We're now in the town of Alleppey, in central Kerala state, about 40 km from Fort Kochi, which we left early yesterday morning. We had spent our last day in Fort Kochi boating on the nearby backwaters for which this part of Kerala is famous. The backwaters are an extensive area of interconnected lagoons, channels, and lakes, and lushly vegetated islands and shorelines. Boating for a few hours, as we did, is a relaxing way to appreciate this lovely tropical setting. From our houseboat, we watched fishermen using rakes and nets to harvest mussels from the sandy bottom, and later we had a chance to eat a dish of freshly-caught mussels purchased fresh from one of the fishermen. We also got an impromptu tour of a household's ayurvedic garden, and learned how that particular family was able to grow many vegetables and fruits for their own use as well as many of the common medicinal herbs used for ayurvedic treatment (Ayurveda being the traditional medical system of India). Our young guide explained that it's common for families living in the backwaters region to cultivate needed herbs and food crops in this way.

We left Fort Kochi by hired taxi yesterday morning. Our first stop was memorable: we helped to bathe two baby elephants from the Elephant Training Center run by the local forestry service. Each morning and evening, the elephants are brought by their trainers to the holy (and beautiful) Periyar River to bathe themselves and receive a good scrubbing. Tourists are welcome to help during the morning session, under the watchful eyes of the trainers (even a baby elephant is much bigger than I). K and I waded out through the shallow water to where the two baby elephants were already relaxing on their sides, as the trainers showed us and other volunteers how to use cut coconut husks as brushes to scrub the elephants' thick hides. The trainers explained that the elephants experience their scrubbing as a nice massage, and the beatific, relaxed expressions on the elephants' faces seemed to confirm that this is a pleasurable activity for them, though they were being scrubbed by rank amateurs. I loved spending time with the calm, gentle creatures, scrubbing their sides, foreheads, and legs, and just running my hands across their thick skin.

The trainers and elephants obviously make up a skilled and experienced partnership. The elephants readily respond to the trainers' commands. And when it was time to leave the river, the one mature elephant of the party (who towered over all of us) nonchalantly lifted up one foreleg; the trainer lithely jumped onto the lifted leg and then smoothly up to the elephant's back.

After the elephant bathing, our taxi driver drove us though the heavy traffic and densely settled outskirts of the larger city of Ernakulum and then through increasingly greener country to Alleppey, where we checked in at a rustic resort where we'll remain through Tuesday morning. We're staying in adjoining thatched cottages on the shore of one of the main canals that run through Alleppey. Here, we're surrounded by palm trees and the songs of birds, which continue into the late evening and begin again early in the morning. Heavenly!

We deliberately left our calendar mainly unfilled for the three days we're here, to give ourselves some down time. And indeed, I spent much of yesterday evening and this morning relaxing in a comfortable rattan chair on our second-floor balcony, watching an endless parade of boats pass by--including every size of boat from small canoes to large houseboats. Taking a trip on a houseboat through the backwaters has become a popular option for Western tourists, and most houseboats, even the largest which are the size of small ferryboats, seem to be carrying just one Western couple. But a few of the houseboats--especially today, Sunday, which is India's day off--are carrying groups of Indians out for a daytrip. These travelers are more social and usually wave to us as they pass by, so we've been enjoying waving back to them and calling out "hi!" and "hello!" (actions guaranteed to thoroughly wind up the youngest members of the boating parties).

Tomorrow, we plan to do some boating ourselves, but haven't yet decided whether to hire a small boat just for ourselves, or to travel on the small government ferries that we frequently see plying the backwater channels. I'll report back...