Under the shade of the rain tree in Fort Kochi

September 4th, 2009  |  Published in Adventure, DesiPundit, India, Living, Photography, Travel  |  11 Comments

Eas­ily a place I could go back to : again and again. Fort Kochi. Wan­der around. Soak in the sights and sounds. Famil­iar cor­ners. Tashi art cafe, the fish­ing nets and the synagogue.

The last time I vis­ited, I stayed at this rather small but cosy guest house on Peter­celli street. It was called Rain­tree Lodge and it didn’t take me long to dis­cover why. Just behind the guest house, a huge rain tree spread it’s mag­nif­i­cent branches and cov­ered most of the road and a lot of other houses. Fort Kochi has some beau­ti­ful trees and if you’re vis­it­ing you must take some time to observe their beauty and grace.

The lodge has rooms on two lev­els includ­ing the ground floor. If you’re vis­it­ing try and check if they have one of the bal­cony rooms avail­able. It just seems much nicer when you can open your door into a bal­cony and get some fresh air in. There’s no view as such as the guest house is adja­cent to a road but the it’s very quiet street so you won’t get much noise here. The inte­ri­ors are com­fort­able and the fur­ni­ture is min­i­mal­is­tic but all old Ker­ala style.

Edgar, who man­ages both this and the Old Har­bour Hotel (another lovely place indeed) made sure I was com­fort­able and set­tled in well. My room was on the ground floor and I could open my back door into a lit­tle cor­ner space. I had a vis­i­tor on the adja­cent wall : a cat that would perch itself there for most parts and sneak away if I came too close.

The only down­side is that there is no cater­ing facil­ity avail­able here. So no tea or snacks or meals served. The upside is a lovely ter­race gar­den where you can watch the colour­ful sun­set or just laze around and read a book. I couldn’t spend enough time there since I was out a lot, but I really liked the place.

For food, I would drop in at TeaPot which soon became my favourite haunt. There I would sit and while away my time, order tea, appams and what­ever caught my fancy. And since it was on the way to the lodge, I always found an excuse to drop in.

Details here:
Rain­tree Lodge
Fort Cochin, Ker­ala
Tel :+91 (484) 3951489
Mob :+91 98470 29000
Email : mail@fortcochin.com

Responses

1. Prasoon says:
   

   September 4th, 2009 at 10:59 am (#)

   Nice :)
   Shall make a stopover some­time if I ever get to visit the place.

2. Anita says:
   

   September 4th, 2009 at 12:10 pm (#)

   @ pra­soon: you must and don’t for­get teapot :0)

3. Anwin says:
   

   September 5th, 2009 at 10:58 am (#)

   You are absolutely right when say­ing ‘Eas­ily a place I could go back to – again and again’. I feel the same every time I am in Cochin right from my child­hood days. I love that place and I can spend hours together walk­ing around, sit­ting and star­ing at the sea, tak­ing a ferry, etc.

4. Anita says:
   

   September 6th, 2009 at 10:27 am (#)

   thanks anwin! saw some of the pics on your blog — you’re lucky to be able to go back there fre­quently! i need to make a trip there some­time soon :-)

5. charu says:
   

   September 6th, 2009 at 11:45 am (#)

   I heard about the place from you — but they did not have room when I vis­ited — but it looked like a great place — hope to stay there the net time I am there — btw, I men­tioned Rain­tree Lodge in a piece on Fort Kochi I wrote recently :)

6. Madhu Rao says:
   

   September 7th, 2009 at 1:08 am (#)

   Beau­ti­ful pic­tures. I will sure keep this in mind when I visit that area next time around. There are indeed many a gems if you dare tread the road not taken and leave the ‘trusted names’ that dole out crappy service..

7. Solilo says:
   

   September 9th, 2009 at 12:10 pm (#)

   The pic­tures are beau­ti­ful esp. the rain tree.

8. Anita says:
   

   September 10th, 2009 at 2:14 pm (#)

   @ charu: pity… where did he land up stay­ing? i think they tend to get busy in sea­son — i went off season.

   @ Madhu: do that! and i have his num­ber some­where in case you need it!

   @ Solilo: thanks! it was a lovely rain tree!

9. Radman says:
   

   September 12th, 2009 at 2:41 am (#)

   lovely.

10. Ms.N says:
    

    September 13th, 2009 at 3:00 pm (#)

    sounds charm­ing! i liked ur tea-house story too, and if i am not wrong its from kochi again right? i am ammazed u get the time to re-visit these small pock­ets so often :). I’ve been mean­ing to go back to hampi, and 3 years later still haven’t!!!

11. Trip to Bhutan says:
    

    September 18th, 2009 at 11:56 pm (#)

    yes Kochi do seem to have a lot of nat­ural beauty, in fact entire India is very beau­ti­ful. I liked ur pics very much. Thanks!!

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