Goan, Goan, Gone.

STATS: Day count=81; Current Illness count=0 (Both in full health at the moment); theft count=0; rip-off count=1; tourist screw-up count=1.7; Chris’ photo count=780; Emma’s photo count=31 (because they keep getting deleted – EM)

I have discovered the meaning of life. We are walking food sources for mosquitoes. All this human diversification, different cultures and environments we create for ourselves is just to give mosquitoes different flavours to taste. We’ve been doped up on Larium for a few weeks now to avoid us catching malaria – it’s great – gives you really vivid dreams. Not so great if you’re prone to nightmares!

We used to think beach holidays were all a bit rubbish. Couldn’t work out why people wanted to go on them. We now realise that we just hadn’t found the right beach to suit our particular tastes and exacting standards!

We started off in Goa by spending a few days in a place called Panaji, which is small town away from the coast, on a river – a nice enough town to wander around for a day or two, but nothing special. We managed to master the bus system – turn up at the really chaotic bus station and ask and you’ll be pointed, with any luck, at an appropriate bus going your way which, with a lot more luck, wont be too full yet – they don’t actually leave until they are crammed with people. The buses are really cheap and, somewhat surprisingly for India, they don’t seem to try to rip us off on the prices and (usually) charge us the same as the locals! We took a day trip to a nearby beach on their weekly market day on Wednesday – Anjuna beach. It has a ‘famous’ flea market located on the edge of the beach. After getting hopelessly lost trying to find it, after we got dropped off somewhere by the bus, we did stumble across an excellent cafe and then eventually discovered the beach and the market – it was massive. More tie-dye than Woodstock and plenty of pink package-tour tourists bussed in to test their haggling skills. Apologies if that sounds patronising to package tourists! We ‘independent travellers’ are no less pink nor any better at haggling, just more arrogant about it all :-) and I guess have longer to lose the pinkness and hone those skills! It was a really good market – everyone was really friendly, there was some good stuff there and it was a great day.

We moved on from Panaji to a beach in northern Goa – Arumbol. Our ideal beach. After struggling with our rucksacks for about an hour from the bus stop, through the small town, along the beach to the cliffs, up the cliffs, round the headland (this isn’t intended to be travelling directions, just to convey how hot and bothered we were!) we found a lovely room which is clean, has a great balcony looking out over the rocks out to sea through palm trees. And we managed to get it for less than £5 a night. We are here right at the end of the season, so although it is relatively busy, it is getting quieter, and prices are dropping. Once monsoon season hits in a month or so, the whole place will close until October.

Arumbol is a ‘travellers’ beach – no built up hotels, no coach tours, no pedalos, banana boats, speedboat trips. Just a small town of shops selling clothes, food, some not-quite-as-tacky-as-usual souvenirs, cafes, restaurants and bars and all the accommodation is low-key, small, mainly beach hut and small apartment room buildings. All on a couple of beaches of golden sand and warm sea. And since we arrived just out of high season, the beaches are very quiet. There are lots of different birds here – if I were an avid ‘twitcher’ I could regale you with all their names. As it is, to me they are either ‘pretty birds’, ‘mean-looking birds’, ‘pigeons’ or ‘crows’. I like simple classification schemes.

We originally planned to stay here 4 days and then move south to the Kerala region. We very quickly changed our plans and are staying here about 9 days – we leave on this coming Sunday (28th).

We visited a local animal rescue centre to see if we could help out, maybe donate etc. Took ages to get there on the local buses, and when we arrived the staff were polite, but not exactly welcoming, so we left without being able to help out at all. Shame. We hired a scooter (as everyone does here) and visited a lot of the other beaches in the area – interesting as it confirmed we had definitely picked the right beach for us.  We visited old Portuguese forts (Goa was ‘owned’ by the Portuguese from 1510 - 1961), small towns, sacred trees, sat in cafes (fantastic food – specialising in seafood, which isn’t great for us, but lots of different veggie options), read books, watched the sea for dolphins – the usual kind of stuff.

The local stray dogs are really friendly here. If you are sat on the beach they will come next to you, dig a hole (as the sand is so hot) and sit in it for a while, before then cooling off by walking down to the sea and plonking themselves in the waves for a bit. Very funny to watch them!

I’m sure there are a lot of trance parties going on here, but we are not invited. Usually, although the place is fairly quiet, there are at least 4 or 5 other couples in the restaurants we visit. On a couple of evenings we haven’t seen a soul in the cafes or around the town. We’re obviously not in the know!

We now have the rest of our stay in India planned out – again, necessary to some degree as many of the trains get very booked up (while we are keen to travel as the locals do, getting on an unreserved train carriage with full rucksacks is just asking for trouble – nowhere to put them and would have to stand for hours). If Google Maps ever gets quicker to update (or I ever find free internet access), I’ll put the planned route on there! Next stop is south – a stay in a national park for a few days in Kerala. Maybe see some wild elephants, if we’re lucky. Tigers are fairly unlikely to be seen – there are so few of them left. I’m still on the look out for a wild snake – saw one the other day but it was hampered a little due to its lack of a head. I suspect it was a sea snake that the fishermen had caught and killed and just thrown on the beach for the birds to peck at.

I’m teaching myself to touch-type (not ideal on a keyboard where half the keys are half-size and the CTRL key is in the wrong place) – this post has taken about a week to write – and to do poi (swinging balls on strings), which apparently teaches concentration, balance and co-ordination skills. So far it has only managed to teach me how much tennis balls can hurt when they hit you at speed. On my return I can either get a secretarial job, or work in a circus. I’m keeping my options open.