Blogs from Palolem, Goa, India, Asia - page 16

After 2 weeks up north in Rishikesh and a one night stopover in Delhi I fly to Goa. I was ready to explore the beaches of India. The moment I stepped off the plane I could breathe clean air again and see palm trees everywhere. Was I transplanted in Costa Rica?? India's various terrain is pretty amazing. After feeling out of place up North, I instantly felt at home in Goa. It reminded me of my Florida roots. Being near the ocean water is very comforting to me. The first beach I went to was Calangute. It was a crowded beach with wooden beach shack restaurants and beach chairs up and down the sandy strip of beach. The water was choppy, but fun to play in the waves and the beach was fairly clean (not great ... read more

04.02.2008 After waking at 5am we packed our things and bid farewell to our room at the Hotel New Bengal and stumbled groggily onto the still dark streets of Mumbai, picking our way through the press of sleeping bodies on the pavement. 50 rupees later found us climbing out of a taxi at CST which even at 6am was packed to bursting. Checked the board and found our way to platform 16, a dusty stretch of concrete that smelled strongly of....something. The Mandovi express arrived about 10 minutes later and we boarded our second class sleeper carriage. It was made up of open compartments, each with either two or four beds that doubled up as sofas. The matresses were reminiscent of blue junior school gym mats but were surprisingly comfortable. Although we expected to be awake ... read more

And it wasn't Kovalam! While I was sad to leave there, it was more due to the people I had met, both travelers and locals, rather than the beach and town itself. The place is seriously too touristy, and I was very glad to be done with that! Yesterday we hopped on a boat in Kollam and went on a very nice eight hour Kerala backwater tour, which ended in Allepey where we caught a taxi to Cochin for the night, and then flew here, to paradise, earlier this morning (and yes, we got up at 4:30am to watch the Super Bowl, which was... an odd game). For this leg of our journey we've also adopted a Scottish traveler by the name of Henry, who we met in Kovalam, and at least for the time being ... read more

Well today we discovered a new beach which was gorgeous i burnt myself there all day, we cant take dora on these outings anymore as the risk of her kidnap is too high! georgia and i also went conoeing today but we were pretty bad at it and nearly capsized a few times, but on the positive side we sang kate nash and disney songs the whole way, but probably put far too much effort into that rather than into rowing the thing, so basically went nowhere. Oh yeh and we are really excited cuz amy gets here tomo so we are staying here abit longer so that she can see everything. But most importantly all this travelling lark has not changed us at all, as they say you can take the girl out of england ... read more

Palolem Beach, 3 hours south of Baga, is perhaps the most idyllic postcard retreat you could imagine. We originally planned to rent motorbikes to get there but after the rental guy watched me test drive it in the parking lot, he refused. Apparently, according to Nicole, the man was wiping the sweat from his brow, shaking his head, and announcing "No, no, no, she will not take that on the roads." So we took a cab instead. Our taxi ride left our stomachs churning which we have now learned to expect. But as soon as we saw the beach, we remembered why we had trekked so far away from civilization. No horns, no crowds, no perverts, no trinket shops, no filth, just miles of palm trees, beach huts, and ocean. Yay! We hung up the mosquito ... read more