Beautiful sea Polelom Beach, Goa

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Beware of the 7.30pm 200km night bus, because you are going to arrive at your destination at 4am in the morning, not the 6am you were told. Fortunately there were enough drivers sleeping in their tuktuks to ferry us to the beach at the elevated price of course. And three of us didn’t have to wait long before a guy came off the beach and guided us to a beach hut provider where we haggled a very good price. This was only off meeting the germans the day before who had come from Goa and gave us a good benchmark for pricing to work off. Cressida Beach Huts let us check in at 4.30am which was cool as we could get a few hours rest and have a full day ahead of us free of charge. After breakfast at the attached restaurant on the beach we walked up and down the beach then made use of the beach chairs. An hour of baking was a little to long for my pale skin as I would soon realise. The customary beach hawkers that you find all over the world were in action and Storm allowed her toe nails get painted by one, which was not a bad wage for 30 minutes work, but we rested easy knowing that this womans 1yr old baby would be fed tonight... Our first attempt at lunch resulted in me convincingly beating Storm at a game of connect4 before we decided that the restaurant weren’t interested in serving their only customers, so we moved to the restaurant next door were we were the only customers, and these guys didn’t seem to interested either. I was impressed with the chilly nachos I ordered while Storm overcooked calamari went back to be remade. The restaurant should have thanked us as we sat in the most visible seats and 4 more groups of patrons entered after our pioneering efforts. I think the lack of interest is that at 1pm when us westerners are used to lunch. These guys prefer to siesta through the heat of the day and don’t like working.
The afternoon comprised of bits and pieces, some shopping and a nothing special dinner. One thing that I noticed while shopping was that all the t-shirts were made in Thailand and the boardshorts made in China! The beach hut restaurant had moved all its seating out onto the beach which was a really beautiful setting.

For the second day running Storm was out of bed before I was, which is like lightning striking the same place twice. We walked down to the Banyan Tree (Thai) restaurant for breakie – disappointingly the muesli was no better than yesterday’s venue so we will try again tomorrow. After packing our days supplies we bartered down a daily hire of a scooter to 150Rs and set off for Agonda beach which was 8km away. Not knowing exactly how to get there and the Indian back roads made it all the more enjoyable. Tthe beach was very nice, but perhaps a little too deserted, whilst Palelom beach is the most geared up beach for tourists in south Goa, we have arrived in the final month before off season, so everything is open but very quiet – perfect! Makes for good bartering. After a swim, sun session, and walk along the beach we were on the way back to Palelom and we stopped off at the Blue Planet cafe on the recommendation of a fellow traveller. This place was right up Storm’s alley. We had a delicious meal, then headed home for a siesta. In the early evening we rode down to Patnem beach 2km away for a look, it was really beautiful, a smaller beach in a picturesque bay with a really friendly vibe. We had a drink there and a walk along the beach, then headed back to return the scooter and chill for the evening.

Up for yoga at 8am with a master that looked the part. Full on yogi beard and grey long hair, curious to know his age but not wanting to ask. The session was 1 and half hours and was not fitness testing, just breathing and flexibility. Breakfast followed where we found our best Goa muesli yet, and then a dunk in the sea to freshen up.
As Storm wanted to do a reiki course with the yogi, we needed to draw more cash, no ATMs in Palolem so cash advance from the tourist shop will have to do, for a 2% fee of course. His drawer contained large wads of cash, and the first 1000Rs notes I had seen. Made me think that Goa must be run by the underworld. Everything is cash, there is good availability of drugs for party goers who visit the party beaches, and we heard stories from an Indian guy in Bangalore that the Russian mafia were embedding themselves into the Goan beachfront.
The afternoon included more beachtime and sea, then we started getting into the drinks, Storm in her usual Jeckal and Hyde style transformed into the booze animal and we were off trying to jump the fence into a private beach party with DJs and all that. Storm made it over and I followed only to be apprehended by security and sent back over the fence cutting my foot on barbed wire, of course they let her stay, being a drunk girl and all. Eventually Storm came out and we were told to leave and never come back...oooohhhh!

The next day we paid a heavy toll for the drinking the night before, our no longer battle hardened livers cried for pizza and movies in bed. Thats all we managed during the day, although we briefly spoke with a polish guy who invited us on a boat ride in the morning. In the evening we syched ourselves up for a big seafood platter on the beach, we order, sat and waited for 45 min, then they put our clean plates on the table in anticipation of the bbq. Then what happens... a absolutely buckets down with rain and ruins the bbq, takes out the power to the beach and leaves us hungry for the night.

We were out on the ocean bright and early to try and catch the dolphins in the bay. It was a nice 1 hr cruise and then we went for breakfast with our new polish friend and two dutch girls. That evening we successfully ate our seafood platter and whilst it looked good, it just didn’t hit the spot, considering it cost 4-5x the usual price of a dinner there.
The days sort of merged into each other, every day was swimming, sun bathing, eating nice food, massages, long bike rides to other beaches, all thoroughly enjoyable.

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