Thekkady trip

       

       So far, not only have we seen the beautiful sea beaches (read "my Varkala trip") but also have witnessed the picturesque beauty of the mountains (read "my Munnar trip") of Kerala. So, now we planned to explore the forests of Kerala by visiting Thekkady. 

       In December end (year 2025), when I asked my husband Neeraj to visit somewhere nearby as my 02 Casual leaves were going to lapse in the year end, he denied for the plan saying that in the quarter end he would be busier than usual. However, he told me to make a plan in the 4th week of January 2026 as there were 3 continous holidays (Saturday, Sunday and Republic day). As I knew that more than exploring the new place, Neeraj would be more interested in exploring the luxuries of the hotel as always, I decided to book "Niraamaya", a famous luxury hotel chain of South India in "Thekkady, Kerala" from January 24-26, 2026. "Niramaya" is also known for ayurvedic spa, which I could also enjoy.

     Thekkady (Idukki district), a town famous for tourist spots like "Periyar National Park, Kerala" is bordering the neighbouring Tamil Nadu state. I made a mistake, I booked the hotel but forgot to book the tickets for Periyar National park for the said duration, which I repented later.

      So, for January 24th, Saturday, 8 AM Neeraj booked a cab for Thekkady. We started our journey to Thekkady at 8:30 AM from our Apartment in Ernakulam. 

      "A very Good morning sir, Good morning madam!" said the cab driver while opening the door of his Ertiga cab. We got into the cab and noticed that on the car bonnet, there were small idols of lord Ganesha, Mother Marry, Islamic holy symbol and also Indian Tricolor. The driver was very courteous and to satisfy us, he played "Ram Siya Ram" song at the starting of the journey. We asked him to stop at some vegetarian restaurant for breakfast and he stopped at Saravana Bhawan. Having breakfast, we continued our journey. He was continously playing bollywood hit songs and was also speaking on phone to some person about some issue in Kanyakumari trip. 

        En route, while watching the terrain of Ernakulam and Kottayam districts of Kerala, where mainly I could see the banana, coconut and bamboo trees alongside road, I asked the driver whether he also arranges the tour to Kannyakumari and Rameswaram. He responded that there is a package to Rameshwaram where he would take 6 people to Rameshwaram, Madurai, Kanyakumari, Trivandrum, Varkala, etc from Ernakulam and would charge Rs. 28 thousand. I asked whether "Darshan" in famous Rameshwaram temple are easy despite the huge crowd from across the country. He replied that he could also arrange the darshan through his brother, from Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu who is a leader of BJP. 

      "Are you from Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu" I asked. "Yes Madam" he said. "So, this year, besides Kerala, State Assembly elections are also due in Tamil Nadu?" I asked. "Yes Madam" he replied. "You said your brother is a BJP leader but BJP is not anywhere in Tamil Nadu" I enquired. "Madam, my brother is BJP supporter and is associated with a small Hindu party called HMK". "So, are there BJP supporters in Tamil Nadu?" I asked. "Yes madam, many support BJP these days." "Then why BJP does not win any seat there?" I asked. Driver smiled and said, "Madam they support BJP but they would not vote for BJP". "Then what is the meaning of support?" I asked. He replied, "Actually madam, people of our area vote for individuals not for the party, earlier voted for AIADMK leader Jayalalitha, and now for AIADMK leader from Coimbatore who despite being a big political leader, came to my house for condolences when my father passed away". "Oh Ok" I responded... and after this conversation, the driver played only Tamil songs in the whole journey.

      It was 2 pm now....after having lunch at a Gujarati restaurant with our driver, we reached "Niraamaya Retreats Cardamom Club, Thekkady", the hotel with lush surrounding and peaceful atmosphere. We were allotted a separate cottage named "Ginger" by the hotel manager. We enquired about the tourist places in Thekkady. The manager asked whether we had online booking of Periyar tiger reserve. "No" we replied. "Then it would be almost impossible to get jungle safari, but there are some other places like spice plantation where you can visit tomorrow" Manager said. "Right now we have some time, so we want to visit spice plantation today itself" I said. He arranged a driver and we visited a spice plantation site, where the Guide very enthusiastically showed us different plants of cardamom, clove, Nutmeg, Dalchini, stevia, mentha, Lemon, different types of Basil (Tulsi), cocoa, coffee, etc. He also gave us the leaves of these trees to smell different fragrances. He also showed the rare species of flowers. We bought some cardamom and other spices from there.

National flower of Bolivia

      Then we went to "Kerala Govt Information and reservation centre" at Thekkady to book tickets for Periyar tiger reserve. The person at ticket counter told us that for tomorrow (Sunday) no ticket was available, neither for walking, nor for boating, nor gypsy, etc. However, he told that for Monday we could book ticket for "nature walk in Periyar tiger reserve", which we booked  and went back to our hotel. At night, we had dinner at Niraamaya hotel at 7:30 pm. Thereafter, hotel boys burnt the campfire. We enjoyed it for some time and as it started raining, we went to our cottage "Ginger". At 9:30 pm, we went to bed to sleep peacefully.

Our room

Campfire

Cottage

       Next day (January 25), we woke up at 6 am while hearing the beautiful natural sounds like chirping of different birds. We had our breakfast at 8:30 and were clueless where to go that day. I enquired about 'Shirodhara session' at the hotel, which they told that I could attend at 4 pm. At 11:30 am, on our request, hotel staff arranged a vehicle for Tamil Nadu visit. 

      The driver took us to Tamil Nadu and showing  big pipe lines, told us that the Kerala state shares this huge amount of water with Tamil Nadu. "Is this the water of Periyar river?" I asked. "Yes madam, long back.... there was an agreement between the governments of Kerala and Tamil Nadu...so Kerala Govt. gives water to Tamil Nadu in exchange of just Rs.4000/- per year" Driver told. He took us to Kambam town of neighbouring Theni district of Tamil Nadu and showed us grapes farm, banana trees farm, coconut farm, passion fruit farms etc. From the farm, we bought fresh grapes and took some pics. 

Grapes farm, Tamil Nadu

Banana farm

      We came back to our hotel at 3:30, had some snacks and lemon tea. Then I attended relaxing "Shirodhara and body massage" session. At night, we had dinner at our hotel and again slept early at 9:30. It is possible to sleep this much early in travel vacations only. Otherwise household chores and office work do not let us take proper rest.

       Next day (January 26) we again woke up at 6 am at our cottage, in green and natural atmosphere, listening to birds whistling, chirping and singing songs in their language. We had breakfast at 7:30 am and got ready at 9:30 for our way to "nature walk to Periyar tiger reserve". We had also packed our bags as we had to return to Ernakulam at 2 pm. We checked out from hotel but kept our bags there only. The vehicle arranged by hotel took us to a bus station, from where we got govt bus to go inside Periyar national park. The bus left us at Periyar lake, from where some people had to book boating tickets, while others had to go for nature walk. 

Beautiful butterfly in Periyar tiger reserve

Great Hornbill bird

       As we had tickets for nature walk, we met a forest guide who navigated us inside forest, where he showed us the foot prints of elephants, deers, etc, but no animal was visible at that time. It was drizzling that time. There was some fog and the weather was not sunny but we were excited with our umbrella. We were given a pair of brown socks/ jungle gaiters each by forest guide to tie or cinch over our shoes and pull up to our knees to block leeches. We tied them over our shoes and started our walk witk the forest guide. First we crossed the river with guide standing over a raft made of bamboo. The guide navigated through the forest alongside the periyar river. He informed us about different species of birds like Great Hornbill: the state bird of Kerala,  white cheeked barbet, water birds, etc found in the forest and took picture/videos of some of the birds and butterflies for us. I enquired, "How many elephants and tigers are there in this forest?". "Approx 500 elephants and 33 tigers are there in the forest" he said.

Periyar

Walking inside the forest and learning about flora and fauna was a different kind of experience for us, which we enjoyed a lot. It was reminding us of the programmes of 'Discovery channel' or 'National Geographic channel' which we used to watch earlier. At around 1:30 pm we returned to hotel and at 2 pm we started our journey back to Ernakulam with memories of lush greeen forest with us.