Vacation part 2 : Mountains and greenery ! :)

Thank you for seeing pictures on my last post :) I was waiting if I could show you some crafty progress as well but no luck :(

I have another set of vacation pics to share......hope you don't get bored .

Entering the backwaters of Kerala surrounded by greenery .....

These are traditional houseboats - a house on a boat - which can be booked for entire day cruise through lake and backwaters. We did not have a spare day so we went into the Shikara boat (another traditional boat) for 3 hours.

Shikara boat - with 4/6 seater, to be booked for a family/group. They have old style of long  wooden boat with curved ends as you saw one end in the first image.

On the way, there were innumerable coconut trees laden with coconuts .

and banana trees too .

There were - homes, guest houses and hotels on either sides of backwaters

Ducks joining our boat ride :)

At one place , there were many lotuses . When pulled out, some of them had stems running even six feet long. Ok , I have always seen lotus from a distance but never took in hand . Have you ?

Over to mountains : This is a hill station named Munnar in the same state as backwaters. It is located at a height of  5200 ft. above sea level .

View from the sit-out of our hotel room

Farming in the valley

The weather changed every few hours....Sometimes very cloudy

Then.....so clear

Lush tea gardens

 Walk through the tea gardens

Hope you enjoyed these as well.

Thanks for scrolling till the end !! :)
Preeti

Vacation - Part 1 :)

Thank you for welcoming me back !! :)

I have been doing some crafting but I cannot show you as it is a part of secret Santa hosted by a Ravelry group in India . I have tried to minimize the vacation pics and most probably will share in four parts .

We went to a 14 day vacation to Kerala- a state on west coast of south India- a place of backwaters, mountains, lakes , beaches and most important greenery . It is the greenest state in the country . We went to six cities/town - Kochi-> Munnar-> Thekkady->Allepey-> Varkala -> Trivandrum. We had a direct flight from our city to Kochi and then from there we hired a cab for 13 days and back from Trivandrum we had a direct flight to here .

These are some pics of Kochi city . First Portuguese in 14th century and later Dutch established there colony here in 15th century . There was an old palace of king of Kochi where photography was prohibited.

We stayed in kerala styled traditional cottage, a stone and wooden structure. The lanterns on the pathway lit at night.

View from outside the room, it was raining early morning .

The backyard of the hotel was a deck from where we could see merchant ships passing by. At night they would set the deck with candle light dinner .

An old Basilica

On the way to various places, we saw a pineapple farm and tall areca nut trees. the coconut trees in the background of the pineapple farm  were to be seen across the entire state. 

We saw traditional and folk dance - Mohiniyattam and Kathakali

Models of war ships on display in a Naval museum. The city has a big Naval base.

Next ....on mountains and greenery:)

Thanks for seeing!

Preeti

Back on track !! :)

Hello !!!
Hope you all are doing great . I am glad to be back on the blogland after a break . I had a great and relaxing family vacation last month :) However, the joy later disappeared under the post vacation mountains of laundry and later Diwali festival cleaning .

Sharing some beautiful pics.....

Aster : highlight of my garden

Daisy 

Anshita made this artistic Rangoli on Diwali . It is made with a slightly coarse powder using pinch by pinch , a job which requires patience . She can now make without much of my help . It took her 2 hrs. to complete . Rangoli's are made just outside the main door as a gesture to welcome Goddess of wealth  'Lakshmi' to enter our homes during Diwali festival .

Hydrangea - growing first time

My favourite : Gerbera

I haven't shortlisted vacation photos yet . Don't worry , I will share only minimum pics :) Sometimes, I feel old digital-less life was better when it comes to taking and choosing photos although it is a great thing for creative people like us . But on vacation , we end up taking lot of pics and then it takes ages to sort them and file them . Few decades back , even if the printed photos turned out bad, we would still choose the best ones from the bad ones and feel satisfied . What do you think ? Do you often shortlist , print and file the digital photos ? I have lost many whenever my laptop crashed .

I will visit you very soon 

Have a great weekend !! 

Preeti