Inspired by the travel blogs of various wonderful people here, I want to share a particularly fond trip of mine, that involves various trains, a tourist trip to the Malabars and the best food experience ever.

It was the year 2014, and after my 8th grade final exams were over, my father had planned a trip with his office friend with our families for Kerala, Kanyakumari and Goa. The next day after my vacations had begun, we started out trip from Lokmanya Tilak Terminus in the morning. We could have boarded from...
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Panvel, but my father felt that it would be better for our peace of mind if we started from LTT.

There, we boarded our first train, the very popular Netravati Express, for an end-to-end journey till Trivandrum. Locomotive for this run was an Erode Alco Diesel, WDM-3D #11171. I remembered this number because of something that happened ahead, which I will share.

Luckily, both of our families had cabin seats in a 2A coach, which meant no disturbance. Once the train entered Konkan, we got stuck to the windows. This was our first time travelling towards Konkan, so us 4 kids got glued to our windows and took in all the greenery and beauty one could grasp. Tunnel after bridge after tunnel, the scenery was beautiful indeed. And with our coach close to the locomotive, the chugging made it all the more amazing of an experience. Good thing we were in an AC coach otherwise we would have all turned black from the soot and smoke.

Goa came in the night; Mangalore came early morning and Kerala started right after. Benefit of a slow train: we had a full day to experience the coast and backwaters of Kerala from the train. We went through Calicut, Ernakulam (Kochi), Allapuzha and Quilon and saw the backwaters and coasts passing right through us. We were also shocked by the number of coconut trees that adorned the railway tracks.

We finally reached Trivandrum by the evening, and stayed at a hotel for the night. Next day, we visited the Padmanabhaswamy Temple and the Varkala beach with its black sand (used to be empty that time, now it is a tourist spot). After roaming and shopping for two days, we left for Kanyakumari.

The trip to Kanyakumari was by CSMT - Kanyakumari Express. Older railfans will recognize this train as the famed Jayanti Janta Express. Newer railfans know this train as the Pune – Kanyakumari Express. It was a short trip, full of greenery, but the locomotive ahead got a shock out of me. It was the same Alco from my Netravati Express trip, down to the same road number, #11171.

We experienced the Sunset/Sunrise point (where the three seas meet), the Thiruvalluvar statue (where we were nearly thrown out into the sea by the strong winds coming from all three directions) and the Vivekananda Memorial.

We left for Ernakulam next day by the very famous Vivek Express. It was shunted by an Erode Alco #11171. I felt like this locomotive was the guardian angel for our family for this trip. Other than that, it was an uneventful trip, where we got down at Ernakulam Town (Ernakulam North for the railfans) at night. We stayed at a hotel nearby for the night and went for the Guruvayur Temple at Guruvayur next day by a passenger train. I was shocked to see that even a passenger train was near empty and clean. Visit to the Guruvayur temple was very serene and it fulfilled one of my promises that I had given to one of my best friends.

We also visited the Athirapally waterfalls, though due to the weather being swelteringly hot, the waterfalls were not at their full flow. Still, it was an amazing trek and a wonderful experience which had us spending the whole day. We returned to Kochi that night and stayed there till next day for shopping.

Our next trip was to Goa (specifically Madgaon), and our train for this trip was the Kochuveli Bikaner Express. This train is now Kochuveli Sriganganagar Express. It was an overnight trip, nothing special. But the locomotive attracted me. It was an EMD Diesel, and it was the first time I experienced the jet like sounds of the locomotive. I became an instant fan.

We reached Madgaon by the morning and took rest at the hotel till evening. For three days, we enjoyed the numerous beaches along Madgaon and Panaji. My father describes our Goa trip as our “three-day rest after a week of hectic tourism”.

Finally, it was time for our return to Mumbai. The train my father chose for our return was the Mandovi Express, this time led by an EMD. Once the train started, we kids got glued to the windows. Once the food arrived though, everyone in our entourage wanted more. The food was so tasty and so good that even my mother, who prefers home made food to train food, said that she would prefer the food of this train. We snacked ourselves with our favourite foods the whole day, to the point that we wanted more even though our tummies were full.

After a whole day of snacking, watching the Konkan beauty through the windows and resting afterwards, we finally reached Panvel at night, late by 1 hour. Boarded a local train on the next platform and went home to a nice, sound sleep.

This concluded my 10 day trip to the South and has always left me wanting for more trips towards the Konkan and the Malabars.