Tea hills and cliff beaches share this list with temple towns and backwater villages. Pick the corner of Kerala you would go back to first.
1MunnarHill station in the Western Ghats of Idukki district, surrounded by tea estates and close to Eravikulam National Park.
2AlappuzhaCoastal town on the Vembanad backwaters, the main base for Kerala houseboat cruises and home of the Nehru Trophy Boat Race.
3Fort KochiHistoric quarter of Kochi with Chinese fishing nets, St. Francis Church and Portuguese, Dutch and British colonial buildings.
4ThekkadyTown in Idukki district at the edge of Periyar Tiger Reserve, known for boat rides on Periyar Lake and spice plantations.
5KovalamBeach town south of Thiruvananthapuram with three crescent beaches and the Vizhinjam lighthouse.
6VarkalaCoastal town in Thiruvananthapuram district where laterite cliffs drop straight onto Papanasam Beach.
7WayanadHighland district in northern Kerala with Edakkal Caves, Chembra Peak and wildlife sanctuaries in the Western Ghats.
8KumarakomVillage of backwater resorts on the eastern shore of Vembanad Lake, with a bird sanctuary on the lake's edge.
9ThrissurCity around the Vadakkunnathan Temple, host of the annual Thrissur Pooram festival of caparisoned elephants and fireworks.
10VagamonHill station on the Idukki and Kottayam border with pine forest, rolling meadows and tea gardens.
11Athirappilly FallsWaterfall on the Chalakudy River in Thrissur district, about 25 metres high and the largest in Kerala.
12BekalCoastal town in Kasaragod district built around Bekal Fort, a 17th-century keyhole-shaped fort above the Arabian Sea.
13KozhikodeMalabar coast city where Vasco da Gama landed in 1498 at nearby Kappad, known for its beach and Malabar cuisine.
14KollamPort city on Ashtamudi Lake, the gateway to the Kerala backwaters and starting point of the backwater cruise to Alappuzha.
15ThiruvananthapuramKerala's capital, home of the Padmanabhaswamy Temple, Napier Museum and Kuthiramalika Palace.
16PoovarVillage near the Tamil Nadu border where the Neyyar River meets the sea, with a golden sand estuary beach reached by boat.
17Marari BeachFishing village beach at Mararikulam, north of Alappuzha, lined with palm groves and small resorts.
18PonmudiHill station about 60 km from Thiruvananthapuram, reached by a road of 22 hairpin bends through forest.
Photo credits
- Munnar — Kondephy, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Alappuzha — Augustus Binu/ facebook, CC BY-SA 3.0
- Fort Kochi — Vyacheslav Argenberg, CC BY 4.0
- Thekkady — Jigyasu, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Kovalam — Georgeumartin, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Varkala — Devender Goyal, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Wayanad — Karkiabhijeet, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Kumarakom — Jigyasu, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Thrissur — Challiyan at Malayalam Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0
- Vagamon — Visakh wiki, CC BY-SA 3.0
- Athirappilly Falls — Jan Joseph George, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Bekal — Vinayaraj, CC BY-SA 3.0
- Kozhikode — Sulyab Thottungal, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Kollam — The Raviz, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Thiruvananthapuram — Aravind Sivaraj, CC BY-SA 3.0
- Marari Beach — Mahendra M, CC BY-SA 3.0
- Ponmudi — Arunelectra, CC BY-SA 3.0
