Southern Highlands & Backwaters Trail

Kerala end to end, unhurried. Twelve days that begin with the gold-plated gopuram at Padmanabhaswamy and the red laterite cliff at Varkala, slow to walking pace on the Kuttanad canals, then climb to Wayanad’s…

Length: 12 days, 11 nights
From: ₹2,98,000 per person
Pace: Gentle
Stops: 7
Best months: July to August, October to March

The route

7 stops over 12 days

Thiruvananthapuram
Varkala
Alleppey
Kumarakom
Kochi
Thrissur
Wayanad

Two-day Ayurvedic course prescribed by a resident physician at Varkala
A night aboard a teak kettuvallam on the Kuttanad canals
Kathakali and chenda classes at Kerala Kalamandalam, Cheruthuruthy
Edakkal petroglyphs, cut into rock six thousand years ago
Cooking a fish moilee with a Syrian Christian family

Day by day

What actually happens

Length: 12 days
Stops: 7
Pace: Gentle
From: ₹2,98,000

1

Thiruvananthapuram

Arrive Thiruvananthapuram

You arrive at Thiruvananthapuram International, ten minutes from the sea. Our representative meets you and hands over phones, permits and a printed day-by-day. If you land in daylight, walk out to Shanghumugham beach for the sunset; if not, the kitchen will send up appam and stew whatever the hour. Nothing is scheduled until tomorrow morning.

Night: Vivanta Trivandrum
2B

Thiruvananthapuram

Padmanabhaswamy and the Napier

Men wear a mundu to enter Padmanabhaswamy, women a sari; both can be hired at the gate. Inside, Vishnu reclines eighteen feet long, visible through three doors. Afterwards the Napier Museum, an 1880 Indo-Saracenic building with natural air conditioning, and the Sri Chitra gallery’s Raja Ravi Varma canvases. Late afternoon at Kovalam’s lighthouse beach; catamarans come in around five.

Night: Vivanta Trivandrum
3B D

Varkala

North to the Red Cliff

An hour and a half up the coast to Varkala, where laterite cliffs drop straight to Papanasam beach and mineral springs run out of the rock face. Janardanaswamy temple is two thousand years old and still receives ancestral rites at the waterline each morning. Your consultation with the resident Ayurvedic physician happens this afternoon: pulse, questions, a prescribed course.

Night: Kadaltheeram Ayurvedic Beach Resort
4B L D

Varkala

Two Treatments and a Backwater

Treatments run morning and late afternoon — abhyanga with warmed sesame oil, then shirodhara, a thread of oil on the forehead for forty minutes. Between them, a boat on Kappil lake where it meets the sea at Edava, and the Portuguese-built Anjengo fort, taken by the British in 1684. Dinner is prescribed rather than chosen, and it is very good.

Night: Kadaltheeram Ayurvedic Beach Resort
5B L D

Alleppey

Aboard a Kettuvallam

Three hours north to Alleppey, where your kettuvallam is waiting — teak and coir, two cabins, a cook who shops as you go. You cast off at noon and drift through Kuttanad, farmland two metres below sea level, past duck herds a thousand strong. Karimeen fries on deck at eight. The boat moors for the night; the frogs take over.

Night: Overnight on board
6B L D

Kumarakom

Kumarakom and the Village Canals

Off the big boat mid-morning and into a country canoe, which fits where the houseboat cannot: coir-twisting yards, toddy tapped from coconut palms at seven, a lime-and-chilli shop the size of a wardrobe. At Kumarakom, the bird sanctuary holds Indian darter, purple heron and, from November, Siberian visitors. Tonight is a lakeside room with a fan and a mosquito net.

Night: Coconut Lagoon, Kumarakom
7B

Kochi

Fort Kochi by Water

You reach Kochi by mid-morning and cross the harbour by ferry rather than road — three rupees, ten minutes, pelicans on the pilings. Fort Kochi is walkable: the Chinese nets at Vasco da Gama Square, St Francis Church, Santa Cruz Basilica. Spice warehouses on Bazaar Road still smell of ginger from the street. Kathakali make-up at five, performance at six.

Night: Old Harbour Hotel, Fort Kochi
8B L

Kochi

A Morning in the Kitchen

A cooking morning with a Syrian Christian family in Mattancherry: how a fish moilee is built on coconut milk and green chilli, why the curry leaves go in last, what makes a good appam batter ferment overnight. Eat what you cook. The afternoon is free for the Paradesi Synagogue and the Kashi Art Cafe, or a nap under a punkah.

Night: Old Harbour Hotel, Fort Kochi
9B

Thrissur

Kalamandalam and the Temple Town

Ninety minutes north to Thrissur, Kerala’s cultural capital, where the Vadakkunnathan temple sits on a green hill in the middle of a roundabout. At Kerala Kalamandalam in Cheruthuruthy you sit in on classes: Kathakali eye exercises, Mohiniyattam footwork, a chenda drummer working a single rhythm for an hour. The Punnathur Kotta elephant sanctuary is close by.

Night: Hyatt Regency Thrissur
10B D

Wayanad

Up to the Wayanad Plateau

Four hours north-east through Nilambur teak — the oldest planted teak plantation on earth, sown in 1840 — and up the Thamarassery ghat’s nine hairpins. Wayanad sits at 900 metres and grows coffee, pepper and paddy in the same valley. Afternoon walk on the estate, then dinner: kappa with fish curry, and a Wayanad robusta afterwards.

Night: Vythiri Village Resort
11B L

Wayanad

Edakkal Caves and Tholpetty

A steep half-hour climb to the Edakkal caves, where petroglyphs of human figures and wheels were cut into the rock between six and eight thousand years ago. Down for lunch, then the afternoon safari at Tholpetty, the northern range of Wayanad Wildlife Sanctuary — gaur, Malabar giant squirrel, elephants in the bamboo. Sunset from the Banasura dam wall.

Night: Vythiri Village Resort
12B

Kannur

Down to Kannur and Departure

The last morning is slow — coffee on the verandah, the mist off the plateau by nine. Then the descent to Kannur International, two and a half hours, for your flight out; Kozhikode and Kochi both work as alternatives if your routing prefers them. We hand you a small parcel of estate coffee and cardamom for the flight home.

Night: -