Goa

Location: Arambol
Country: India

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Many people warned me that the beaches of Goa do not compare with the beaches of Thailand, that is an understatement. I don’t think they compare with Sinai or even Michmoret beach.
I have found the beach here disappointing. The water in the sea is unclear and has sand floating around in it, and every time I have been in, there has been a strong current. The beach itself is ok, but nothing spectacular.
There is also that annoying thing that you see on the beach here, that I do not think you would anywhere else:


The actual village is very touristic with many shops, but very pleasant to walk around.
There is no night life to speak of. I ain’t exactly the party type, but it would be nice if not everything closed at 22:30.
This is not to say that we have not had a very pleasant week here, I guess I was just expecting more.
I will say this - The food here is brilliant! I haven’t enjoyed food this much in two months. We’ve had lovely fish, great Italian and I even had a steak, which was a right treat. Seems like every restaurant we pick has good food, good service and a beautiful location.


We have mostly been spending our days on the beach, Paula can take lying in the sun longer than I can, and I am getting worried that she is getting browner than me.
I sometimes prefer sitting on our balcony and reading there, it is cooler then the beach and as I have mentioned, the view is beautiful.


One day we decide to go out for the day to Panjim (the capital of Goa) and to Old Goa (the old capital of Goa). We could have done it by cab, but we decided not to be lazy tourist and do it with buses. Again the lord decided to punish me for trying to change my natural ways.
It started off badly with us having to walk 2 kilometers to the bus stand. This should have been the point when I understood I made a mistake and found a cab. But no, I carried on for some reason.
The buses were an absolute nightmare. I could handle the fact that it was old crummy buses, I could somehow bare the terrible heat, I could even handle the fact that I had to stand, but being squashed to death by smelly Indians was beyond my abilities.
Somehow, I really don’t know how, we survived the buses (3 there and 3 back).
First we visited Panjim, which is very quiet and peaceful for a capital. We visited the main church there (Goa is predominantly Catholic).

We saw the Portuguese quarter with it's pretty houses and the Goa State museum, which Paula really enjoyed and I just glanced through and enjoyed their chairs more.
I have to mention at this point that is was a boiling hot day and the distances we walked were not short (by normal standards, not by mine).
We then went on to Old Goa, by which point we were starving, hot, sticky and exhausted.
Lunch was pretty bad, but took care of the starving part.
We were then approached by a cab driver, who told us that there were 17 different churches and chapels to see, that it was too far to walk and that we should take a cab tour. We had no idea if this was true or not, but we chose to believe him just to be able to sit down in the cab and not walk anymore (a cab with air-conditioning would be too much to hope for, but the breeze from the windows was a blessing at this point).
The cab driver turned out not only to be truthful, but a great tour guide. He took us round all the sites and gave interesting explanations. Paula and I both love churches, so we had a great time.
After taking the 3 buses back to Arambol and walking the 2 kilometers back to the village, we were both totally exhausted.
All I can say is, if you are ever in Goa and want to do that tour – take a cab.

The other day we went to the weekly market in Anjuna (took a cab this time).
This market was unbelievable, it was the biggest market I have ever seen in my life, tourist from all over Goa come to it. I don’t know how many stalls there were there, but we were walking around for 2 hours and felt we had hardly seen any of it.
Paula managed to buy some nice bits there, I didn’t buy much, there was just too much to choose from and too much going on for me to be able to concentrate on shopping.
It was an interesting experience just being there.

Following the visit to the market and too much past shopping, we both decided to send packages home.
I jumped on the opportunity to make Paula send home at least some of the excess things she brought with her.
We went through her whole bag checking what can go.
Thankfully, after carrying the bag on her back on the way to Goa, she did see the logic in sending some things home and agreed with most of my suggestions, but there were shouting matches about things we did not agree on (such as the high hill shoes, which she categorically refused to send home).
I think we managed to lighten her weight quite a bit (though would have been more if I had had my way).

My washing abilities are fast improving. I am now succeeding in the two main objectives – The cloths are coming out clean and they are not ending up with any colours that were not originally theirs.

Tomorrow we are off to another beach, at the other end of Goa – Palolem. It is said to be the most beautiful beach in Goa, so I am hoping it will impress me more than Arambol.

I leave you with yet another sunset picture, I liked it too much to leave it out the blog. And to prevent the questions – I do not know who the guy is, just made for a good picture.