This morning we've an early start to catch the 6.40am Cannanore Express to Alleppey. Alarms are set for 5am, and I'm relieved to find Sarah is feeling much better. At 5.40 I take our bags to reception to check out. The receptionist boy is asleep on the sofa but rouses himself when I arrive. He presents me with the full bill. "I've been promised 'maximum discount' by Mr Kumar," I say. He appears to know nothing of this and disappears down the corridor. I don't know whether he's talked to Mr Kumar, but when he comes back he offers me a price less tax, which is about Rs400 off. It's less than I'd been expecting, but by this time it's 5.55am and we've no time to argue.

Yesterday I'd arranged with reception for a taxi to be at the hotel at 6am to take us to the station. Or at least that's what I thought I'd arranged. "Is taxi here yet?" I ask. The receptionist boy looks blank, but lifts the phone and makes a call to, I presume, a taxi company. By 6.05 there's no sign of a taxi and we're getting concerned. "What's happening about the taxi?" We try and inject some urgency into the situation, but this is India. "Security man is finding taxi". "Who did you phone?" I ask, but he doesn't seem to understand this question. The main road is a two minute walk from the reception area but we move our bags to the main gate. Just then the security man arrives back on his motorbike, apparently having tried, and failed, to find a taxi. By now the receptionist has disappeared, but Sarah spots him lurking round the back of a building. "Hey!" I shout, "What's happening with the taxi?" "Don't worry" he answers with an infuriating smile and shake of the head. "Station is only five minutes." By now it's 6.15 and no-one seems to be doing anything. I leave Sarah with the bags and run down the drive to the main road.

There are very few vehicles and it's five minutes before I see the single headlight of an auto-rickshaw approaching. I flag it down, but it's already taken. The driver shouts something as he passes. It's now 6.25 and I can see we're going to miss this train if something doesn't happen quickly. Just then the same auto comes back, empty. It's like the cavalry coming over the hill just in the nick of time! I jump in and we race down the drive to where Sarah is standing with the bags. It seems she's got so angry with the hotel staff that they've scattered to the four winds! We load the bags in the auto (there's not much room in the back of an auto rickshaw for two large rucksacks, two day packs and two adults) and urge the driver to get to the station quickly which, to his credit, he does. For his efforts I give him a 50% tip - Rs5! We're just walking onto the platform as the train pulls in. Wouldn't you know it, but the only train which we might have wanted to be late is bang on time!

This is the first train we've travelled on which has a chair car - that is a carriage with conventional seats rather than sleeping berths. Apart from that amazing statistic, the journey to Alleppey is uneventful, and in fact we arrive ten minutes early. We negotiate an auto to take us the the Hotel Arcadia, and we're decanted at a rather flash place which looks very new. The Lonely Planet guide says it's been recently renovated so that must be the reason why it's so smart. We check in, but for some reason they've no record or our booking. Once we're up in our room we check the phone number we have against the details on the hotel's documentation, and they're completely different. It now dawns on us that we're in completely the wrong hotel. This is the Arcadia Regent, whereas we're booked into the Hotel Arcadia, an altogether more downmarket affair. Clive goes back to reception and explains the mistake, and says that we'll have to move out because we're poor Kiwis travelling on a tight budget. As a result we get a 15% discount as an incentive to stay, which we accept, particularly as we've discovered that there's a pool on the roof. In fact it turns out that the hotel is only 3 weeks old which accounts for the staff's enthusiasm.

Alleppey is the main tourist point for people wishing to travel on the Kerala backwaters. This is a network of lagoons, lakes, rivers and canals which fringe much of the Kerala coastline. In Alleppey itself there are two canals which connect with the sea. These look quite stagnant and are fairly pungent, but this is not typical of the waterways themselves. Tomorrow we're taking an overnight houseboat trip, so our first task is to find the office of the boat company and provide payment. The office is a little difficult to find. We walk in the general direction, as given in the Lonely Planet guide, but we can't find it and have to ask. It seems we're not far away, and we're directed to the second floor of a non-descript concrete office block up some narrow dingy stairs. There's a comatose man at the foot of the stairs who doesn't stir as we step over him. There are no signs, but several pairs of sandals outside an office door indicate some kind of activity is taking place. We look through the office door. "Is this the place for the boat trips?" we ask. "Ah, Mr and Mrs Thompson I presume" answers a genial chap, standing to shake our hands. We've found it!

We decide not to eat at the hotel restaurant because we've found out they don't have a liquor licence yet. We find a family restaurant at a nearby hotel, sit down and order a Kingfisher. "Sorry sir, first of the month, dry day today" says the waiter. Ho hum. However the food is good, but we do take issue with the musak, which is one traditional Indian tune repeated over and over (and over and over)again. On the 18th play, by which time we can hum it note perfect, we take it up with the head waiter. "You not like the music?" he asks. We try and explain that it's not so much the music itself, its the fact that its the ONLY music. He goes off, and shortly afterwards a managerial type chap comes over. "You not like the music?" he asks and we have to explain yet again. Presumably this issue has never been raised before, and they've been playing the same tune in the restaurant since independence in 1947. The managerial type disappears, and shortly afterwards the music stops to be replaced by Bryan Adams. Although it's nice to have something different playing, the sound system is totally inadequate for this sort of rock music. Only the treble is discernible, and distorted at that. We decide not to create any further fuss, and just get on and eat our meal.