Cochin Kochi, India

India

Wooden frames tall as houses lean toward the water, held back by stone counterweights. Kochi's Chinese fishing nets, installed on this coast for centuries, greet ships entering the harbour. Old Cochin, on the Kerala coast, was one of the great spice trading posts; Portuguese, Dutch and British succeeded one another, and each left traces that a few hours at port suffice to encounter.

Willingdon Island: The Starting Point

Ships dock on Willingdon Island, an artificial island at the harbour's centre, either at Samudrika Terminal or at the nearby Ernakulam Quay. The immediate surroundings remaining industrial, better to head promptly for the historic quarters. The taxi or autorickshaw reaches Fort Kochi in about twenty minutes; the public ferry, slower overall but full of life, offers for a few rupees a crossing of about fifteen minutes with views of the fishing boats' coming and going.

Tracing the Empires

At Fort Kochi, streets shaded by enormous trees line colonial houses, artists' cafés and walls patinated by the monsoon. St. Francis Church, one of India's oldest European churches, once held the burial of Vasco da Gama, who died here in 1524 before his remains were returned to Portugal. On the neighbouring shore, the famous fishing nets are worked by several people, and fishers readily invite the curious to pull on the ropes. Evening brings stalls offering to grill the freshly caught fish.

Mattancherry: Spices and Synagogue

Continuing to Mattancherry, spice warehouses still perfume with pepper, ginger and cardamom, riches that drew half the world here. The Dutch Palace, built by the Portuguese then renovated by the Dutch, preserves frescoes dedicated to Hindu epics. A few streets farther, the Paradesi Synagogue, founded in 1568 at the end of Jew Town's antiquarian street, astonishes with its chandelier ceiling and floor of hand-painted Chinese tiles, each different. The whole area is walked on foot, among antique shops and ochre façades.

Kerala in Condensed Form

The companies' excursions often propose an outing on the backwaters, this network of canals and lagoons bordered by coconut palms that make the state's reputation. Depending on available time, a voyage of an hour or two aboard a traditional boat gives an overview of this amphibious life—rice paddies, kingfishers and villages along the water. The longest port-calls even allow pushing as far as Alappuzha's canals, farther south. In town, a condensed kathakali performance introduces you to the green make-up and coded expressions of this Kerala theatrical art, sometimes offering the chance to watch the artists' preparation.

Coastal Flavours

The Keralan table merits keeping a place for it: curried fish in coconut milk, shrimp sautéed with curry leaves, rice served on banana leaf in traditional establishments. The old quarter's cafés, often housed in ancient mansions, permit a cool pause between neighbourhoods.

Returning to the harbour, the fishing nets cut a silhouette against the backlight, motionless and patient as on the first morning. Kochi leaves that rare mixture: spices full in your nose, centuries full in your head, and the certainty that the Malabar coast has not finished telling its navigators' tales.