Bangalore is the first place so far where we have decided to extend our stay. What was supposed to be two days of quick fire city energy turned into nearly five, and we just loved it. A few people we had met on our trip had talked about the wonders of Bangalore - the quantity of microbreweries, the great cafe culture, the buzz of a tech hub and the famed traffic jams. Bangalore is known as India’s ‘Silicon Valley’ and has topped the global list of fastest growing cities by 2033, in terms of urbanization, economic growth and innovation. The GDP of the area is around US $300 billion, and is responsible for 40% of India’s tech exports! For context, NZ sits at around $220 billion, and California at $4.132 trillion. With a population of 14 billion, Bangalore is India’s fourth biggest city (after Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata). In 2014 the city was officially renamed Bengaluru to reflect its original Kannada name and to shed the anglicized form used during British colonial rule, but we have used Bangalore as this is what is most commonly used in day-to-day conversation. 

Here, once again, we are reminded of the dizzying and dazzling diversity of India. The reminders are subtle in some ways and glaringly obvious in others. I can happily romp around in shorts and a singlet, where there are other places we have been where I always have my knees, shoulders and chest covered to feel comfortable. I started writing this in a cafe that would not be out of place in Melbourne or Auckland, and the pizza we had for lunch could have easily cost $30 USD in a San Francisco neighbourhood. Most people here speak English, and it seems that at least every second person we talk to works in tech. The metro is so easy to navigate, and all our auto/moto rides are booked on an app, along with our washing, our hostel check in and most ordering in restaurants. We needed a new adapter and toothpaste, and it arrived at our hostel in 15 minutes after ordering on an app. We based ourselves in an upscale neighborhood called Indiranager, and this did mean our time here leant towards lattes and larger, the city of course has its fair share of temples, markets and slums.

Getting recommendations for places to visit in Bangalore was easy, we had met a few native Bangalorians on our travels who sent us on our way with lists of sites, breweries, bookstores and neighbourhoods. We ticked off most of these, with the exception of the “sites”. That’s right, we didn’t visit any temples, palaces, churches or similar while in Bangalore. Instead we whiled-away the days wandering the neighbourhoods, browsing galleries and shops, eating lots of yummy food, and almost “pretending” to live in this wonderful city. We felt like the people we met here were some of the friendliest so far and we had lots of great conversations over shared tables at breakfast or a bar. While writing this I looked back through my camera roll to remind me of what exactly we did and what to talk about, and although we didn’t visit any palaces or temples, there were plenty of noteworthy highlights. 

It won’t come as a surprise to anyone that we ate our way through Bangalore, and not just of the Indian variety! We were treated to some really quality global cuisine from the Middle East, Italy and Myanmar. It was nice to step away from the day to day dosa and even though it blew out our budget a bit it was still cheaper than eating out at home. For example, we went to the upscale, very well reviewed Burma Burma and shared a soup as a starter, and then had three mid sized share plates for mains. It came to 2,368 rupee, or $50 NZD, where at home I would guess that meal would have cost at least $100 NZD. Bangalore also has amazing beer, and Josh especially definitely tested this out!! Toit was a local brewery that we loved, and was also where we parked up to watch the IPL game (more on that later). Sadly no Hazy IPA’s, but lots of great IPA’s, dark beers and lagers. It was really cool to see these buzzing locations full of young people out socializing after work, showing us a different side of India. Bangalore also has amazing Indian food in abundance, and we were particularly taken with Rameshwaram Cafe and Mavalli Tiffin Rooms (MTR). I think we visited Rameshwaram three or four times. It was kind of like a food court in style, where you placed your order at a counter or booth, and then got tickets that you would take to the relevant stations. Although more expensive than your typical mom and pop type corner place, the dosa, idli, gulab jamun and coffee that we had here was absolutely top notch. It also made it easy to try new things, and meet people, as you ate your food standing around communal high tables. Rameshwaram is a bit of an institution in Bangalore, and we are very pleased we tried it!! We also loved MTR, which has been around since 1924. This super popular eatery serves legendary south indian comfort food, and we especially loved their specialties of Rava Idli (steamed semolina cakes made with a mic of yoghurt, coriander, cashew nuts, curry leaves and mustard seeds) and Chandrahara (their trademark dessert of deep fried maida flour pastry topped with a custard like liquid made of khoa). 

We have unintentionally timed our trip to India with the Indian Premier League (IPL), the professional Twenty20 cricket league here in India. Featuring 10 city or state based teams it is the most popular and richest cricket league in the world! Lots of our New Zealand Black Caps come over to play for Indian IPL teams during the season. I think we have mentioned how cricket is a constant conversation starter for us here once people find out we are from New Zealand, so following the IPL was a natural next step! We’ve pledged our allegiance to the Bangalore team, Royal Challengers Bengaluru, and have spent a few nights now watching the cricket and really enjoying it. Watching RCB crush Chennai at a bar in Bangalore was such a fun experience, very similar to watching rugby at home!! Stay tuned to find out if we are brave enough to still support the RCB as we head North…

Other highlights included a sundowner beer from a 13th floor bar where we could see Bangalore spread into the distance, the many bookstores around Church Street absolutely stacked from literal floor to ceiling with books, a BJJ class for Josh, and trying chicken burgers from the locally famed Empire. Slotting into this city and experiencing a small slice of life here was such a joy.

One morning at Rameshwaram we met a lovely couple, Tushaar and Ishani, about the same age as us that we got talking to and exchanged details. Tushaar’s family is from Punjab and Ishani is from Rajasthan, and they have been married for three years now. They both work in the city, Tushaar as a Product Owner and Ishani as a lawyer. As we were planning our Saturday night we thought they might like to meet up for a drink, as Ishani had mentioned that the neighbourhood we wanted to visit was one of her favourites. They sorted us a reservation and we met at The Bier Club - a three story craft beer bar in the heart of Koramangala. We spent hours chatting, enjoying sharing stories about our respective lives and reflecting on the differences and similarities. It was so special to meet a couple similar age to us, living and working in Bangalore, and I’m sure we will keep in touch and maybe meet again somewhere. 

We also finally visited a doctor for my chronic sore throat and got onto antibiotics which worked a treat after about two days. The medical system was super easy to navigate, I had my appointment at 4:30 PM, and by 8:30 PM I had the results of my blood test back and antibiotics onboard. Super efficient and really cheap too compared to New Zealand healthcare (although this should be covered by our travel insurance). 

Finally, Bangalore is known for its traffic. The infrastructure has struggled to keep up with the growing population, even with efforts like their rapid Metro construction. We didn’t find it too bad, mainly choosing to travel outside of peak hours. Never did we notice this more than our manic rush to the train station on our final night. I had come straight from the pharmacy and Josh had headed back to get our bags, and we both bribed our respective drivers with extra cash to weave through the traffic and run some marginal lights to get us there on time! After a literal sprint upstairs past platforms one to seven, we jumped on the train as it started moving, with racing hearts and lost breath. We vowed to never leave it that tight again, and found our beds for the ride to Hampi thanking the traffic gods that we had somehow made it on the train. 

Our days of rest and relaxation in Wayanad had come to an end and with it our time in the state of Kerala was over. I was sad to say goodbye to Kerala, the people in this part of India are so laid back and friendly, and the food is amazing; Kerala parathas are our favourite Indian flatbreads so far. The meat here is also delicious and a lot more accessible than in much of India, especially b**f (beef is often spelt like this on menus). This is down to their more relaxed following of Hinduism and there being a higher percentage of Christians. 

With each new state in India comes different languages, cultural differences, different religions, and different state laws. We have struggled to learn much of the many languages spoken in India as each time we have a few phrases down, we have to start again. So far we have come across Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Malalayam and Kananda and we have only been to 3/28 states in India!! 

We caught a very early bus from 4am - 9am onwards to our next destination, the ancient royal city of Mysore in the state of Karnataka. By some miracle I managed to sleep quite well on this windy bus while Alice spent the time tossing and turning and looking for tigers out the window. Mysore was once the home of a royal dynasty which ruled the Kingdom of Mysore from the 14th century until the 20th century. During their reign, the Wadiyar family built several palaces including the grand Mysore Palace which is now one of the most famous tourist attractions in India, after the Taj Mahal, attracting around 2-3 million visitors per year.

Although we had an average sleep, we were very excited to be in a new state and to explore this ancient city. Along with being rich with royal history, it is also famous for being the origin of the Ashtanga style of yoga which has been hugely influential on yoga in the west. This was another one of the “cow cities” in India, and cows ruled the streets, with even buses giving way to them. We were vibing this city immediately, the streets were dotted with palm trees and outside of the yoga area we were staying in, the city seemed to be full of friendly locals.

While eating some of the best dosa of our lives (I will talk about the food soon), we were invited for dinner with a local family (we didn’t end up taking up this offer as we ran out of time). There was an extremely chaotic photoshoot situation with some of the vendors in the local market who had their first experience using a real camera. Sanjay (age 14), who was the most excited to use our camera, insisted I send him the photos on WhatsApp immediately, and I had to explain to him that I can’t access them on the SD card from my phone. When I did eventually send him the photos on WhatsApp, he excitedly called me to say thanks.

The food we ate in Mysore was truly exceptional, and we planned our eating well here. When you only have 2 days in a place, there are limited meal opportunities and without proper planning it can be easy to squander these. We had done some reasonably thorough research before reaching Mysore and it paid off big time here. The dosa place I mentioned earlier served the most incredible dosa, crunchy on the outside and deliciously soft and fluffy on the inside, along with south indian style filter coffees of course. We’re not sure how we will cope once we head north and the coffee and dosas disappear.

After this breakfast experience, we went for lunch at another local spot famous for samosas. We didn't expect it to top our breakfast, and we were in for a big surprise. This place was on another level. There was a constant queue of locals lining up here at this hole in the wall samosa shop (also serving varieties of chaat and puri)  tucked into a busy alleyway. Behind the counter there were three guys, one was filling the samosas at lightning speed, while the other guy prepared and cooked them in a pan filled with oil, and the third guy skillfully popped the Panipuri open with his thumb. We sat down behind the counter and began a five course meal of Indian delicacies. I can’t really find the words to describe the food here, so I will let the pictures do the talking. The man cooking the samosas explained each dish to us and he smiled when he saw our reactions eating his food. Afterwards we tried to tip by leaving without change, but they wouldn’t let us and quite literally forced us to take our change. In total, this five course eating extravaganza cost us 170₹ (about $3NZD).

We really loved our time in Mysore and I wish we could have stayed a bit longer. It was a great introduction to the friendly people and amazing food we would encounter throughout the rest of Karnataka. However, we were very excited for our next stop and our first major Indian city, the Silicon Valley of India - Bangalore.

I have a secret. One I’m not particularly proud of. Throughout this trip we have been getting lots of travel advice from ChatGPT. Yes, the water guzzling privacy concerning carbon consuming large language model. And yes, I am aware it seriously doesn’t align with our values from an environmental perspective. Usually, our “friend” as we call it, gives us great ideas of places to stay, helps us understand the history of sites we are visiting and outlines the most efficient travel routes between places. We don’t rely on it for precise details, but to give us ideas, it’s perfect. When we consulted our friend about hill stations in Kerala, we included in our prompt that we wanted to avoid the tourist hot spots of Ooty or Munnar. We were nervous about finding another town like Ella in Sri Lanka - we wanted somewhere a little more off the beaten track.

Enter Wayanad. The area was described to us as quieter than its well known counterparts, and famed for its tea estates, forests, waterfalls and walks. Everyone we talked to was surprised to hear we were heading there, but we took it in our stride and felt even a little boastful that we had found somewhere more off the beaten track. 

Over the last few weeks I had started to feel a bit run down, I had a pretty constant sore throat and was more tired than usual. I was dreading the overnight bus, as there’s nothing like a broken sleep to catapult that kind of run down into a full on cold. We boarded the bus in Kochi at 1 AM after an hour of delays, and both fell asleep quite easily in our double berth. The road to Wayanad was windy with hairpin bends and steep hills, not exactly conducive to a good sleep. On arrival we got an auto to our hostel, and a stroke of luck meant that our room was actually available so we could happily tuck up for another few hours of sleep, then I kept resting for most of the day. Our hostel had a pool, so we spent a few hours down there, before a wild rainstorm pushed us up to the hostel communal area to write, read, nap and play table tennis. 

This is the part where I would love to tell you that the next day we were up at 5 AM hiking to the top of Chembra Peak, but in reality the next few days passed with much of the same. We spent a lot of time on a particular couch in the common area, and I enjoyed a few 10+ hour sleeps in a row. We swam, did a few short workouts (including the therabands for all those invested), planned more of our trip and met some really great people. I especially needed the rest and although it was hard not to feel guilty about “wasting” our time in the hills, I felt much better for it. 

The lack of access to amenities here was pretty tricky. We were staying outside of the small town of Vythiri, and although we had chosen this place as it was quieter, we still struggled to find things to do or places to see. It was quite spread out, meaning that we had about an hour and a half on the bike to reach different places. We just didn’t really have the energy required to make the most of this destination. 

We rented a bike one day and spent a couple of hours riding around the picture perfect tea plantations, finding ourselves accidentally at a very fancy resort for a coffee. Usually they don’t let in ‘outsiders’ but they kindly welcomed us in for a coffee with a view. There were also a number of walks in the area, but unfortunately most of them were out of our price range. I understand charging tourists to access these places, but it’s hard to swallow when the cost is double that of our nightly accommodation budget. This paired with my sickness meant our longest walk was an hour-long joint around a local lake, which was very developed and not exactly the serene nature experience we were hoping for. One of the highlights was when a fellow guest at the hostel ordered us dinner (delivered) from a local restaurant, and we had our final taste of the famed Kerala beef curry and Parotta. Here in Kerala they are much less strict about not eating beef. We also washed this meal down with a bottle of fresh toddy - local palm wine made from the fermented sap of palm trees. It was surprisingly good, and great to try this before we head further north where it is less common. In the end, we left Wayanad a day earlier than we had planned, adding a stop in Mysore on our way to Bangalore. 

So - what was my final verdict on our Chat GPT suggested stop? I think that touristy places are touristy for a reason. If we went to Munnar or Ooty, we would have had coffee, walks and views on our doorstep. Somewhere like Wayanad requires more effort, and at this specific point, we just didn’t have the energy for that. It probably also required a bit more money - being able to easily pay for the walks, nice accommodation and the luxury of a driver would have totally changed the game. I think Chat GPT knew what we wanted and gave us a good suggestion, but it was an important reminder that we need to research well and work out how we are going to spend our time at these off the beaten track locations, and if they are within our budget. 

P.S I also want to say…  we are not using ‘our friend’ for these blogs! I think with writing once you start using AI it can be very hard to go back, so we’ve been pretty strict on ourselves with this!!

It was a busy morning of travel starting with a short tuk tuk to the train station where we hopped on a train to Kochi (which only cost us $1.40NZD for a comfortable 3.5 hour train ride). Once we arrived at the railway station in Kochi, we jumped on the metro line for one stop, then after a 10 minute walk with all our bags we jumped on a ferry for about 20 minutes, arriving at our final destination for the day around lunchtime. 

Fort Kochi is a region in Kochi, which is a city and the largest metropolitan area in the southern state of Kerala. This place was reminiscent of Galle in Sri Lanka (we wrote a blog post about Galle previously), in the sense that it was colonised by the Portuguese, Dutch, and finally the British. Much of the architecture here is colonial and includes some of the oldest churches in India, built by the Portuguese in the 1500s.

Fort Kochi has a long messy history, however in modern times it has become a haven for tourists looking for yoga classes, boutique shopping, art galleries, and artsy cafes all within reach of small sandy beaches. Most of these things are right up our alley (maybe not the boutique shopping, but we can window shop). It is also an important centre of Keralan arts (traditional and contemporary) and a standout place to see Kathakali and Kalaripayattu.

Kathakali is a traditional form of Indian Classical Dance. It is usually based on the Hindu epics the Ramayana, the Mahabharata and the Puranas. Drummers and singers accompany the actors, who tell the story through their precise movements, particularly mudras (hand gestures) and facial expressions. We went to see a show in the evening and it is a unique experience. The performers are all men taking on both male and female roles, and they are precisely painted with beautiful makeup so that their many facial expressions during the performance look otherworldly.

After the Kathakali show we stayed in the theatre to watch a Kalaripayattu performance. This is an ancient form of martial arts taught in Kerala, and is thought to be the forerunner of all martial arts and as ancient as 3000 years old. We had no idea what to expect from this performance, and were shocked when we saw two of the masters engage in an intense sword fight including flips and spins using real swords (although they were blunted). Many of their techniques are inspired by animal movements, and also seem to borrow from yoga poses. One of the performers was a young boy of about 9 years old who was spinning a stick very proficiently and doing some of the simpler movements. They would send him out to show some of the more basic techniques, and then one of the masters would come out to show the advanced techniques. It was really cool to see the progression from a child to a master who has trained their whole life in this ancient martial art. After the show, they asked if anyone wanted to come up on stage to learn some moves, so up I went. They taught me some basic grappling defense techniques such as how to defend when someone headlocks you from behind. I was in for a surprise when he demoed this on me, as it consists of a punch to the balls (very effective technique 😂).

We managed to find a local yoga instructor who offered private classes. His price for a private class was out of our budget, and when we told him this he said he would do it for about 1/5th of the price as “Money shouldn’t be a barrier to Yoga”. He was a young guy and was incredibly strong and flexible. The class was hard, but very rewarding and he gave me some tips on how to do a headstand (now I can finally be that cringy tourist doing headstands on the beach). He also gave us some great recommendations on where we should go after Kochi.

At one of the local art cafes (literally art galleries which are also cafes), we saw a painting that really caught our eyes, particularly Alice’s eyes as she teared up when she first saw it. A gorgeous portrait of five women wearing sarees painted by someone called Ramani. It was out of our budget by a lot, but Alice asked the gallery manager for this mysterious Ramani’s contact details and sent a lovely message. After five minutes Alice got a phone call from the artist who turned out to be a local grandmother in her eighties. She invited us to her penthouse suite in a building looking out over the harbour to see more of her art, and discuss purchasing the painting. We were given a full tour of her penthouse suite to see her paintings, and then driven by her driver in an actual car to see her gallery. Sidenote, being in a car is a real rarity for us these days. In the last two months I think we have been in about two cars. 

Anyway back to the art story, it turns out she was the matriarch of a wealthy family in Kochi and her children are spread out around the world working important jobs. She spends her days painting now and her art is amazing. We were seriously considering splashing out and buying this painting to send back home. She did also lower the price for us and it would have cost around $950NZD, which is way more than we could afford to spend. But we both loved it and really want to bring some art home with us to fill the house we don’t own yet. We did go back to the gallery the next day to look at it one more time, and eventually decided it was too expensive and we couldn’t really justify spending the money sadly. I’m sure we will find some more amazing art on this trip which will be a bit more affordable.

It is a real struggle when visiting a city to get a sense of what it is like when you only have a few days there. We only really spent time in Fort Kochi which is a tiny part of Kochi, and I would have loved to explore further afield but we didn’t have time. From what I saw though, I definitely liked Kochi as a city and would love to go back there one day. Now it was time to leave the coast behind and head into the rolling hills of tea plantations and waterfalls where we could hopefully find some trekking.

Kerala is famed for its varied, beautiful nature. We’d already been lucky enough to experience the palm tree fringed train tracks, cliff lined beaches and vivid sunsets, and we were excited to venture deeper into the backwaters of this special state. ‘God’s Own Country’ is the motto of Kerala, and as our train got closer to Munroe Island it was easy to see why. The Kerala backwaters are a network of canals, rivers, lakes and lagoons that stretch for over 900 kilometres through the coastal areas of the state. Lots of visitors experience these on a houseboat, but that was slightly out of the budget for this trip. Instead, we were heading to a quiet place called Munroe Island, at the top of Lake Ashtamudi. From Varkala, it was a short 45 minute train journey to a local station where we hopped in an auto rickshaw to get to our home stay. The first special touch of this island (and there were a few!) was finding the father of the family we were staying with waiting at the roadside with his canoe, ready to take us over the river to the accommodation. The place was accessible by road, but it was so nice of them to make sure we had a shorter and much more scenic arrival! The home stay was a small family affair with a few rooms above the main house. The place was run by the wonderful Vijeesh, with boat trips by his father and cooking by his mother. 

On our first night we had a shared dinner with the other guests, before being asked if we wanted to attend a concert at a local school. Of course we all said yes! We walked as a group down the road to the local school where we could hear the music blaring through the speakers from a few hundred meters away. It was very cute watching the primary aged students all dressed up doing their versions of traditional dances. Everyone was involved and it was very special to be included in the local village community this way. When we got back, Vijeesh very proudly told us that it was his niece who had been front and center, definitely one of the stars of the show!

The main attraction on the island is a tour of the backwaters and at 5 AM the next morning we were up and into the canoe with Vijeesh’s Dad. Vijeesh had the genius idea of putting thin mattresses into the canoe so people can sit sideways (perpendicular to the boat) and relax, as opposed to having to sit up on the raised seats with no back support the entire time. This worked a treat and we were both totally relaxed, just enjoying watching the world go by. Rumour has it that I may have fallen asleep, but I will deny that one… I was just resting my eyes! We rode through small canals and waterways out to Ashtamudi Lake, where of course we went through the compulsory mangrove tunnel. It was interesting to hear how the area used to be primarily used for rice production, but due to climate change and increased salinization, they can no longer grow rice here. We saw a lot of prawn farms on our boat trip, which is now the primary export of the area. The boat trip was very scenic and beautiful and it's clear to see why this part of the state is so world famous. Spending a few days on these canals in a house boat would be pretty special, but it was equally cool to get to travel through some of the tiny waterways that went through local villages. 

That evening we decided we should really see a little more of the island, so we borrowed the push bikes from the home stay to head to a dinner spot Josh had found on google maps. On the way we could see that sunset was fast approaching, and we saw a sign that said “view point”. So of course, we grabbed a warm 7 Up from the small store we were next to, and ventured to find the view point and hopefully catch the sunset! We biked down a series of big hills which seemed a little counter productive, and didn’t find a viewpoint. We had enjoyed the ride though, and the 7 Up was appreciated on the bike back up! It added a few extra kilometers to our ride, and with darkness basically upon us, we found a different spot for dinner. We got our bikes under cover, and then it absolutely started bucketing down. Some of the heaviest rain I have ever seen in my life! The restaurant kindly obliged our request to sit in a covered area outside, so we could really take in the storm. The rain came and went, and there was some incredibly impressive thunder and lightning! Now we are into March we are experiencing the summer rains, which occur in the months before monsoon. It stays hot, and the rain usually passes in half an hour or so. Once we had finished eating we took a break in the rain to bike home, and somehow made it back to our accommodation dry! 

The next day we hopped on the local train for the three and a half hour ride down to the coastal city of Kochi, which cost us all of 70 rupee, or $1.41 NZD!! Munroe Island was a great antidote to the development and intense tourism of Varkala, and it was nice to have a quiet day enjoying this beautiful corner of the state.