From Egypt we flew to Kochi in Kerala, India. We had last visited India as a family in 2016 with a toddler aged Phoebe when we travelled around Rajasthan. Kochi felt like a million miles away from our experience of Delhi as it is a far calmer and upmarket version of Indian backpacking! We stayed in a homestay with a very welcoming Indian couple who cooked us a delicious Keralan breakfast. The girls are not up for curry for dinner, let alone breakfast, so they opted to make most of a lie in.

We discovered the most amazing restaurant in Kochi for vegetarian Keralan food. The owner went out of his way to entice the girls into eating it and served them up a dosa covered in Hershey’s chocolate sauce! 

Fort Kochi, a neighborhood of the city, is known for its Dutch, Portuguese, and British colonial architecture, and elaborate Chinese bamboo fishing nets. We strolled along the water watching the fishermen and sampling the street food on offer, corn on the cob being a family staple.

We watched a Kathakali show, which is a complex mixture of mime, music and dance. The facial expressions are extreme and take years of practice, imagine eyeball rolling, cheek shuddering and chin waggling. We did not really have a clue what the story was about but the pre-show make up application and the theatrics made for an interesting watch.

From Kochi we travelled to Alleppey to stay on a houseboat.