Day 11

Plan is to stay in Varkala for the New Year celebration, but I already had 2 full days on the beach and I wanted some change. As described yesterday about failed invitation, I planned to go to Jatayu Earth's Center which is about 30 km from Varkala. Google Maps is not particularly helpful, showing only some routes round through state's capital Thiruvananthapuram (Trivandrum) which would take more than 3 hours. That can't be right! There has to be other way locals would travel.

Fortunately Abhinand gave me instructions how to get there. Go to the bus stand (where is it? somewhere close to your hotel, same district), then to Paripally and from there catch bus to Chadayamangalam where is Jatayu Earth's Center. My residual polish habits were striving for more precision, like when exactly buses are going, written down to the minute. But I already gained some limited experience with moving around here so I went to place when I remembered were a lot of buses and asked a lot of questions and tried to read malayalam script on buses. I managed easily to get to Paripally, but then I was confused if I should go to different bus stand or not and locals seemed to give me inconsistent directions. Eventually I asked at one bus which came by and one of older passengers said something in malayalam and then conveyed it to bus conductor. Nobody spoke English here, but from the shape of the sentences and context I understood that I will not go directly to Chadayamangalam, but somewhere closer and then catch another bus. It went exactly like that without problem.

One free flowing observation that I wanted to note down and it's good occasion. In Kerala it's really hard to distinguish where one city/town/village ends and start the new one. All the so-called villages I saw so far were pretty much urbanized. Maybe it changes somewhere while moving closer to hill regions or between backwaters, but what I saw so far closer to coastal areas is like if everything is urbanized and borders are hard to point at.

I went by foot from Chadayamangalam center (if I could call it like that) to the Jatayu Earth's Center. Huge statue of the bird standing (or laying) on top of rock hill was visible from afar. Before going I decided to eat something and I got some nice biryani in some family restaurant. Only one young lady were sitting there, but generally it's another instance where I observed how often people's jobs and shops blend to their houses and to their private lives. Lady was more preoccupied with playing with her phone or talking on it with someone. To be fair, she didn't have exactly much to do except serving some rare customer. It's how it looks like here very often.

When I approached Center I was surprised and discouraged by huge queue leading to the gates of the Center. I went all the way here so either way I decided to line up in the queue. But soon some guy came and started to explain to people that that huge queue is for cable car route and if someone wants to go by walkway queue is negligible and price is lower. I didn't have to think twice, I went for walkway. I got my ticket and went to the gate, but female guard (it looks like basically whole crew of the park is female) said that I should leave my backpack. It taken me some time to understand that I should return to the same ticket counter and leave it there. Somehow suddenly small crowd gathered there and all of them either wanted to get their bags back or leave it same as me. It was still very small and negligible, but it taken me some little time, because all people were chaotically thrusting themselves through others. One guy gave me some advice and I discovered how to get there through this too.

Walkway was nice and cozy. It was only one kilometer uphill by stone stairs. Most people seemed to be challenged, but for me it was a breeze. I had some nice chat along the way with small group, but eventually went faster ahead. There were lined up water points along the way, there were also multiple signs with message about nature being wealth and things along this line.

At the top I made a lot of photos of Jatayu and landscape around. It was nice change from coastal views, but I was surprised that I can't see ocean, it should be quite close. It seems like a lot of attractions are still in preparation, like musem and theater. There were one shrine, separated from main area. Whole area around the shrine was typically no footwear area, but it was actually nice to walk barefoot around the rock. I knew that Hindu often don't like when their temples are photographed, especially insides, but there were little shrines with statues of various sages and mythological figures, mostly related to Ramayana, but there was also Ganapati (South Indian name for Ganesha). I didn't have qualms with photographing these, because others also did. Only at the entrance of main chamber (with statue of Rama, if I'm not mistaken) there was sign with explicit on photos and camera.

At the main area I went for snacks (I asked about one of every possible type like excited child) and lime juice. After that I went my few rounds around to enjoy the views for the last time.

Along my way back to Chadayamangalam at least few school buses were waving at me. Rain also started, but it was barely noticeable sensually and short, but sheer fact of its presence at this season was weird. When I returned to Chadayamangalam I was confused where exactly I should go for Paripally bus. I asked some girls about directions and if they speak English ("korchi-korchi"). Should I go for that big bus hub or find bus stand at the road leading to Paripally or something else? Eventually I found it's the second option.

I waited quite a lot of time on bus stand. Excited schoolboys tried to explain something to me about Mohanlal, that something related to him is there somewhere close. We talked about movie stars and I tried to show them that I watched movies with Mohanlal and Mammootty. When they asked me about favorite actor I went with my standard maneuver at this point and said Parvathy Thiruvothu. Soon they changed their position and on their place younger schoolgirls sat next to me. They were trying to look unphased, but sometimes glanced at me and shyly smiling when they noticed that I noticed. Elderly guy started to talk to me loudly, asking about my native place and also saying something to girls. They giggled and started to glance at me more openly and smile, but didn't say anything.

I already got the trick to easy spot my bus (at least longer distance buses and if I'm already at correct stand). Just find name of the place you want to go, look up its malayalam script and scan every bus that approaching for that. After that everything went smoothly and at Paripally I caught the bus to Varkala beach. Back there it was already late so I didn't have time to swim today and I went with standard evening routine, roaming around the beach and cliffs, eating something, observing people. There were yellow-claded people which I saw traveling in huge groups in pilgrimage-like form in my way on bus on both directions. As far as I understood, they were celebrating Narayana, famous in Kerala guru and social anti-caste reformer from beginning of XX century. What was special occasion, I couldn't tell and somehow I didn't know how to approach people with questions.

I sat at the beach for a little bit longer and went back to my hostel. Tomorrow I will have whole New Year celebration to do.

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