Kovalam Beach

The view from our room at the Sargara Hotel.

Our team, Shakthi, the assistant, Thoufeeq and Ravi, the driver.

The Lighthouse Beach.

John and I in the very warm sea.

The conservative Indians at the beach.

Fishermen on the beach.

Jamie, Thoufeeq and John at dinner.

Saturday, March 10^th.

We were up and off early as we had a long day of driving ahead. We stopped at a coffee shop where there was a toilet and an ATM so that people could withdraw money for the tips. John and I had talked to this group yesterday on the boat tour and everyone is on board this time, which is great.

On the bus I collected all the money and Jamie and I sorted it into envelopes for Thoufeeq, Ravi and Shantha. To save some time on route Thoufeeq stopped and bought some curried pastries and a sweet for each of us from a pastry shop he knew. We ate them on the bus as we continued to drive. They were very good. We had planned to stop at a temple that was on the itinerary, but we wouldn’t get there before it closed for the afternoon. So, we drove to the hotel straight away. We are at the Sagara Beach Resort which is quite a nice place with a great view of Lighthouse Beach and it has a couple of pools. We are at Kovalam Beach, just outside of Trivandrum.

The first thing we did was present the tips to Ravi and Shakthi because they were leaving with the bus as the have another tour starting in two days.

After we checked in, Thoufeeq took three of the group back to the temple that we missed, because it had reopened after the afternoon break. The rest of us opted to stay and take a advantage of the great beach and pool. John and I hung out with Jamie and Jo at the beach. We walked the entire length watching the locals in the water and the fishermen at the end of the beach. We also swam in the pool back at the hotel to get the salt off of us.

At 6:30 we met up with the others and Thoufeeq took us to a restaurant called the Fusion. The food was excellent, fish and calamari and the view was looking over the beach. After dinner we headed back to the room to type and sleep.