Which is better, Kerela Houseboats or Lakes and Lagoons. What is the difference b/w Premium boat and Luxury.Is it better to book when you get there? We%26#39;re going in the first week of February.
Houseboat Companies
We run a travel agent in the UK, an my advice to you is watch the houseboats! Everyone we send complains about the grubby condition of the boats, often they park in some not-so-nice places, and they can be hot and mosquito ridden, non-working air-con, no hot water etc.
Having said this, they are usually fully booked.
the houseboat belonging to the Kayalorum hotel is clean and pretty efficient. You can get in touch via their web site.
We now usually recommend that you take a day cruise only. The food is usually fantastic, the crews are good and you don%26#39;t see anything between 6.30 and 6.30 anyway.
It seems expensive, but at least you won%26#39;t need to complain!
Houseboat Companies
I have just returned from Kerala. Regarding houseboats: If you are travelling outside the Xmas new Year oeriod it is often much better to book the houseboat when you are there. And when I say ';there'; I mean actualkly go to Allepey or Kolam and choose your boat as there is a quite a wide variation in price and quality. We booked a boat from Varkala for 7500 rupees a night and even though we thoroghly enjoyed the trip ,we were a bit disappointed with the standard and cleanliness of the boat, however had we booked from home we could have paid almost double for the same boat. We met a British couple who had travelled to Allepey the night before and just went down to the pier in the morning and picked up a luxurious boat for 6000 rupees a night. There are now over 400 houseboats in Allepey and on any day (outside Xmas and N year) probably only half of them have a contract so it is definitely a buyers market.
Regarding the advice that you should only take a day cruise. I can%26#39;t really see the logic here. A large part of the fun is sleeping on the boat and visiting the villages in the backwaters. When you tie up for the night you usually get offered a canoe trip down the samll side canals so you can see how the people live out there as well.
i just got back after a weekend in Kerala, and was on the backwaters on Friday night. It is warming up now-apparetnly started the past week, and days will be quite warm. The incremental cost of spending the night in a houseboat versus a hotel room is not much and , IMHO, well worth it, if the cruise boat is a good one.
Definitely book after you are here-you will see what you%26#39;re paying for..
On 25 Jan we had a backwaters overnight cruise on a boat from the following company:
http://lakelandsrenjini.com/houseboats.html
We left Alleppey at noon and returned to Kumarakom at 9am the next morning.
It%26#39;s worth doing it this way to get the contrasting scenery, and you really get a chance to unwind.
The vessel was absolutely spotless, it was a 3 bedroom, 3 bathroom a/c boat but we only used the fans. There were 4 staff, one of whom was the cook, and we 3 passengers.
The cruise was one of the real highlights of our time in India and was utterly relaxing. The only thing was they didn%26#39;t have any coconuts and we had to pay Rs 50 for 3, in a deal that was done when we stopped for the evening!
The boat was booked by our Delhi travel agent and cost us US$100 per person. You could well get it a bit cheaper dealing direct.
Our captain told us that Lakes and Lagoons are regarded as the best company, but purely because they have the most vessels. Ours, Lakelands is apparently regarded as the 2nd best.
Hope this helps.
My partner and i returned from Kerala on 16th Feb 2008 and prior to booking our houseboat cruise we wrere told that the no 1 was Muthoot River Escapes. Lakelands is 2nd best and this is who our tour operator booked for us.
We did a over night Alleppy to Alleppy cruise. During the day it was very very relaxing, we had the top deck all to our selves and it was very refreshing as you could actually feel the breeze on the top deck (you couldn%26#39;t on the lower deck and needed a fan). Our bedroom was clean (no mosquitoes) with an AC which was on from 9pm to 6 am.The bathroom however was full of mosquitoes and cockroaches.
Night time was horrible and we ever on edge the whole time.We were sitting in the lower deck watching a movie while we waited for our dinner, we couldn%26#39;t switch the lights on as it would attract insects so were sat in the dark. The dark atracted at least 6 lizards which came to eat the many insects that we were surounded by (switching the light off didn%26#39;t help!!!)
When the food was ready they switched the light on and some of the lizards hid but we ere then hit in the face and body by all sorts of insects flying into the boat. We ate very quickly and went to our room as soon as we could. We very glad that there were no insects or lizards in the room and did manage get some sleep.
Our experience in the evening was just horrible and for this reason i would not do an over night cruise again.
Hard to explain how we could have had such opposite experiences, just 3 weeks apart, with the same company.
Your boat sounds far superior with an upper deck and movie-watching!
If we%26#39;d gone through what you have, we would have been put off as well.
Nelluda, I am glad you did not have the same experience. We spoke to a couple of other people and they did not experience anything similar either so I guess we were just unlucky. It’s a shame because it really did turn something that could have been a perfect experience into some thing that we would never want to experience again. .
Our house boat was the one they advertise on their bill boards ‘The first ever complete super luxury hose boat in Kerala’. It had a TV, DVD player and a very good sound system.
Dear Friend ,
Weather it is Kerala Houseboats or lagoon or other operator ;
weather it is mosquitos or lizards ;
what should be even more looked into is
How nature friendly is this , how responsible this is to the lake or the backwaters ??
Yes ! i do agree that there is mosquitos , hence you have lizards on boat and ofcourse cockroaches ... and many more insects
why , mosquitos?this is a water based system , you are sure to see this in any part of the Vembanad lake
You are lucky , if there is slight breeze and the boat is in line to the flow of the wind , you get to avoid a considerable amount of this little creatures of Nature
Premium , luxury , deluxe , standard are the name given by operators , seen mostly in the iternary
and in ground it can be the said category( ocassionally) and in most cases the oopposite , especially in the peak season .. coz even the top operators are over booked and the only choice is to hire others, who have less contact in the travel industry , and hence depend on the major operators , for the cruise bookings ..( here also they are paid very less than what is collected from the guests)
as a result compromise in quality .
but serivice part, i think all staffs on board houseboats are very good in delivering the best and offering a memorable cruise along backwaters ...and most of them are from the local area and this is one way tourism can be said is responsible( socially)
and as pointed out in one of the above pst , if it is not the peakseason ( from mid october to January) , it is always good to come and see for yourself and choose based on what you see , there are over 500 houseboats in the backwaters ..
for those who dont want to take that hassle of coming here and doing that , always better to get quotes from operators , and there are numerous operators , if you go on the internet and get quotes from them and get to see what they offer in rates
best regards
indiantripadvisor@gmail.com
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