Chennai to Varkala

Distance covered since last entry: 800km

Nightmare trains, beer, cricket and sunburn. These would without doubt be the main things that have characterised week two of my tour, which has been just as enjoyable as the first.

We have become quite good at exploring these massive Indian cities in a single day, and Chennai was to prove no different. First thing was to pick up our tickets from the stadium for the England match the following day - needless to say we were set upon by tuk tuk drivers the moment we walked out of our hotel, and the decision was made to go with a chap called Giri (who amusingly claimed to recognise me from the last time I was in Chennai - I played along). We got the tickets and found Giri still waiting for us outside the ground, so let him take us on a tour of the sites of the city. Chennai has some really interesting history, as you would imagine, with it being the first major white settlement on India's east coast (try and stay awake) - my highlight was seeing a copy of the 'Book of Common Prayer' from 1640! Amazing! Squad wasn't so impressed. After a few more sites, Giri pulled the tuk tuk over to fill up with petrol, for which he demanded 100 rupees for. Up until now price hadn't been discussed, so after we pressed him he demanded 1000 rupees (13 pounds). This doesn't sound like a lot considering he had been with us for 5 hours, but Squad gave him a stern talking to (some might call it a 'verbal shoeing'), and we blagged it down to 650. Nothing like ripping off a poor Indian tuk tuk driver! Chennai is oppressively hot by the way, and our room was serviced poorly by a single fan so I struggled to get to sleep. The option of sleeping 'au naturel' is out of the question until Squad leaves.

The big day arrived! England vs South Africa at the wonderfully renovated Chepauk Stadium. I am pleased they have worked on the stadiums for the World Cup, because I imagine they were pretty grimey before. They still don't feel the need to provide toilet paper though - apparently a hose and bucket will suffice! We were seriously excited, and arrived at the ground for the gates to be opened at 7.30am. Our excitement was immediately deflated when security told us that we weren't allowed cameras in the ground. We put up a bit of a fight, but left defeated and returned to the hotel to drop off the cameras. I have vowed to sneak my camera into the next match!
I won't reel off the details of the match, because I'm sure most of you will be aware that it was a cracker, with England scraping to a narrow win. Indians don't seem to choose a team to support - they just got mental whenever anything happens. England lost two wickets in the first over, and they were all loving it, but then when England won they all came racing over to us with hugs and high-fives! Great scenes! Curry for dinner (obviously): my bowels are still holding up brilliantly by the way, just in case you were wondering.

From one massive city to another - we got the early morning train to Bangalore. It was a total mess from start to finish. Our tickets weren't "confirmed", so we had to go into the 'General Class' of the train with all the riff-raff. Everyone is obviously aware of this, so arrive extra early to get a seat - we turned up 20 minutes before departure and were crammed in, standing up next to the toilet with a load of young Indian blokes. You can imagine how much they were loving being in a confinded space with us, and how much we were hating it. All the usual stuff - giggling, whispering and staring. Squad opened his eyes at one point to find one of them with a camera phone about 6 inches from his face. He was also refered to as "super glamour"! If only the Indian girls liked us this much! It turned out that the train was so full because it was a Monday morning, and everyone was heading to work. We eventually squeezed into some seats and arrived into Bangalore at midday.

Two hours of standing

Bangalore seems like a pretty nice place - it's oddly Western, and sometimes you can forget that you are in India (that is until a begger approaches you, or you breathe in the overwhelming smell of garbage and human waste). Now I'm supposed to be on a serious budget, but I have to admit that this night in Bangalore I might have overspent slightly. We went onto a rooftop bar, sat outside, and had some swanky food, a few beers, then a nightcap whiskey - the bill was 45 pounds, which is massive in India, and I felt suitably guilty for my brazen spending.

Big spenders: drunk in Bangalore

There isn't a whole lot in the way of 'sites' in the centre of Bangalore, so we wandered aimlessly for a while, before deciding to go 10 pin bowling. Squad was giving it the bigg'un, which got me really pumped up to beat him. I bowled two of the finest games you are ever likely to see, and handed out  2-0 drubbing. I really hit my straps in the second game and bowled a PB 165, including a turkey (Squad will question the legitamacy of the turkey, but ignore anything he says. He's just bitter). Overnight sleeper train to Cochin that evening. We took a little bit of 'liquid entertainment' on the train with us, which made it a little bit more fun, and much easier to fall asleep.

Woke up at about 7am and took my first look at Kerala out the door (interesting fact: 'Kerala' means 'Land of coconuts'). I could tell straightaway that I was going to like it, but that it was going to be awfully hot and humid (two things my body deals with badly). Spent some time exploring the 'Fort' area of the city - it's lovely, but very small and you can easily see it all in a couple of hours. A couple of hours was all I could manage anyway because I was hotter than I have ever been in my life. We're talking 'sweat dripping off my nose' hot. Had a freshly caught squid for dinner.

The Chinese Fishing Nets in Fort Cochin

The next day we did a 'backwaters tour' - which is basically sitting on a small boat all day going round the little streams and tributaries that are all over the Kerala landscape. This was our first proper contact with other travelers, and it was interesting to talk to them. There were quite a few American blokes, some Norweigans, some Philipino women, and two smoking hot Swedish girls (I had a total flirty banter fail with them all day). The heat got the better of my in the evening when we were trying to find somewhere to have dinner, and I had a bit of  rage. Some chicken noodles calmed me down, then we went to a bar to watch the cricket.

Fancy another story about a horrible train journey? Good. Well here it is. Varkala was our next destination, and it takes 4 hours by train to get there - our journey took 8 and half. First of all we got in the wrong carriage, so had to stand up. Cue Indian blokes speaking to us. Highlight questions was me being asked 'Do you like love?' and Squad being asked 'Are you a Communist?'. I bought a chicken byriani just so I would have food in my mouth so couldn't answer their endless questions. Anyway, they were doing some repairs to the line, which meant that the train had to go very slowly, and for some reason had to stop for about 30 minutes at each station. In the end I gave up my seat and sat in the doorway - the fans in the budget class are ineffectual at everything except blowing hot air around the carriage. I kept my morale suprisingly high though, even when I got off the train to find that England had been beaten by Bangladesh.

A typical interrogation on a train

 Varkala is bloody amazing, and our first day here was one of my favourites sinces I've been away. It is a small town built on the edge of a sheer cliff, with a beach at the bottom. We spent the morning sunbathing, frolicking in the waves and throwing a tennis ball about. Most people seem to be Western, so my pasty white skin didn't stand out so much. Despite getting out the sun at about midday, both of us managed to turn a bright shade of pink and spent the rest of the day reading, watching cricket, drinking beer and liberally applying aftersun.

Varkala

So there you go, as promised, nightmare trains, beer, cricket and sunburn! Now if you'll excuse me, there's a hammock I need to go and lie in...enjoy your day at work!