a stall on the forecourt I ambled off to look for a bed.
Being dark I could smell the canals before I could see them and having never been to Venice cannot compare the two but doubted George Clooney was going to come round a bend on a gondola singing the Cornetto song.
Alappuzha is the gateway to a watery landscape of lakes and rivers and streams upon which people still live on houseboats built without using one nail and after a night in a steamy room, mosquitoes buzzing, I headed out to look at the Venice of the East (although I do seem to recall Suzhou in China claiming the same title for their city) before catching an afternoon boat to the boonies.
Being dark I could smell the canals before I could see them and having never been to Venice cannot compare the two but doubted George Clooney was going to come round a bend on a gondola singing the Cornetto song.
Alappuzha is the gateway to a watery landscape of lakes and rivers and streams upon which people still live on houseboats built without using one nail and after a night in a steamy room, mosquitoes buzzing, I headed out to look at the Venice of the East (although I do seem to recall Suzhou in China claiming the same title for their city) before catching an afternoon boat to the boonies.