More of River Godavari - Dindi Resorts and House Boat

In continuation of my last post, I now write about the rest of my week long travels around the districts of Godavari.  We returned back to Rajamahendri after the Papi Kondalu Trip a bit tired. The next morning after a heavy breakfast at the River Bay, we took a cab to Dindi a quaint little village along a distributary of the Godavari where the AP Tourism Department has recently built a resort. En route to the resort, we stopped briefly at the Dhawaleswaram Barrage a structure built more than 100 years ago that completely transformed the economy of the Godavari area, making it the rice bowl of India! One can see many statues saluting Sir Arthur Cotton for the hugely noble feat; it is also a coincidence that Cotton was an evangelist and one can see continuing symbols of conversions in the Godavari areas. 

Once we got onto the National highway connecting Madras to Kolkata, we also saw hundreds of plant nurseries that export decorative plants of all kinds lined up along the road. After stopping at one of them and checking it out, we reached the resort at Dindi. Being a government managed resort there were issues like the restaurant menu being very restrictive and the lawns not shaped up well etc (worst part was the dirty bath area adjoining the swimming pool). But on the positive side, the rooms were spacious and provided basic service. Our intent was to stay the night there and board the house boat the next morning.  

We found the house boat somewhat dilapidated from the outside and the maintenance was poor. The rooms inside were well maintained though and the deck upstairs was also just about okay. The railings along the boat were not in the best of condition and god forbid an accident waiting to happen. Our cruise along the river did make up for these shortcomings. We first went on a pre-lunch ride from Dindi all the way to Narsapur which is the last major town before the river's confluence with the sea. The ride was slow, idyllic and all we saw was water and millions of coconut trees. After returning to the resort, and finishing lunch we then proceeded on another cruise in the opposite direction to an island named Sivakodi Lanka. 

The sun was setting - a pretty sight in itself, and the breeze cool and gentle making this ride even more memorable. We alighted at the island and saw ruined structures that were used for tourists as overnight lodges. For whatever reason, they are no longer in use. The island had lots of tall green grass and several milkmen were cutting it away, packing it into bales and ferrying them across the river to their cow yards. We finally turned back to the resort and actually had a target to reach there by six pm. There is a government regulation about not having vessels ply after six in the evening as fishermen take over the river then. We spent the night in the houseboat and except for the occasional swaying of the bedroom it was pretty good.