And suddenly it’s our last day! I ate well last night and without any ill effects, so I followed up this morning with a hearty breakfast, condemned as I was to while away the day lounging by the pool.

First of all Judy, Christine and I went to the butterfly garden and I took a few (!) photos. The butterflies are so beautiful and attracted in large numbers by the flowers they have planted there.
At 9.30 we went on the bird watching walk with the naturalist. At first there seemed little around us soon we were spotting quite a range of birds, including the little owlet roosting in the daytime and another one with a youngster There was also an Indian Scopes Owl roosting in the roof of one of the houses. It was a good hour ad a half and ended with a spectacular woodpecker. We also saw en route some bright red and black shield bugs which covered the ground and some tree trunks.

Exhausted by all this we went for a swim and lounged by the pool – very pleasant. At 4,00 p.m. Christine had booked an Ayurvedic massage. I decided to download our boarding passes and get them printed. This proved more difficult than I expected as I had lost internet access and it required some IT expertise to get me back on.Eventually I returned triumphant with said boarding passes printed at the hotel reception. All quite pointless as it turned out as they simply printed proper card ones at the baggage drop at Kochi airport!

Once Christine was back, duly rubbed to a state of peace and transcendental bliss, we went to the beach to watch the sunset – how romantic. However C’s state of inner calm was short lived once she saw the amount of plastic rubbish on the beach. She set to with a will and soon had a mound of bottles and other plastic waste for us to take back to the hotel recycling bins. There is something special about the sunset reflected in an empty coke bottle, but romantic it isn’t!

Christine wanted to wear her sari for dinner, so Karen arrived to help her tie herself into it. I was a bit concerned about cultural appropriation but was told not to be so silly. Christine certainly looked stunning in it and I was proud to offer her my arm to walk into dinner on. In fact I came in my entirety,to save any messiness.

A couple more mojitos helped dinner go down, but Christine seemed to have picked up a slight tummy complaint and had to leave early and in somewhat of a hurry! She managed to give Mark his present before she fled the scene which was the main thing.

And so to bed for our last night. We would have to be up in 5 hours for our departure at 4.00 a.m. Sleep was likely to be elusive as it often is when you know you have to be up early.