A shikkara to a church that has stood 1,400 years.

Three nights in a 175-year-old family house on an island, with the boat and a cooking lesson in the price.

Kuttanad farms below sea level, and this island sits in the middle of it, fifteen kilometres out of Alleppey. Nine acres of spice garden, fruit trees and fish ponds, the Manimala river across the front and a thousand acres of paddy behind. The house has been in the same family for 175 years and still has its teak, its carving and its Ara, the timber room where the rice harvest was kept.

Three nights gives the two days this place wants. One goes to the shikkara, out through the small canals to a church that has stood 1,400 years, a snake boat and an old temple. The other goes to the kitchen, learning three Kuttanadan dishes and then eating them. Both are in our price, along with breakfast, the fishing, the toddy tapping, the walk round the garden and the bicycles, which the house gives away to anyone who asks and nobody thinks to.

A 175 year old ancestral house on an island in the Kuttanad backwaters, its nine acres holding spice gardens, fruit trees and fish ponds beside a thousand acre rice field. Seven rooms, the Manimala river in front, and a boat at the steps.

Three nights in the Heritage Room.

Shikkara Cruise. An hour out through the small canals to a church that has stood 1,400 years, a snake boat and an old temple. The boat is yours rather than a seat on somebody else's. · per boat

Cooking Class with Dinner (3 Dishes). Three Kuttanadan dishes cooked alongside the kitchen, and then eaten as your dinner.

Breakfast each morning. Served outside in the garden, as every meal here is.

The nine acres. Spice and fruit garden, fish ponds, canals, and a thousand acres of rice field behind the house.

On the house. Fishing in the farm ponds, with the equipment; Toddy tapping and a walk round the garden; Bicycles, for as long as you want them; Country folk songs sung in the garden in the evening.