tea and spice and everything nice

my first full day in Munnar, Kerala has been an AMAZING one. but let me back track for a minute to the two days of travel....

many exciting things happened in my travels. 1) i rode on an airplane alone for the first time in my life!! it was actually a lot of fun and i felt so grown up. 2) i spent 5 hours alone in the jfk airport waiting for my class to get there. this was boring at times, but good thing jfk has the most interesting assortment of people ever. 3) i hopped on a plane for a casual 11 and a half hours. no biggie, right? wrong. big, big, biggie. i was incredibly nervous because i have the attention span of a five year old at times and my last international flight only allowed me 3 hours of sleep. i didn't get a ton of sleep, but i did make a friend on the plane and watched some great movies. when i got on the plane and saw they had "the social network" i kind of freaked out a little. so we arrived in dubai around 8:30 pm their time. the airport was HUGE and beautiful....they had a 3 story water wall for crying out loud! it was awesome...but the layover not so much. our next flight wouldn't depart until 2:45 am. needless to say we were all pooped by the travel and a little bummed it was dark outside so we couldn't see dubai. the next flight was only 4 1/2 hours, which seemed like a breeze compared to the other flights. and i really liked the breakfast they served. yum yum. so we arrived in cochin, kerala at 8:30 am kerala time, hopped on a van, and started one of the most life-threatening bus rides i have ever been on in my life.

one thing i learned extremely quickly is indians seem to not see road lines and they love to honk. for such a sweet, peaceful people i was shocked at how much honking they did. when i think of excessive honking i think of an angry new yorker. but nope. when i looked at our drivers face he was just as peaceful as can be. so i concluded that this was some kind of communication between the drivers and pedestrians. from what i can tell one honk means "warning-i'm here and i'm bigger than you," two means "move it...i'm coming through and i'm faster than you" and multiple honks is leaning more towards the i'm-not-playing-around-get-out-of-my-way end. not only was the driving crazy, the roads we drove to get to the town of munnar were extremely curvy. it was a blessing that i was exhausted and slept off and on the whole ride. at one point we stopped on the side of the road to go look at a waterfall and purchase some bottles of water. the waterfall was amazing, but it was nothing compared to what we were about to see.

continuing our drive to munnar we started seeing mountains covered with tea plantations. this is literally an amazingly beautiful thing to see (i'll post pics when i get the chance!). we passed a couple more HUGE waterfalls and cinnamon trees, which made me so excited for the tea and spice plantation tour. after four hours we arrived in munnar, a small mountain town, generally geared toward tourists. the hotel we are staying in, east end munnar, is a beautiful hotel nestled in the middle of downtown. when we arrived we had lunch and then headed up to our rooms to rest. maggie and i were only going to take a two hour nap, but whoops...i turned my alarm off and we ended up sleeping until dinner. the food is challenging for me (surprise, surprise) but i am finding some good stuff to eat :) we headed back up for bed and woke up, wide awake at 4 am. awesome. i managed to drift back asleep.

yesterday morning we woke up, put on our hiking gear and prepared for our 4-5 hour hike. well...at least that's how long the guide told us it would be. for the next six hours i went on one of the most challenging hikes of my life. nothing says, "you're out of shape. maybe you shouldn't have eaten those christmas cookies" like a six hour hike. but it was absolutely amazing. while it was challenging at times, it was breathtaking at others. just when i thought we had climbed the highest peak we would walk down to a small valley and start our trek upwards towards a higher and inevitably more magnificent mountain top. the mountains we were climbing had tea plantations on them, which were absolutely beautiful. i really can't even explain it here except by saying that God is the most amazing artist ever. end of story.

after about 4 hours of hiking we entered a rain forest type area where the spices and coffee plants are. it was a quick environmental change from the breezy, grassy mountain tops, but it was beautiful just the same. we stopped on a rock and ate a packaged lunch. the remainder of our hike was walking through the paths of the tea plantations. 6 hours later we were absolutely exhausted. we headed back to the hotel, rested and showered and then ventured out on our own for the first time to have dinner. we found the best little restaurant in the middle of town and for the first time since i've been here i had an awesome meal that i ate every single bit of!

this morning we are packing up and heading to the tea and spice plantation! i couldn't be more excited (rachael and mom, get pumped about the tea i'm buying you!). then we are making the four hour drive back to cochin. i am missing my friends and family back in burlington and raleigh, but i am so thankful for all of your love and support throughout this whole process!

once i get a computer, i will update y'all again :)