Alleppey Tour Packages

You board after the drive in, and the crew cruises the canals and paddy fields through the afternoon while lunch is cooked on board. In the evening the boat moors on a quiet canal for the night, dinner is cooked on board, and you sleep in a cabin. After breakfast you step off, and your driver takes you on. All three meals are included on board on every dated route listed here.

Yes. Every trip is tailor-made, and our own routes suggest a simple way: swap a Varkala night for a night at Kumarakom, another backwater base on Vembanad Lake, so you have a night on board and a night by the lake. A second night on the houseboat is possible too. A single night already gives a full afternoon and morning on the water, which suits most travellers.

Every year on Punnamada Lake, part of Vembanad, usually in August, on a date the organisers announce each year. Snake boats over 100 feet long, each with 100 to 150 oarsmen, race a 1.4 km course, and over two lakh spectators line the banks. The race society announces the date each year and sells tickets in advance, so let us know early if you want to watch.

Tell us who is travelling, and the specialist matches the boat: houseboats come with one cabin or several, and their cabin standards vary. Mention small children, since life jackets and a safety talk before boarding are standard, and anyone with limited mobility. Every meal is cooked on board, so tell us about dietary needs when you enquire.

It can. The backwaters stay open through the June to September monsoon and turn a deep green, but after heavy rain the water runs high and some houseboat routes are changed. Alappuzha averages about 580 mm of rain in June alone. If you travel then, keep your dates flexible and expect the route to be decided on the day, by the conditions.

Kuttanad is the rice country around Alleppey: about 500 sq km of lakes, canals and rivers where rice is farmed below sea level. In reclaimed blocks such as R-Block, fields and homes lie four to ten feet below sea level, protected by dikes. You see it from the houseboat: the cruise on our routes runs through the canals and paddy fields, with village life on the banks.

Kochi's. Cochin International Airport is about 83 km from Alleppey, roughly two hours by road, against about 149 km and three and a quarter hours for Thiruvananthapuram's airport. On our routes Alleppey sits mid-trip, so the airport question only arises at either end: the Backwaters and Ayurveda routes fly home from Thiruvananthapuram after Varkala, and the South India tour from Kochi.