House boats on the back waters of Kerala

We are currently staying at a CGH earth resort on the shores of the Kerala backwaters – more specifically Lake Vembanad. A traditional Kerala tharavad, it has been beautifully restored, sits amidst verdant green lagoons, with miniature cows, vibrant orchids haphazardly growing off everything and all sorts of bird life.

Yesterday morning I set off in company at the crack of dawn to bird watch; an hour or so later we’d seen 19 different types of birds and were getting hot and hungry. So back to our bungalows…

My own little bungalow. Bungalow means “large house”

I was in a bit of a hurry to get to my washroom, which is an open air walled enclosure with bushy things growing in the middle area – all quite lovely and a bit “exotic” as you can hear people talking as they walk by – presumably they can then hear you as well….

My well ventilated bathroom at Coconut Lagoon

I opened the door, with a glass in hand, not looking around particularly and mashed my right foot onto a dead and headless fish! The glass went flying, the guts went squishing between my toes and I just about cracked my head open on the stone wall. I was stuck – couldn’t go forward to rinse off my foot because of the glass, couldn’t go  back to the room because of the squishy fish guts and I really needed the facilities. So I’m hopping madly in place, starting to giggle like a loon – it really struck my funny bone for some reason and quite stuck! I’d really love to know what passers by might have thought of the noises coming out of my bungalow…

Finally managed to calm down somewhat, hop back into my room, dig out my flip-flops, hop back into the bathroom, rinse off my foot, have a much needed pee (sorry), throw the headless and very squished fish over the wall, clean up the glass, rinse off the fishy floor and then collapse – still chortling. I started howling again when I tried to explain to housekeeping about the broken glass, the pungent aroma in the bathroom (honestly it was NOT me making that smell!) and the fish over the wall. I DO NOT doubt they thought I was start raving mad but were far too polite to say so…..

That I did all that hopping around on my new left knee was just the icing I needed!

I have subsequently decided I have an admirer of sorts as there was another fishy offering this morning – but I managed to avoid any more entanglements and left the present baking in the sun on top of the wall. Could have been an egret, a heron or stork, or one of the bigger kingfishers. Perhaps the staff will believe me now? Personally I think the hotel should charge extra for the “value added”!

Fishermen on Lake Vembanad