Kochi to Allepey - beyond the horizon

The prospect of another weekend going waste, with us doing nothing other than the basic activities to live was enough to kindle the roadies in us. Neither were we the real roadies with big Harley’s or the Bullet nor were we planning to go on a all India trip in our steeds, but we were simple people working (spending time in office) 45-50 hours on weekdays and looking for something exciting in the weekend atleast. Rajan as usual with his ever enthusiastic planning of trips which never really happen suggested Allepey as a possible destination, we agreed. So we got up early on Saturday at around 11am, got ready and had lunch @brindavan – one of our life savers in kochi and the starting point for the trip. I had to fix my rear view mirror as it had become loose and kept falling on my arm. We started from Brindavan @1:30 after rajan got a pair of new sandals. The route was fairly simple, straight road with no forks or turnings for the full distance of 64 km. With Venkat and Rajan on one bike and me and Vivek on my bike, we hit the road.
The ride was mostly uneventful with Venkat being the avid photographer trying to take pictures on the go while the bike was going at 60kmph. We passed two bridges a few kilometers from vytilla, great view from there, although at the time it felt as if the bridges were made of some other material other than concrete as it started wobbling every time a truck or bus passed over it. After these two bridges, there wasn’t much change in the landscape. The highway at many places became a bit dangerous with too many potholes. Even though I wasn’t breaking any speed records I was going at decent speed, while Rajan on his fiero sped away out of sight with Venkat taking photos on the pillion seat. After nearly one hour and ten minutes we reached the outskirts of Allepey at 2:40pm, had tender coconut in a roadside shop and were off to back waters where the famed boat races took place. The entire place was off for cars and bikes, we parked our bikes and proceeded on foot.
After about a 2 km walk, we reached the back waters only to be greeted by a huge wall of people. There was a raised platform made out of wood and people were all over it. The entire place was a mess and we couldn’t see a thing. So we left that place and walked a kilometer further down, the place here wasn’t so crowded, we even got ourselves spot near the water’s edge. Although we couldn’t make out who or what were the teams, we enjoyed our first live boat race experience. After an hour or two at the boat race, we raced off towards the beach, with a little photo session at the railway gate. It started raining heavily when we reached the beach, so we took shelter in a Guajarati temple nearby. The allepey beach is what a marina or a besant nagar beach would have looked like 15 years ago. Neat small little place. Then it was time we left and by the time we reached the highway it was dark. The vehicles coming on the opposite side did little help by being on high beam, thus blinding me. The ride back took more time with us trying driving slow to avoid the potholes. A wrong turn took us to Edakochi instead of back to Vytilla. It was the shorter route but it took us more time to travel through the crowded streets of Edakochi, Mattachery, Fort kochi . Finally we were back on MG road. Not wanting to have dinner in a place where cockroaches kept flying all over, we came out of dhaba and finally ended up having dinner @Brindavan/Abhirami- the place where it all started.
It was a fresh experience, traveling 120km on bike, watching the boat race and the clean beach. Nice way to spend the weekend although a bit more tiring than the other option of eat/sleep/eat routine.