After the SB Regency, we stayed in the Hill Palace Hotel:
We met lots of good people in Varkala while we stayed there. Syam, an economics graduate, works at the Caffe Italiano, bakes great brownies and took us on a trip to Golden Island one evening.
Further north, past our hotel, there is an Ayurvedic Centre, where Anil performs marvels with his feet (called "Chavutti", I think), behind the Funky Art Cafe where Gopal works.
The Funky Art Cafe was also where we met Rocio and Carlos
Carry on walking past all the tourist stuff and you come to a Muslim fishing village: this young man was keen to make friends:
Early in our stay we met Susa, down from Karnataka for a few weeks to help her sister-in-law by selling stuff along the clifftop (when she could dodge the tourist police, enforcing child labour laws). Later on, we got to know the Levitt-Campbells, on a ten week trip having sold up in California and on their way to a new life in the southernmost city in New Zealand: returning home for Paul, and back to where Lisa had spent part of her childhood, but a new chapter in Max and Myra's lives.
Finally, here's an example of a kind of Communist 'shrine' that we saw a number of places in Kerala, and the mother of the puppy Rosa's all gooey over, above.
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