Things to Do in Alleppey Around Your Houseboat Cruise

Most guides to Alleppey give you thirty things and no sense of which fit together. This one is organised differently, around the constraint that actually applies: a houseboat boards at noon and releases you at 9:00 AM, so what you can do depends entirely on which side of that you are standing.

If you have not booked the boat yet, the first-timer’s guide covers the cruise itself.

The morning before you board

You have from dawn until about 11:30. This is more time than people realise and it is usually wasted on a hotel breakfast.

Alappuzha Beach and the pier. The beach is a working seafront rather than a resort strip, and the 1860s iron pier running out into the Arabian Sea is the landmark. Early morning is the time — fishermen bringing in the night’s catch, the light low, nobody selling you anything. Fifteen minutes by autorickshaw from most hotels in town.

The town canals. Alappuzha was built around a canal grid, which is where the “Venice of the East” line comes from. The canals through the middle of town are nothing like the backwaters — narrower, scruffier, lined with houses and shops — and far more interesting for it. Walk the stretch near the boat jetty.

A coir workshop. Coconut-fibre rope and matting is what this district actually does for a living, and several small workshops around town will let you watch the spinning. Ask your hotel; it is not a ticketed attraction so much as somewhere you turn up.

The fish market, if you are an early riser and not squeamish. Worth it for the karimeen alone — the fish you may well be eating on the boat.

The hours after check-out

You are off the boat at 9:00 AM, which is a genuinely good time to be awake in Kerala, and most people waste it driving straight to the airport.

A shikara hour. This is the one we would push hardest. A shikara is a small canopied canoe that goes into channels a houseboat physically cannot enter — the thin canals where the banks are within arm’s reach. An hour costs very little and shows you a completely different version of the water you just spent a night on. There is a full comparison in shikara vs houseboat.

The Alappuzha–Kottayam state ferry. Two and a half hours across the backwaters for a few rupees, on a working public boat full of commuters rather than tourists. One of the best-value boat rides in India. Only if you are heading that way — it is a journey, not a loop.

Marari Beach, about twenty minutes north. Quieter and cleaner than the town beach, with the fishing village still working behind it. A good place to spend the afternoon before an evening flight.

If you have a whole spare day

Kumarakom, ninety minutes around the top of Vembanad Lake, has a bird sanctuary that is genuinely worth the trip in the migratory season — November to February. It is the other famous backwater destination and makes an easy day from Alleppey.

Ambalappuzha Sri Krishna Temple, fifteen kilometres south, is a 15th-century temple known for its palpayasam, a milk pudding served as offering. Non-Hindus are not admitted to the inner sanctum, but the grounds and the surrounding town are open.

Karumadi, a few kilometres further, has an 11th-century black granite Buddha — damaged, half-missing, and quietly extraordinary. Almost nobody goes.

Kayaking in the narrow canals is available through several local operators, and is the most physical way to see Kuttanad. Mornings only, realistically — the afternoon heat is punishing on open water.

If you are here in August

The Nehru Trophy Boat Race, traditionally the second Saturday of August, is the largest snake-boat race in Kerala and finishes on Punnamada Lake — the same water your houseboat departs from. Crews of a hundred-plus rowers in chundan vallam boats, enormous crowds, and an atmosphere nothing else in the state matches.

Book accommodation and boats weeks ahead if your dates land on it, and expect peak pricing. The lake closes to tourist traffic on race day, so houseboat routes work around it.

Onam, in August or September, brings feasts, flower carpets and a festival mood across the whole state. If your cruise falls during it, expect a sadya aboard.

What we would skip

Being straight, since most lists will not tell you:

• The “Alleppey backwater tourist village” type attractions that cluster near the jetty. Thin, and you have just come off the real thing.
• Ayurveda packages booked on the day from a tout. Genuine Ayurveda is a multi-week clinical business; a one-hour walk-in massage is a massage. Fine if that is what you want, but do not confuse the two.
• A second houseboat night. Covered elsewhere, but worth repeating: the second day covers similar water. One night, then land.

Fitting it together

A sensible two-day shape:

Day 1, morning	Beach and pier at dawn, coir workshop, town canals
Day 1, 11:30 AM	Board the houseboat
Day 1, 5:00 PM	Anchored — the evening is the trip
Day 2, 9:00 AM	Check out
Day 2, morning	Shikara hour in the narrow canals
Day 2, afternoon	Marari Beach, or drive on

That gives you the backwaters from three different boats — houseboat, shikara, and optionally the public ferry — which is more varied than two nights aboard the same vessel.

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