We arrived in Ernakulam roughly on time, feeling grotty and sleepy (even though I'd slept for 7 hours on the train). Ajeesh had arranged for Shaji and DS (his journalist and social-worker friends) to drive his car to Ernakulam to meet us. They'd been delayed by a puncture: this gave us time to eat at the station's vegetarian restaurant (Yummy dosas, as I recall).
About an hour into the journey, we stopped in a place called Muvattpuzha and took a kettu valam (old-style boat/taxi) across the local river to a landing stage. We stripped to undies and swam and washed in the river - it was brilliant to float and drift in the current, but quite hard work to get back to the landing-stage. However, I felt clean again: hoorah!
We also called in at a Maruti/Suzuki service station where Ajeesh negotiated about a replacement tyre - apparently Shaji hadn't know he carried a spare wheel and had had a new tyre put onto the afflicted wheel. Also these tyres were still under guarantee and Ajeesh naturally wanted his friend to be reimbursed. We stopped later for lunch at a small restaurant: boiled tapioca with onion, tomato and chilli salad. (The others also had beef[!], chicken and fish dishes.) We arrived at Nedumkandam late in the evening: I don't recall much else about the day.
© (except the blatantly ripped-off bits) Random Bozo 2006