Houseboat holiday, wildlife sanctuary
Kerala also offers visitors stressfree boat ride in Alleppey which is known as ‘Venice of the East’.
You will be greeted with attractive landscapes like lavish paddy areas below the water levels, small chapels, fishing with netting, ducks in water and water lilies while taking a houseboat vacation along the natural backwaters in Alleppey
Other tourist destinations in Alleppey are Chettikulangara Bhagawathy Temple, Arthunkal Church, Krishnapuram Palace, Pathiramanal, Marari Beach, Sri Krishna Temple in Ambalappuzha.
For a stress relieving vacation, sail through the relaxed wealthy waters of Kumarakom which is situated near the Vembanad Lake.
It is a sleepy little hamlet with exotic scenery and rare flora and fauna which is one of the best tourist spots in Kerala to visit during monsoon as well.
The place offers boating, house boat cruising, fishing and sightseeing on canals, waterways and lakes decorated with lilies and lined with coconut groves, green paddy fields and mangrove forests.
Kumarakom is situated near to Ayemenem town and provides the most delightful Kerala food.
Spread across 14 acres, the sanctuary in Kumarakom is home to varieties of birds including teal, wild duck, egrets, herons, cuckoo, waterfowl, darters and also migratory birds.
The place offers boat trip around the islands giving you a breathtaking experience of watching the birds and the nature’s beauty.
Periyar National Park, Periyar Tiger Reserve and Periyar Wildlife Sanctuary are also mustvisit tourist spots in Thekkady, Kerala.
The Periyar National Park is one of the most bio-diverse regions in the world and the bestprotected reserve area in India famous.
Every year, thousands of tourists from all over the world are attracted to the gorgeousness, greenery and stillness of the park which is the home of royal tigers, elephants, reptiles, fishes and birds.
Visitors can go for boat cruises, jungle and elephant safaris as well as take part in eco-tourism activities such as Jungle Patrol, Border hiking, Bamboo Grove, Bamboo Rafting, Periyar Tiger Trail, Jungle Inn, Jungle camp and Bullock Cart discoveries.
The Periyar Tiger Reserve is named after the Periyar river, and surrounds the Periyar Lake, which was created in 1895 by building a dam across the Periyar river. The forests around the lake were declared as Reserved Forests in 1899.
Among the animals in the reserve are elephants, gaur, sambar deer, barking deer, mouse deer, Nilgiri langur, bonnet macaque, lion-tailed macaque, tiger, leopard, jungle cat, wild dog, bear, porcupine, jackal, Indian giant squirrel, Malabar flying squirrel, wild boar, small Indian civet, mongoose and pangoline.
The tiger is the main attraction in the Periyar Tiger Reserve. An estimated 40 of these magnificent beasts inhabit the reserve.
The artificial lake in the middle of the Periyar Wildlife Sanctuary is a good place to go boating and enjoy the peaceful environment.
You will see birds perch in logs of wood and creeks in and around the lake, and a large herd of elephants quenching their thirst.
After visiting the backwaters, head to South India’s most popular hill station, Munnar which is famous for the tea gardens and greenery.
Its mountain slopes are covered with about 80,000 miles of green tea farms.
The little bungalows, old play areas and tea factories give Munnar an old world colonial feel.
Munnar was once the summer season of the erstwhile English and English settlers found that the elevation, slope and alignment of the hills were particularly designed for the farming of tea.
Near Munnar is the Anamalai hills where neelakurinji flowers bloom once in 12 years, turning the lush hills of Kerala into a purple landscape.
Spread over 3,000 hectares of rolling hills, Munnar is home to this rarely occurring neelakurinji flower plants. Each shrub reproduces once in its lifetime and dies after flowering.
These plants take another 12 years for the seeds to sprout again and grow up to 30 to 60 centimetres high.
Thousands of visitors flocked to the scenic hills from August to October this year to behold this phenomenon spectacle. The next flowers bloom is in 2030.
Neelakurinji plant is a tropical plant species which is generally found in Asia and Australia. It belongs to the genus Strobilanthes which has around 450 species of which 146 are found in India and of them, about 43, in Kerala.