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Shankumugham Beach

Shankumugham Beach is a beach in Thiruvananthapuram district of Kerala, south India.

 The beach is on the western side of Thiruvananthapuram(Trivandrum) and very near to Trivandrum International Airport.

Shankumugam

The vast stretch of white sand and the serene atmosphere, away from the crowd in the city, provide all the ingredients for relaxation and for spending an ideal evening. There is also a “Star Fish Restaurant” with eating kiosks and open-air theatre with car parking facilities. Good food can be enjoyed at the Indian Coffee House, just across the beach, which is also a vantage point for enjoying the sunset. Unfortunately, the beach is not well maintained with garbage littering the entire area.

VELI

The Veli Tourist Village which lies where the Veli Lake meets the Arabian Sea provides for unique boating and picnicking opportunities. Visitors can hire pedal boats or paddleboats as per their convenience. One can also roam the gardens and have a nice picnic or choose to employ the boats for the entire duration of the trip. The view and feel of the place is extremely unique, considering it is merely 12 kms from the capital city of Thiruvananthapuram. Children are known to have a lot of fun climbing the sculptures here and the speedboat ride across the waters. A separate Children’s Park and Floating Cafe run by Kerala Tourism Development Corporation (KTDC) are added incentives to visit this unique village.

VELI LAKE

Poovar

Poovar is a tourist town in the Trivandrum district of Kerala state, South India. This village is almost at the southern tip of Trivandrum while the next village, Pozhiyoor, marks the end of Kerala. This village beach attracts tourists.

Poovar beach

Geography

Poovar lies very close to Vizhinjam, a natural harbor. Poovar has an estuary which connects with the sea during high tides. The 56 km Neyyar Riverpasses through Neyyattinkara taluk into the Arabian Sea near Poovar. Its natural environment enables it to be a tourist spot

History
Poovar was a trading center of timber, sandalwood, ivory and spices. In around 1,000 BCE, it is believed that ships owned by King Solomon of Israel landed in Ophir, which is identified by some sources as Poovar, while the village was one of the ancient Muslim settlements along the western coast of India. The central mosque in Poovar was built by Malik Deenar, an eighth century Muslim preacher. During the reign of the Chola dynasty, Poovar was a major port. The explorer Megasthenes, Roman writer Pliny the Elder and Venetian traveller Marco Polo mention connections with Greece and Rome

There were a merchant named Pokku Moosa Maraikkar who lived in Poovar during the 18th century in a house called Kallaraickal Tharavad, which many times gave shelter to Marthanda Varma (1706–58), king of Travancore from his enemies. Poovar also had trade relations with international markets at this time as well as a well trained army and some ships. At the Battle of Colachel and Battle of Kayamkulam these forces assisted the Travancore army against the Dutch East India Companyduring the Travancore–Dutch War.

The origin of the name "Poovar" has a story related to Marthanda Varma. Before that it was called Pokkumoosapuram. During internal riots in Travancore and while escaping from the Ettuveetil Pillamar (Lords of the Eight Houses), the king reached Poovar. It was a spring season and the trees on either sides of the Neyyar were full of flowers. These flowers fell into the river making it more attractive. On seeing this pleasant scenery, Marthanda Varma commented that this was poo-var, a conjunction of the Malayalam words for "flower" and "river"

Kovalam

Kovalam is a beach town by the Arabian Sea in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India, located around 18 km south of the city center

Kovalam beach, Trivandrum

History

Kovalam first received attention when the Regent Maharani Sethu Lakshmi Bayi of Travancore constructed her beach resort, Halcyon Castle, here towards the end of the 1920s. Thereafter the place was brought to the public eye by her nephew the Maharaja of Travancore.The European guests of the then Travancore kingdom discovered the potentiality of Kovalam beach as a tourist destination in the 1930s. However, Kovalam shot into limelight in the early seventies with arrivals of the masses of hippies on their way to Ceylon in the Hippie Trail. This exodus started the transformation of a casual fishing village of Kerala into one of the most important tourist destinations in all India