Quilon Travel Guide

 Willettsworld Says:  Mukkada Bazaar is a series of parallel streets with spice warehouses, metal merchants, rope makers... all busy loading and unloading their goods on brilliantly decorated trucks. It's a hive of activity and well worth exploring. 

 Willettsworld Says:  This colourful market is just to the west of the Mukkada Bazaar and features shops with nicely organised and colourful fruit and veg displays plus trucks (and even auto-rickshaws) fully laden with bananas. Well worth a visit. 

 Willettsworld Says:  You'll probably pass by this small cemetery with a small chapel when you get off/on the tour boat to go along the Backwaters as it's along the small road that leads to the lake. 

 Willettsworld Says:

 Willettsworld Says:  This is an unusual shaped building with a small shrine in the middle that embraces a Hindu style of worship within a Christian setting. This is because it is dedicated to a patron saint from neighbouring Tamil Nadu. 

 Willettsworld Says:  As we neared Kollam, and so neared the end of our Backwaters Tour, we passed by this rather surprising and revealing statue of the Goddess of Light on Ashtamudi Lake. She's bearing quite a lot to the world! 

 Willettsworld Says:  Along the way down to Kollam we passed by several modern and pretty churches but not many temples. 

 Willettsworld Says:  I had seen these Chinese fishing nets in Kochi and thought they were only to be found there, so it was a big surprise to see them along the river in the Backwaters. We went past a whole load of them, in a line either side of us, as we passed by some kind of power station... 

 Willettsworld Says:  I did my Backwaters Tour from Alappuzha (Alleppey) to Kollam and it was a fabulous day out. We left Alappuzha at about 10am and made our way south past lush vegetation of coconut trees and palm trees and people crossing the river on small ferries and coracles. Daily life all... 

 ushar Says:  Rameshwara TempleThis temple which shows Pandyan influence in its design has inscriptions in Tamil, dating from the 12th to the 16th centuries. The Vyala monster sculptures in this temple give one the impression that the creatures are animate and actually climbing up the... 

 FruitLover Says:  Kerala is the land of Coconuts, and they have central role in Hindu religious practices. They are offered to the gods, and, for example, smashed on the ground as part of launching building projects, facilities or ship. 

 FruitLover Says:  Children here learn to swim before they walk, and they control a small boat before using a bicycle. 

 FruitLover Says:  The coir (the fibre) is used in ropes, mats, compost, brushes, caulking boats. 

 FruitLover Says:  Kerala's ancient, extra-ordinary geographical situation has remained unchanged for many centuries. It is a labyrinth of waterways and lagoons, surrounded by palm trees and friendly people who live there. 

 Willettsworld Says:  We stopped for lunch, on our Backwaters Tour, at a very simple looking place where we were served veg curry, rice, samosa and fish on a banana leaf. There was an palm oil factory nearby which we had a quick look around before we set off again. 

 Willettsworld Says:  Coracles are flat basketlike craft used to ferry people & sheep (yes sheep!) and are about 6 feet in diameter. They are made of bamboo, cane, plastic sheets and a fine coating of bitumen to make it leak proof. They're used, here, for fishing as well as to get from one side...