About Poovar Island
Poovar Island is a tourist destination of Neyyattinkara lying within the Thiruvananthapuram district. Standing at the southernmost tip of Kerala, it lies within the proximity of a natural harbour, Vizhinjam. Poovar homes an estuary connecting itself with the sea when the tides rise higher than their average level. Once a while, this island was a reckoned timber, ivory and spice trading centre and represented as a significant part in the era of Chola dynasty.
Poovar was once known to own international trading relations and was a place of stay for well-trained army accompanying their war-ships. Pokkumoosapuram or Poovar remains encircled by backwaters and opens to form a sea. This island homes to a beautiful beach called Poovar beach which marks a junction of meet points of sea, river, lake, and beach.
Raising its head high as being unspoiled, unexplored and eco-friendly tour spot of Kerala, this beach presents a scenic view of the backwaters of Kerala. Once you land here, you will lose yourself in the exotic species of flora and fauna endemic to this zone. This beach also marks the opening of Neyyar River and its meet point with the vast Arabian Sea.
There are quite exquisite boating trips scheduled for daily tourist engagement and are available at very nominal rates. The shiny golden sand of the Poovar beach is what excites the tourists for a long haul here. People love to stroll with their footwear off all day around for a relaxing day. As the beach zone is not so vast, you will find a very few residents nestling here. Its remoteness is what makes it a pleasant place filled with solitude and solace.
Tourists from far off places visit here to experience the mesmerizing charm of early sunrise and late sunsets. What else do you want when you have a cruise at your service amidst the fascinating backwaters here. Poovar Island crowns itself as Kerala’s eco-friendly tourist attractions and a perfect place to start off your new beginning with your spouse.
Blue lagoons surrounded all over by mighty coconut trees that sway with the blowing wind offers a picturesque spot for the lone travellers. Poovar village homes to the Keralite fishing community standing unique from the rest natives in their customs, cultures, and traditions. This community is tender by heart and makes the place a heaven for all Poovar visitors.
These people love to engage themselves in the building fishing and boating rides. Here, you can find Indian Muslim settlements of ancient times dating back to around 1400 years. There’s a beautiful mosque established by Malik Ibn Dinar of middle-east.
So, if you are searching for either a delightful honeymoon or a holiday destination, plan your visit here. This place homes to a wide array of thrilling activities to indulge yourself to the fullest. Be it either boating, cruising, playing beach volleyballs, strolling or swimming, Poovar beach is the perfect spot for water adventure freaks. After having an overview of Poovar’s endearing beauty, let's move on further to find what’s there in store for you.
Best time to visit Poovar Island:
Winters or falls is the best time to visit Poovar Island as the place offers a comfortable temperature to enjoy all the water sporting activities. You can plan on your Poovar itinerary anytime between October-February. This season, the island experiences a temperature in the range of 19 to 34 degrees.
Crispy cold makes this island favourable for the tourists to have a relaxing holiday or a weekend. Visiting Poovar in either summers or monsoon is not recommended as the place experiences sweltering climate in summers and underwater currents in monsoons.
Still, nature lovers, plan their trip round off monsoons to enjoy the real hidden beauty of this place. During monsoons, this island is covered all over by lush greenery and offers a delightful cum picturesque sight. As Poovar falls within the tropical climatic zone, summers here are quite warm to extremely hot and with a fair amount of humidity. However, people find it uncomfortable even to stroll around the gold sand.
How to reach Poovar Island?
Reaching Poovar is now more comfortable as the place is well-connected by three primary modes of transportation. Kerala’s capital, Thiruvananthapuram lies at approximately 30 km from this island. As this state capital is well-connected to other major cities of the country, people prefer to carry on their journey from here to Poovar.
Thiruvananthapuram airport is the closest one and is well-connected to all metropolitan cities of the country. You can even plan your Poovar trip by rails. All you need to do is to get down at Thiruvananthapuram Railway Station standing at a distance of 27 km from your final destination.
This railway station allows you to ride to and fro trains for all the four metropolitan cities and other important places. Trivandrum offers road connectivity to Poovar through buses run either by the state government or private entities. Also, Poovar is well-connected to Kulathupuzha, Tirunelveli, Kochi, Kollam, Madurai, Thrissur, Kottayam and Thoothukudi by roadways.
Things to do in and around Poovar Island:
Next, we move on to the things to do at Poovar Island. In the first place, Poovar Beach offers relaxing sun-kissed gold sand to stroll all day long. People visiting Poovar beach spend some quality time walking through the coastline and capturing the beauty of sunrise as well as sunset.
Do not forget to accompany your children’s mud tools on your trip. Look around throughout the beach, and you will find children all around building their mud or sand castles. This stands yet another moment for you to capture in your DSLR’s. Swimming, cruising, boating, holy shrine visits, building boats, outdoor games on beaches, religious and food festivals are yet other activities to enjoy here at Poovar.
Shopping: Shopping stands to be one of the favourite leisure activities of the majority of us. Right? Likewise, there are many things and spots to halt and shop in Poovar. You can head towards Saree market for buying handloom and textile-based silk as well as cotton sarees.
There are South Indian style footwears, wooden carpet works, and artificial jewellery to shop at Poovar. Brass artefacts and sculpture is the first shopping preference for international tourists here. Every nook and corner of Poovar is engaged in exhibiting its best handicraft talent before you. You are inevitably going to carry a lot of stuff from here for your onward journey.
Cruises: There is nothing that drives away the tourist from refraining themselves from cruising activities. Kingfisher Boat Cruises are reckoned for providing cruise services to the tourists for enjoying the Kerala backwaters and blue lagoons of Poovar. It is a private entity functional at the Neyyar Lake and offers the best cruise hospitality through picturesque can always.
Besides, there are facilities available for an hour ride in motor and country boats. On the other hand, Poovar Boat Cruise facilitates you for a two-hour cruising journey and rides you through the canopy of trees and mangrove forests. On average, you will be spending around 1500 INR per person per hour on the lower side.
Enjoy the beach: While others seem to be busy in either shopping, boating or cruising activities, you can spend some alone quality time to rejuvenate yourself. Either prefer to walk along the beach barefoot, or meditate with the rising sun- the choice is yours.
Spending some solitary time will tuck you out of all the personal as well as professional life stresses. After completing your walk, you can either go for a glass of fresh and tender coconut water and indulge yourself in its sweet flesh or go for some light food available there. Watching tides changing their heights is yet another pastime activities for the lone beach visitors.
Picnic Near Neyyar Dam in Poovar: Popularising itself as a top-pick picnic spot of Poovar tourists, Neyyar dam offers a pleasant condition to relax with your fellow companions. This dam is located near the state capital of Kerala- Thiruvananthapuram. Reaching here from Poovar is no more a strange thing as there are a lot of guides to direct your way to the dam. Neyyar dam stands high on the southern hills of the vastly stretched Western Ghats.
For a photographer, there is no other place except this dam to offer a beautiful panoramic view of the surrounding region. If you are confused with things to do here, you have a park reserved for lion safari and deer watching and a beautiful and magnificent wildlife sanctuary. Other than that, this dam lies amidst mountains and is surrounded by lakes and waterfalls that embrace the allure of this place in totality for a picturesque spot.
Places to visit in Poovar Island:
Moving on to the next section is the places to visit here. Some unique places tourists find worth-seeing are as follows:
Poovar Beach: Nestling amidst the beautifully swaying coconut trees, Poovar beach homes to Kerala backwaters and gorgeous blue lagoons. You can enjoy a wide array of beach and water sporting activities here. Either you can accompany fisherman for their fishing activity or watch them fishing amidst the tidal drifts.
Shell collection is yet another thing to do here. There are beautiful boating trips to take you on tour around this beautiful beach at very nominal rates. This place is reckoned to be the meet point of the four major water bodies (lakes, beach, sea, and river). Crowning itself as an eco-friendly tourist destination of Kerala, this beach remains unspoiled to embrace its beauty.
Thirparappu Falls: Located in Kanyakumari, Thirparappu Falls is the next best place to note down in your Poovar itinerary. You will reach this place within an hour or so if you start off your journey from Poovar. Originating from Kodayar or Kothai River, this magnificent waterfall descends down at Thirparappu.
It is as high as 50 m and is alternatively known as Kumari Kuttalam. Cascade of this waterfall stretches across a length of approximately 300 feet forming a pool at its basal end. This place is ideally perfect for the swimmers and the District administration vouch on the hygiene and cleanliness of kids swimming pool here. The location is open from morning 7 am to evening 6 pm.
Aazhimala Siva Temple: This is one of the ancient natural beauties of Kerala. Standing at the ocean’s edge, this massive temple lies on a huge rock. It is believed that this temple reflects a blessing of Lord Shiva and exhibits beautiful reminiscences.
The temple derives its name owing to its presence along the golden shore. Tuesday is considered to be pious here, and hence this place welcomes hoards of Shiva disciples all along the daytime. Between January to February, this place hosts its annual festival. It is during this festival that the natives offer oil lamp or Narang Vilakku (lit on lemon).
The Fishing Village: If you are fond of fishing, do visit the fishing village of Poovar. This village lies within close proximity of Poovar Island and comprises of the fishing community of Kerala following a traditional fishing culture. River and sea form a significant part of their livelihood earning resource and a mean of commutation.
People of this village spend the rest of their time either in building boats or working rigorously hard in paddy fields. Karimeen is a well-known delicacy of this fishing village the food festival arranged here is worth visiting. Spending some time with the villagers here might take you back into their rich customs and traditions.
Poovar Backwaters: Poovar is known for its beautifying backwaters that leaves a soothing mark on every Poovar tourist. Tourists visiting Poovar never miss this place when they plan for their Poovar itinerary. Standing as the paradise island, these tranquil backwaters accompany sun-touched golden sand. In and around, you can find a lot of endemic and exotic floral and faunal species complimenting with the groves of banana and swaying coconut.
This place makes the ideal location for enjoying cruise activities amidst the canalways. There are many private entities providing cruise and boating facilities at a very nominal rate. You can hire a guide to accompany you on your backwater trail.
Neyyar Wildlife Sanctuary in Poovar: Standing at a distance of around 32 km away from the main city of Thiruvananthapuram, this wildlife sanctuary is built across 12000 hectares of land. Here, you can have a glimpse of rarest floral and faunal species endemic to the Poovar region. There are a lot of trekking options available for the adventure freaks.
Also, you have an Agasthyamala Peak standing high at 1868m serving as a reckoned picnic spot for the Poovar tourists. Within its close proximity lies yet another charming place of Neyyar Dam. Some wildlife found in this sanctuary is Asian Elephant, Leopard, Reptiles, King Cobra, Tiger, Travancore Tortoise and so on. Reservoir here serves as a boating channel to exhibit a beautiful panoramic view of the surrounding territory.
Places to stay near Poovar Island:
Here, we go with some of the best stay places in and around Poovar.
Poovar Island Resort: This Resort is a venture of Floatels India. A sophisticated place of stay, here you are sure to find a lot of indoor as well as outdoor activities for your comfort. Be it either organizing a conference or planning your destination wedding, this resort hospitality is by far the best. Starting at INR 4500, you avail heaps of facilities and amenities.
And guess what? You do not need to travel miles as this place is just at the distance of around 0.4km from the main island.
Isola Di Cocco Beach Resort: This resort homes to some of the exceptionally well-trained Ayurvedic doctors of Kerala. All over the surroundings, there are lots of coconut trees standing tall. Here, you can book a villa with an attached balcony. At the base rate, you can avail a room under this resort at INR 7000.
You get 24-hour security service, wi-fi connectivity, and front desk service. There’s a library for the reading freaks, and medical assistance is available at nominal rates. Isola Di Cocco Resort at a distance of around 0.3km from the island point.
Poovar Estuary Island Resort: Just as the first one, here too, you have both the indoor and outdoor activities to enjoy. The cuisines served here, and the hospitality makes this place the best one to accommodate on this tropical island. You can have a sip of brewing coffee while you enjoy your beach activities in the private beach zone.
This island resort is at a walkable distance of approximately 0.2km from the main island. People travel from far off places to enjoy a rejuvenating Ayurvedic and Spa treatment here.
Havelia Island Resort: Situated amidst the Kerala backwaters, Havelia Island Resort is rated as one of the best tranquil stay places by tourists. Here, you can avail either a deluxe room giving a beautiful sight of the sea that stretches wide or you go ahead with superior cottages.
There are king suites for those who prefer to accommodate their families with them. Each and every room is well-furnished and equipped with all modern and up-to-date amenities. At a nominal cost of 3500 INR, you get free Wi-Fi and security services twice around the clock, medical assistance, swimming facilities, and room servicing. This resort is 0.4km away from your island. So you can always have enough room to stroll.
