Junkar and Vallom - An unique way to commute

The Hyderabad traffic police were craning  the scooty’s and bikes parked in the no parking zone. The vehicles were lifted with a hook onto the back of the truck.  The vehicles inside the truck reminded me of a similar scene at Vypeen island in Kerala. 

At Ernakulam, when we checked into Bharat tourist homes in Dec'08 we were not tired after travelling a 24 hour journey from Hyderabad. We refreshed ourselves and went to the reception office to book a cab to Cherai beach. The reception guy suggested us to take a boat ferry instead of a cab. We took his advice to make a journey,  a  journey to discover beautiful sights and reach  Cherai.

We took a boat jetty from Ernakulam and reached a place called Vypeen island. We disembarked from the rickety boat jetty and boarded a local bus to reach Cherai. As we sat in the bus and were waiting for it to leave. A similar sight of vehicles like car, motorbikes, cycles and even a minibus carrying passengers drove onto the landing of the big motor jetty using the roll on- roll off(Ro-Ro) concept. . The jetty locked itself and started its journey towards Ernakulam carrying all the vehicles and its owners. Only here the owners of the vehicles willingly drove and parked their vehicles inside the boat jetty unlike hyderabad. It was a very interesting sight to see the vehicles being transhipped. Here it is a means of commuting. Since Ernakulam has many islands around it like Fort Kochi, Vypeen and Willingdon. The people during peak hours to avoid the traffic over bridge find it a easy means of commuting. This transportation is called “Junkar Ferry”.

Similarly when I was travelling through Vypeen island to reach Cherai, the back waters of the Arabian sea formed canals inside the village and the kutcha  houses on either side of the palm fringed canals found it easier to use the valloms ( wooden plank boat)  than the bridge. Every house had a vallom tied to the palm tree outside it. The sight of  the tender coconut and fish laden valloms sailing on the canals made a picture post card sight. Also, this island faces a huge water crisis and so it is a familiar sight to see water pots on the vallom. Potable water is carried here through the back water channel.

I ‘ve heard that many  tourists  don’t travel this way and instead take the Goshree bridge(by road) to travel to Cherai from Ernakulam. We only had to thank the manager at Bharat travel homes who suggested us this way to reach Cherai instead of taking a cab.

The junkar ferry(see the auto & 2 mini lorry)

vallom laden with coconuts

 We had a nice time discovering the country life of these people who commuted with vallom and junkar ferry. When here leave no opportunity to miss the relaxed way of life  where many houses go about their daily chores without even glancing at you.  They glide in a ferry to their work as if that is the most natural thing to do and i still can't forget the beautiful fishing scenes on my way back. The fishermen fishing with the lanterns in the late dec evening made such a surreal sight . I did  capture in my camcorder for posterity but lost them due to my carelessness. A beautiful Island and an unspoilt beach near Ernakulam. Already blogged about it here. 

Making or planning a holiday  is not a big deal. But to make the holiday and journey a lifetime memory is. One such lifetime memory is from my Ernakulam (kerala) trip. 

pics: google