Life on the beach... — Palolem, Goa, India

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Life on the beach... — Palolem, Goa, India

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Palolem, Goa, India

While we were still in Anjuna we rented a scooter for the day for Rs 200 (just under £3.00) and went up to the north of Goa to have lunch in Arambol and a wander down the beach. Luckily people drive a little bit better than they do in the big cities like Delhi or Jaipur or I don't think we would have even contemplated it! After Arambol we made our way back down the coast to visit Chapora fort, which is an old ruin of a Portuguese fort which looks out over the north Goan coastline with panoramic views. We then jumped back on the scooter and headed down to look at the shops in Calangute before returning to Anjuna.

We were both quite sad to leave Anjuna which had been such a welcome break from the madness of Rajasthan, but on the Saturday we once again packed our bags and took the bus down to Benaulim. Our first night there we ended up staying in what was initially described by the owner as a 'Coco hut,' which in fact turned out to be more like a box made out of corrugated metal, with less than sanitary bedding and ants everywhere you looked. As taken as we were with our 'coco hut' we made the decision to look elsewhere for the second and third night and ended up in a much nicer less rusty place called Tansy's. There were two real highlights while staying in Benaulim; meeting a rather interesting dude called Shiva who ended up giving us an Indian cooking lesson, and visiting the spice plantation just outside Ponda.

Shiva is a guy who basically is a bit of a local entrepreneur offering cooking classes, organizing day trips and taxis all over the place for tourists that he bumps into drinking down on the beach in Benaulim. His English is impecable, and his knowledge of the UK was actually quite scary. When he found out where we were from he was able to name individual postcodes for areas of Edinburgh and Warrington off the top of his head and new the names of their local newspapers! So on our second day we went for a three hour cooking class which he only charged us Rs 650 for both of us (around £9) at the end of which we got to tuck into a rather tasty three course meal including chapatis, vegetable masala, Sara (a lentil dish) and a really good cabbage bajhi. Can't wait to get the chance to try them all out for ourselves. It also transpires that Shiva knows Rich and Elli and met them three weeks ago while they were here on thier honeymoon- its a small world...

The spice plantation was also an amazing experience. We took the bus from Benaulim to Margao, then Margao to Ponda from where we took a tuc-tuc to the plantation. We had a really good guide all to ourselves who showed us round telling us all about the different plants and trees growing in the plantation getting to sample things as we went along. We tried a fruit which we'd never heard of or seen before called a Rose apple which looked a bit like a tiny pink marrow but tasted like a cross between an apple and a mellon. At the very end we had an really tasty meal which was included in the Rs 400 ticket price, all made with spices from within the plantation.

On Tuesday we took the bus from Benaulim, which took about an hour and a half to Palolem where we are currently staying. Palolem is by far the most picturesque place we've visited up to this point with a beautiful sandy beach hidden away in a cove protected from the choppy waters of the Arabian sea, lined with coconut palms and beach huts- one of which we're calling home for the time being. Our hut is less than 50 meters from the waters edge and we're waking up to the sound of the waves crashing on the beach, which is a rather chilled out way to start the day. There's more European travelers here than any other part of India we've been to so far and we've befriended a group of people from Finland, Denmark, Germany and Holland. There's a small Island at the north end of the beach we've all been wading out in the evenings to watch the sunset before heading out to grab some food and beer.

This morning we all clubbed together to hire a boat to go up the coast to try and see if we could see dolphins- a success and a really good start to the day! I think Palolem is is going to be even more difficult to leave than Anjuna and I think we probably both wish we could have a bit more time here, but at the same time we're really looking forwards to heading onto Hampi before our epic two day train/coach journey down to Trivandrum in Kerala for the last leg of the Indian part of our trip.

I can't remember if Kat's already mentioned, but due to all the problems in Thailand at the moment we've had to have a rethink that part of the journey and we've decided to go to Malaysia for two weeks instead. It was a tough decision but somebody had to make it. We'll try to be in touch soon- probably when we get to Hampi, hoping that everyones well back in the UK.

Take care

Ewan and Kat