Kerala Backwaters

The Kerala Backwaters circuit is India's most relaxing 5-day journey and the perfect monsoon-shoulder escape (September-October when the rest of India is humid and the southwest monsoon has just freshened Kerala's landscape into emerald green).

• The classic route: Kochi (Fort Kochi heritage, days 1-2) → Alleppey (overnight houseboat through the Vembanad backwater lagoon, day 3) → Munnar (tea-plantation hill station at 1,600 metres, days 4-5) → return via Kochi airport.
• For vegetarian travellers, Kerala's coconut-and-curry-leaf cuisine is a revelation.
• The Onam Sadhya — a 28-item vegetarian feast served on a banana leaf, traditionally eaten during the August-September Onam harvest festival but available year-round at quality restaurants — is one of India's most refined plant-based meals.
• Avial (mixed vegetables in yoghurt-coconut), thoran (cabbage with grated coconut), pachadi (sweet-spicy gourd), pulissery (yoghurt curry with mango), olan (white pumpkin in coconut milk), and the famous payasam dessert define the menu.
• Kerala parotta (flaky layered flatbread) with vegetable stew, appam (rice-flour pancake) with coconut-vegetable curry, and idiyappam (string hoppers) with kadala curry are the breakfast classics.
• Best season is October through March (post-monsoon clarity, cool evenings).
• The southwest monsoon (June-September) is dramatic and beautiful in Munnar but disrupts houseboat schedules.
• The optimal window for green landscapes + dry sky is mid-September to mid-October.