High tides and the vanishing act.

The outbreak of COVID-19 has caged us all. With plenty of free time, we have been reminiscing about our trips and transforming them into words. Here is one such trip of ours. We hope you enjoy reading it and we hope to take you to the same place we had traveled to a couple of years back in January:


The countless tall coconut trees, the incredible and popular backwaters, and the variety of spices that are cultivated in the state do make the phrase “God’s own country” befit Kerala (the phrase was adopted by the Tourism department of the state's government in the 1980s).


Poovar is a humble town in the Thiruvananthapuram district of Kerala. It is gifted with a beautiful beach that attracts an appreciative number of tourists each year. This town is a miscellany of beauty, with its indescribable beach mixed with the tranquil sound of waves lapping against the coast.


Poovar has allowed the establishment of numerous luxurious and wellness resorts, in addition to the plethora of florid island resorts (not actually an island as the landscape is surrounded by water only at three sides, but even then, its still called an island resort), which offer many recreational activities to tourists.


We were lodged in one of the many aforementioned island resorts. Such types of resorts could be entered or exited through boats (as they were located on an island). One, therefore, gets to experience the feel of the backwaters as soon as they ride the motorboat to the island, with the luxuriant virginal vegetation on the periphery of the waters, and the melodious chirping of the birds and the sound of the waves produced as the boat slices through the corrugated surface of the water (if one chooses to lodge in the mentioned type of resort).


The 10-kilometer drive to Poovar from Neyyattinkara railway station is an exciting journey filled with a multitude of coconut trees and numerous small shops and shacks that line the road. It is splendid to see the locals valiantly climb the trees to procure coconuts for their livelihood, and it is wonderful to drink the divine waters these fruits offer. Traveling via train to Kerala offers scenic views throughout the journey, as the train makes its way through forests and runs across villages.


The famous beach of Poovar is something that cannot be missed. It is a narrow stretch of a sandy landscape that is surrounded by the backwaters on one side and the mighty ocean on the other. Thus, the beach can only be reached via boats unlike the Marina Beach in Chennai. The breezy atmosphere and the waves that crash against the beach on either side create a movie-like effect. Much like the beach in Chennai, horse-riding and balloon-shooting are the two primary recreational activities that can be found on this beach. Besides this, the ferocity with which the waves crash against the shore is something that amazed us. An interesting fact about this beach is that on occasions when the tide is high, the beach gets submerged in the water, leading to the creation of a magnificent estuary.

The tranquil Poovar beach.

Boating, scuba diving and visiting the famous Neyyar dam should be part of every globetrotter’s itinerary.


Our first scuba diving on-land lessons began as soon as we reached the scuba-diving agency. For all the people who suffer from thalassophobia, scuba diving in Poovar is the best way to overcome your fear.

Ready for plunging into the ocean and scuba diving for the first time!

"Scuba" is an acronym of "Self Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus". On average, the oxygen tank that each of us carried on our backs weighed 15 kilograms (of course we were assisted in carrying the tanks, or else our frail spinal cords must have cracked into two under the weight of these tanks as well as gravity). Our scuba apparatus was the most commonly used set that used a “single-hose open circuit 2-stage demand regulator, connected to a single back-mounted high-pressure gas cylinder, with the first stage connected to the cylinder valve and the second stage at the mouthpiece”. In addition to the strenuous efforts of wearing the scuba equipment, we also had to equip ourselves with bricks to increase our weights by an additional five kilograms of weight so that we could dive underwater.

Getting ready with the gear for scuba diving!

Weighing approximately 20 kilograms extra and a heavy load on our backs, we stood on the coastline, wondering if it was going to be good, and turned out that it was amazing! We were paired up and had to dive in twos.
When it was our call, we began walking steadily into the ocean as long as our feet were in contact with the seabed, after which the trainers who accompanied us pulled a chord in our jackets, making it inflate and assisting us in floating. We were not afraid but in fact, we were confident we received impromptu training like practicing breathing underwater (the trainers made sure we got acclimatized to breathing through the mouth) when we were distant from the shore.

                 The coastline from where we walked we began walking steadily into the ocean.

This was our first scuba diving experience and and was truly a memorable one! We saw turtles (whose numbers, unfortunately, are dwindling at an alarming rate), ray fishes, and a variety of other fishes.


The goggles that we wore on our eyes were similar to the rear-view and side-view mirrors of vehicles, wherein the objects that we see in the mirror are closer than they seem to appear.

Our next destination, Neyyar Dam, was a beautiful architectural structure after which the Neyyattinkara railway station had been named. This dam provides water to multiple regions of Kerala and also facilitates irrigation and many other purposes.


After viewing the marvelous Neyyar dam and witnessing the majestic lion, the lithe spotted deer and the resilient crocs in the safari very close to the Neyyar Dam, our spectacular journey came to an end.


The water in Poovar was murky that hindered visibility during our dive. According to our diving instructor, the water is very lucid with greater visibility at Havlock Island. Waiting now to dive in the clear waters of Havlock Island, one of the many beautiful islands Andaman and Nicobar Islands......