Noel packed and ready to board the houseboat. Our trip specification said "1 bedroom houseboat"; The company supplied their standard 3 bedroom boat with a 3 person crew! Captain, cook and guide, although in reality they all seemed to swap roles. We were certainly not short of space!
The rivers (38 of them) are the lifeblood of the area. Fishing, washing both clothes and people, water supply for crops as well as transportation of goods and people made the Backwaters essential for life! The first part of our tour was down the main artery that drain a large lake, flowing towards the ocean!
{Photo left} Lenore is entering the lounge / diner from the hallway that ran the length of the boat. Kitchen, A/C compressors and stand-by AC power generator were at the rear. Flushing toilets, A/C, hot showers and large comfortable beds as well as ceiling fans made the houseboats quite luxurious.
Our Captain Alexander used an umbrella as a sun shade.
Thousands of ducks being farmed by two men in boats.
From their small boats they use calls and a long thin pole to direct lead ducks.
The evening before we saw a smaller group of ducks being led home by a single farmer. They crossed the main channel (about 200M wide) in front of our boat and then swam a kM or more up one side of the river. The farmer provided gentle guidance to the lead duck.
We were travelling at the end of the rice season, and it appeared to be fully harvested. In some areas the grains were being dried, bagged and transported to places where it could be loaded onto trucks. In a number of places the stubble was being burnt causing significant haze.
They certainly try to maximise the load onto boats and trucks.
{Photo left} This was the "red team" loading 2 trucks. Near by the blue team was at work.
In the lower or downstream areas new rice had recently been planted.
{Photo left}And in the middle area of the main channel, we saw huge areas of flooded fields. This photo shows one of the places where the river bank can be opened to allow water to flow into the lower fields. At one location we saw a pump removing water from a newly planted field.
The Christian Church and the Catholic denomination has a significant presence in Kerala. Catholic Schools are literally everywhere especially in the Backwaters.
[According to 2011 Census of India figures, 54.73% of Kerala's residents are Hindus, 26.56% are Muslims, 18.38% are Christians, and the remaining 0.32% follows other religion or no religion. Various tribal people in Kerala have retained various religious beliefs of their ancestors.]
We pulled to the river side in the evening (as the sun was setting) and we were soon joined by 2 other company boats to share a 240Vac outlet; saves running the noisy generators.
Over night it rained quite heavily leaving pools in the burnt rice fields.
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