Places to visit in Alleppey, and the order to see them

The main goddess temple of Alappuzha town, in the old market street, with a large banyan tree and stalls of flowers and lamps round its gate. The Mullakkal Chirappu festival in December fills the street with lights and stalls.

A canopied shikara boat from the Nehru Trophy finishing point on Punnamada Lake into the narrow canals of the Kuttanad backwaters, past paddy fields below the water line, village homes, churches and toddy shops on the banks. A small boat goes where the big houseboats cannot.

One of India's largest private museums, built by the Karunakaran family, who made their fortune in coir. It holds ivory carvings, Swarovski crystal, Lladro and Meissen porcelain, Chinese jade, Tanjore paintings and old Kerala furniture, in rooms modelled on Kerala houses.

A lighthouse from 1862 a short walk from the beach, painted in red and white bands, with a small museum on lighthouses at its foot. The climb up the spiral stairs gives a view over the town's coconut palms, the canals and the sea.

The town beach, with the iron posts of a pier more than 150 years old running out into the sea, from the days when Alappuzha was a busy port. Vijaya Beach Park at the north end has rides and food stalls in the evening.

A small museum of the Coir Board at Kalavoor, north of town, on Alappuzha's old trade: coconut husk turned into rope, mats and carpets. It shows the steps from husk to fibre to loom, with old tools and woven pieces.

A quiet, wide beach in a fishing village about 15 km north of the station by road, lined with coconut palms and resorts. Fishing boats come in on the sand in the morning, and the evenings are calm.

A seaside church first built by the Portuguese in the 16th century, a place of pilgrimage for St Sebastian. Its feast in January draws huge crowds who walk to the sea and back.

A Krishna temple about 15 km south of Alappuzha, famous across Kerala for its palpayasam, a sweet rice and milk pudding offered to the god each day. The legend says a king lost a game of chess to Krishna and still pays the prize in rice.

A black granite statue of the Buddha, about 1,000 years old and broken on one side, in a small shelter beside a canal at Karumadi, 2 km east of Ambalapuzha. Locals call it Karumadi Kuttan, the dark boy of Karumadi.

One of the oldest churches in Kerala, said to date from 427 AD, on the bank of the Pamba river in the middle of Kuttanad's paddy fields. The present church has bright murals inside and a carved granite cross outside.