It had been quite a while since we had gone on a family vacation since the start of the Covid pandemic. The last family vacation trip we had done outside of our state was to Meghalaya 2 years earlier! You can read about that trip here. Given the gap, we were all itching to go on one. Well, it materialised in the form of a family vacation to Puducherry 😀 .

Puducherry, earlier known as Pondicherry, is a union territory of India. It is constituted of four territories of former French India. Interestingly these four parts are quite disbursed in different parts of South India. Our vacation was to the largest territory, Puducherry, on the eastern coast.

Puducherry is fairly small. The trip we did was one with 4 nights of stay in Puducherry. This allowed us to take things slow as well as be able to cover all the key areas of interest. All our family vacations have a mix of experiences; something adventurous, trying new foods, sightseeing and just chilling. This trip too had a good mix of all these 🙂 .

First the “something adventurous”. Now this was something that we had not tried before; surfing! My wife and my children signed for an introductory session. Water based activities are not my thing. So I volunteered to be the photographer 🙂 . The session was roughly for 2 hours. It included understanding the basics and then trying it out in the sea. Here are some pictures to show what they went through.

First is to change into the right attire.

and then take the surfing boards down to the sea.

On the beach first is understanding the theory. They initially cover how to carry your board, how to get on and lie on it.

Then you head out to the sea to try out what you just heard your instructor explain. Nothing like an experience to reinforce 🙂

Now back on the beach you learn about the difficult part; the technique to launch yourself to stand on the board.

You then head to the sea again to practice it. This part involves a lot of trying and falling as you can see in the pictures below 😀 .

And if you are lucky or naturally sporty you may get to actually stand for a while on the board a few times 🙂 . Finally you head back to the beach to get the finishing talk from the instructor.

At the end of the session they came completely satisfied. In fact my son, given his success in the first session, decided to go for another follow up session the following morning 🙂 .

We spent plenty of time to see and experience Puducherry in our own leisurely pace. These included enjoying the beaches

or just strolling through the streets and cafes to take in the place.

We also dedicated a day to Auroville. Sadly the famous Matrimandir was closed to visitors inside owing to Covid. So we had to take in the views only from the outside.

For our places of stay, we had consciously selected places away from downtown. We wanted to be away from the crowd and be closer to the place of activities. We had our car. So getting around was not a problem. We spend the first night at the Afsanah Guest House. This was an outstanding place in terms of the property but is also super serene given it is inside Auroville. Here are some photos of the place:

For the remaining days we stayed in a homestay run by an artist. The place had a very different vibe. Every aspect of the house had something artistic behind it. Here are the photos from the place.

The trip also had its share of gastronomical exploration. My wife would say a bit too much. But who are we to deny ourselves when there is so much oppourtunities and choice 😉 . Here are some captures of the variety we tried:

Video Log

Here is a short video that I put together with some highlights of the trip. Do not miss to watch. You can see all the surfing action 🙂