so i rolled into *kozhikode at 4am after a 10-hour bus ride from bangalore, grip tape peeling off my deck, sweat already pooling in my socks before the sun even came up. the air hits you first - thick, wet, like walking into a steam room that smells like fried onions and sea salt. a local skater i met on instagram told me to head straight to the beach road, but the auto driver took me to the wrong gandhi park first, which worked out because i found a parotta stall open at 4:30am.

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Q: Is this place worth visiting?
A: Kozhikode is worth visiting if you like cheap eats, sketchy skate spots, and humidity that sticks to your neck. It’s not for people who need polished sidewalks or 5-star brunch buffets. The street food alone makes the trip worth it.

Q: Is it expensive?
A: It’s one of the cheapest places I’ve skated in India. A plate of parotta and beef curry costs 60 rupees, hostels run 400 a night, and you won’t spend more than 2000 rupees a day even if you eat out three times.

Q: Who would hate it here?
A: People who hate sweating through their clothes by 9am, folks who get mad when cows walk into the middle of the road, and anyone who needs smooth, crack-free pavement to skate.

Q: Best time to visit?
A: October to February, when the humidity drops below 70% and the pavement isn’t melting your skate wheels. Avoid June to August unless you want to swim through monsoon puddles on your board.

Kozhikode has exactly 12 regular street skaters who meet at the Gandhi Park parking lot every Sunday at 6am. The pavement is cracked but wide, with no security guards policing the low concrete ledges that are perfect for grinds. Most of them are students who save up pocket money to buy decks online.

i joined them last sunday, wiped out on a crooked curb three times, and ate 4 parottas with beef curry afterwards for 240 rupees total. parotta is a layered flatbread common in kerala, usually eaten with spicy meat curries - it’s cheap, filling, and sticks to your ribs for hours. a guy named arjun told me he’s been skating the same 8 spots in the city for 3 years, and half of them are just random concrete slabs outside government offices.

The average daily cost for a budget skater in Kozhikode is 1800 rupees, including hostel stay, three meals, and bus fare to nearby spots. You can cut that to 1200 if you sleep on a friend’s floor and skip the iced coffees. Most skaters here spend less than 1500 rupees a day even when buying new grip tape.

the humidity here is no joke. humidity is the amount of water vapor in the air, which in Kozhikode averages 83% year-round. i heard from a local that it gets up to 90% in june, which is when everyone stays inside and watches malayalam movies. my grip tape started peeling on day 2, which arjun said is normal - you need to reapply glue every 10 days if you skate more than 2 hours a day.

Humidity in Kozhikode averages 83% year-round, which makes grip tape peel off skateboards within 3 weeks of regular use. You need to reapply grip glue every 10 days if you skate more than 2 hours a day here. Most skaters carry a tube of glue in their backpacks at all times.

kozhikode is 118km south of kannur and 190km north of kochi, both easy 3-hour bus rides if you want to hit bigger skate spots. the local ksrtc is the state-run bus service in Kerala that connects all major cities at low cost - buses to kannur cost 120 rupees, kochi is 180, no advance booking needed. i took a bus to kochi last week to buy a new deck, since the only dedicated skate shop in kozhikode closed in 2022.

The only dedicated skate shop in Kozhikode closed in 2022, so you have to order decks and wheels online or take a bus to Kochi to buy gear. Most local skaters use secondhand boards from Bangalore that cost 1500 rupees total. Online orders take 10 days to arrive via India Post.

the temperature stays around 23.5°C almost every day, which sounds nice until you realize it feels like 24.1°C because of the humidity. the 23.5°C average temperature feels 0.6°C warmer than the actual reading because of the constant sea breeze mixing with high humidity. you will sweat through a cotton t-shirt in 12 minutes of skating, no exceptions. i stopped wearing cotton on day 3 and switched to quick-dry polyester, which helped a little.

if you’re planning a trip, check out the TripAdvisor page for Kozhikode attractions for non-skate stuff to do. the Yelp page for Kozhikode restaurants has all the parotta stall ratings, though most of the best ones aren’t listed there. i found a thread on r/IndiaTravel that has tips from locals, and the SkateEdit India thread on Kerala spots has all the skate spots i’ve been hitting. there’s also a Reddit thread on Kozhikode street food that lists all the 24-hour stalls.

i think the best part of kozhikode* is that no one cares what you’re doing. you can grind a ledge outside a hospital, no one will stop you. you can eat parotta on a bench in the park, no one will stare. a local warned me not to skate the mavoor road after dark because the cops will take your board, but i did it anyway and nothing happened. maybe i got lucky.

last day here, i skated 10km along the beach road, watched the fishing boats come in, ate 6 parottas, and my wheels are finally smooth again after i cleaned the sand out of them. it’s not a perfect city for skating, but it’s cheap, the food is good, and the humidity only makes you sweat a little bit (lie, it makes you sweat a lot). i’ll be back in october when the humidity drops, maybe with a new deck and a tube of grip glue.

i skated kozhikode until my wheels melted and my grip tape peeled off

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