Kochi: Rain clouds stayed away on Saturday morning when Sooryamshu, the state-owned hybrid-solar cruise, set sail from Marine Drive. Tess, a bass player from Vyttila, took out his guitar and played a peaceful rhythm as his friends hummed along. A stillness settled over the group, mirroring the serenity of the backwaters as the vessel drifted toward Pizhala Island.
“We run a club called Rockers Club Vyttila, and it felt like an ideal time to enjoy the monsoon drizzle on the backwaters,” said Tess, whose group travelled through Bolgatty, Mulavukad, Vaduthala and Moolampilly before reaching Pizhala, where they tried pedal boating and kayaking.
Summer Vacation Boost for KSINC
The summer vacation season has provided a major boost to the Kerala Shipping and Inland Navigation Corporation (KSINC), which operates six leisure cruise services from Kochi. Following a quiet March due to school examinations, the company experienced a sharp turnaround, with passenger numbers climbing to 11,148 in April and 15,192 in May. This surge pushed the total footfall for the year past 53,000, effectively compensating for the slight dip recorded in 2025.
Transparent Pricing Attracts First-Timers
The state-owned fleet draws not just leisure groups but also first-timers reassured by transparent pricing and the credibility of a government-run service. Thyagarajan KT, a coconut plucker from Vaikom, boarded Sooryamshu with his wife after spotting a KSINC post on Instagram. “My daughters are married and it is just the two of us now. We wanted a quiet trip, and this seemed easy, we could take the morning bus straight to the Marine Drive terminal,” he said.
The full-day backwater tour is priced at Rs 999 and includes morning tea, snacks, a traditional lunch prepared by Kudumbashree volunteers, and evening refreshments. KSINC also runs a monsoon backwater cruise to Palaikkari. With open-sea packages suspended until Sept 1 due to weather regulations, the luxury cruise ship Nefertiti is being deployed at anchor for corporate meetings and private events.
Scouting for Onam
Not everyone aboard was there for a day out. Jisha AS from Kovalam, Thiruvananthapuram, was travelling alone, scouting ahead of a family trip planned for Onam. “My sister and I have three children and we wanted to bring them during Onam. I thought of testing it alone first so we can plan properly,” she said.
KSINC's Profit and Expansion Plans
R Girija, managing director of KSINC, said favourable weather allowed the corporation to run trips without interruption this season. “Last year, early rains forced us to refund passengers who had booked for the final week of May. This year, we ran continuous trips right up to May 31,” she said. KSINC has been operating at a profit since the 2022-23 financial year.
On the infrastructure front, a new terminal near the Fine Arts Hall on Foreshore Road is nearing completion, and a floating jetty at Marine Drive has received sanction. A 150-passenger vessel is already under construction, and KSINC is eyeing an expansion to Kozhikode — ambitions it hopes will get a policy boost from Mission Samudra, the state’s proposed economic roadmap aimed at transforming Kerala into a global maritime hub by leveraging its 600-km coastline to interlink ports, coastal shipping and inland cruise tourism.
