rivers and canals. Traveling the backwaters is one of the highlights of a visit to Kerala. A traveler often is greeted by people in large passenger boats carrying them to towns around the lake. But there are numerous smaller boats propelled by punting with a long bamboo pole, crisscrossing the shallow, palm-fringed lakes studded with cantilevered Chinese fishing nets. They travel along narrow, shady canals, where they are loaded with coir(coconut fiber), copra(dried coconut meat) and cashew. Along the way are small settlements where people live on narrow spits of reclaimed land only a few meters wide. Although practically surrounded by water they still manage to keep cows, pigs, chickens and ducks and cultivate small vegetable gardens.

Once the state's trade and travel highways, these tranquil backwaters is the most popular tourist attraction of Kerala. Kerala is her backwaters and lakes. They have dictated her history, shape her present and promise her a future by offering incomparable beauty and unique experience. The most interesting is the Kuttanad region, called the rice bowl of Kerala, probably the only place in the sub-continent where farming is done below sea level.