South Kanara

Funny, when I started typing this, the first word to emerge was "Mangalore" so synonymous is my ancestral town to the district of South Kanara. But realised quickly that in fact the trip I am about to describe did NOT include Mangalore. Our base in fact was Karkala, a small rather prosperous town dominated by the trader GSB community, from which my brother in law hails (closely affiliated to my own community the Chitrapur Saraswat Brahmins or CSB). Sis and family were down there for the annual "taer" (literally "festival"), which is essentially a period when the emigrant population returns to its roots and celebrates a week of revelry, mainly centered around the town's temple. This happens every year in May.

Sonal and I took a bus from Bangalore to kickstart this one. We were supposed to drive down, and sis and family take the train from Mumbai, but there was some confusion about their bookings being confirmed, which meant that they drove down all along the Konkan coast, then travelled with us in tow to Bangalore, and finally back to Mumbai in an isosceles-triangular path. We spent a fun-filled week in Karkala, at my sister's in-laws' nice house, and spent a lot of that driving around. Travelling with kids is no picnic at the best of times, but Ro and even Aman were on their best behaviour, and that helped.

It's been a few months since that trip and I can only recall some the highlights, pity. We did Kollur, Udipi, Hornadu---day trips all from home base Karkala--- before starting the trip to Bangalore via Hassan. Stayed at a horribly overpriced resort at Hassan for a couple of nights, and made the most of it by planning endless games of UNO and 20 questions (Rohan, not yet 8 then, turning out to be pretty good at it!) and lazing in the pool in the evenings.

A nice family holiday, took a couple of days off from work and did the usual touristy thing in Bangalore as well at the end of it.