Why I love Papanasam beach at Varkala

Varkala is a budget- and backpackers heaven; lots of basic, cheap, yet idyllic accommodations to find. If you don’t need a lot of luxury and comfort and if you like to meet other budget travelers, then this is a fun place to go to.
There are affordable eats, drinks and buys everywhere.

As you know from my post about The Oceano, we are not budget travelers (anymore), so we stayed in a luxury hotel, a bit away from the major tourist area.

Ok, back to the beach. This beach is at walking distance from the hotel that we fled to after our bad experience with The Oceano. (More about that second hotel in another post.)

We sat down in a very basic local bar-restaurant along the beach, ordered a drink and let life enroll itself before our eyes.

We found a seat here at the second floor, overlooking the beach.

You can also opt for a chair on the beach, with a parasol. Like these:

We stuck to ‘our’ beach bar seats and felt fine there.

Some things puzzled me, like these ‘sand-tombstones’. Who made them and for what? As a temporary foundation for a table? Or as a table in itself? No idea. Anybody who knows the answer?

There are clearly fishing activities going on on and from this beach.

The presence of a police station and two officers is very reassuring;-).

The two policemen and their police dog are ready for action…hahaha!

At a few places sacred rituals were being performed. It took forever and was intriguing. Not sure what it was about…
I did read that there is a famous temple nearby and that the waters at this beach are considered holy. That means that your sins can be washed away there. So I guess the rituals I witnessed had to do with that.

The ceremony ended in a sort of offering or immersion in the sea. Probably a symbolic cleansing….

This man also looked like a medicine man or priest:

A lot of locals walk over the beach or along the shore.
The women do that in full attire. None of them goes into the water. At most they would dip in one toe.

In the next picture we see young men in the sea behind the group of women. The boys and men go in the sea with their pants on and play with each other and the waves for hours.

The following man seemed to want to go into the water. I watched him trying to change his clothes for swimwear for at least half an hour without success. I did not see him enter the sea. Weird!

A father and son, followed by one of the beach-dogs.

Beach dogs? Yes, there is a whole group of lookalike doggies roaming around that beach. I guess they are all family.

They were keeping people company. Uh, not really: they just found some shadow there;-).

For the rest they were playing hide and seek everywhere:

From time to time a boat left. Like this one where the men stood upright in the boat and stayed this way, not holding onto anything. Strange! I wonder why that was….

As you understand, you can sit here all day and just enjoy daily life. With more time on your hands, you could try to find some locals that speak english well and that would not mind explaining to you some of the things you see but do not understand. That would definitely add to the experience.

What would you choose? The private but empty paradise beach without a simple chair or drink from the Oceano? Or the less pretty and less clean but more lively Papanasam beach with a chair and a drink?