User talk:Johnsongilbert

Alleppey Houseboat
The reason tourists visit Alappuzha is for its backwaters. But, until a few years back, Alleppey was still on the fringe of the tourist trail in Kerala. A stop-over point for the Alleppy-Kollam motorboat day tours. Since then, with the Kerala Houseboat tours’ meteoric rise in popularity, Alleppey is the most sought after tourist destination in Kerala.

In fact, the overnight alleppey houseboats tours is now considered the no.1 thing for tourists to do in India. Tourism figures have experienced incredible growth since Johnson started his home stay business in Alleppey/Alappuzha in 2001. Yes, when Johnson started his business here, there were about 30 houseboats in Kerala. In the 10 years since, there are now close to one thousand active houseboats or Kettuvalloms plying their trade in Alleppey now.

An overnight trip on a houseboat around Alleppey offers tourists a more meaningful, diverse, scenic and enjoyable trip than the never ending dull Alleppey-Kollam 8 hour day-trip. Even though more expensive, tourists slowly but surely switched to the wonderfully relaxing, all inclusive, overnight trip on the ‘Only in Alappuzha’ built houseboat or Rice barge.

Information on Kerala Backwaters: The Kerala backwaters are a network of connected rivers, lakes, lagoons and smaller canals. Over 900 km's long, dotted by picturesque rice fields, stunning natural landscapes, bird life, wonderful sunrises and sunsets make it one of the most visited tourist locales in the world. The Kerala backwaters are interspersed by villages and connects a number of major towns and cities of Kerala including Kochi, Kollam, Kottayam and Alappuzha.

Information on Alleppey/Alappuzha backwaters: Defintiely the most scenic and meaningful part of the backwaters is in and around Alleppey. The hub of houseboat tourism, it attracts tourists, both Domestic and International throughout the year. Kuttanadu, the famed rice bowl of Kerala, is a scenic village- a huge area partly reclaimed form the water. It's one of the few places in the world where the water level is higher then the land level. Alappuzha also hosts most of the major Snake boat races of Kerala, including the world famous Nehru trophy boat race. more information