Ah well, what can I say? We started off in Goas Southern most and most iddylic beach of Palolem. I thought it was all just a joke that India actually had decent beaches. but I was wrong. palolem is a picture perfect white sandy beach bay fringed with palms, restaurants and thatched beach huts. Its pretty special. Its mainly a tourist spot, which is probably why the beaches are actually clean and well looked after. The water is luke warm with small waves. The temp was in the 30s while we were Goa the whole time. For 3 or 4 days we lazed on the beach on sunchairs, occasionally dipping into the water, then wandered back to the guesthouse past a few wandering beach cows, dogs and canoe vendors to clean up. Then it was off to a lovely seafood restuarant on the beach. Ah bliss. We took 3 kayaks out one morning and went right around the point to the next bay which was pretty rocky. great exercise tho. Coming back in pauls dad fell in, and i almost did, but my hat came sailing off. I was so wet by the end of the ordeal i just jumped in and went for a swim anyway. you can walk south to the next bay called Patnem which is similar to palolem only less crowded. to be honest it was pretty uncrowded anyway with the new years crowds gone. its such a nice place to come for some bliss in india. pauls dad was soon to head off to we headed to Anjuna beach about 50kms north. this is supposedly where all the hippies came in the 60s, but now its just a hangout for the long-timers who never left from the 60s. the beach is mediocre but inland is quite beacutiful with palms and green paddy fields. 100's of tourists ride around goa on mopeds or scooters. when we first arrived we were shocked to see hippie looking couples riding around on enfields dressed in leather. so many of them everywhere. after a few days we figured out why everyone was on scooters, beacuse its a pain in the arse getting anywhere. so we hired some scooters the next day and zoomed up the coast to vagator beach and chapora village which was laced with young israelis and more hippies stuck there from the 60s. we zoomed south again and checked out calangute beach which is where all the package tourists from UK and europe go. seeing them all there in masses was a bit weird, as the beaches we'd gone to had none of the real large scale touristy feel as that place had. paul and dad went for a swim, but i headed back to anjuna that day. in anjune we also checked out the infamous wednesday markets where almost everything is sold from cushion covers to jewellery to badges, bags and more...its a pretty amazing experience and you can haggle with the stall owners to get some decent prices. nothing here is fixed price, if you want it you make an offer. its a real different way of working things. it was mostly set up for tourists tho, so more tourists than indians. many of the permanent western hippies also make stuff and sell it here. a lady in the market imports womens clothes from UK and sells them for about one twentieth of the price you pay there. our time in anjuna became better as time went along. for pauls dads last day we visited the spice plantations and Old goa. to be blatantly honest Old Goa was pretty boring. a few big churches spread across a large area. i can appreciate it though. its all the remaining churches from the old portugese days which is pretty special i spose. The plantations were interesting where we saw how all the different spices were grown and they threw in a free lunch too. at the end of the tour you get a cupful of cold water poured down your back (not sure why) but i got a great photo of the boys squirming. he he. the next day sadly pauls dad had to head off to bangalore to catch his flight home. we had a real good time with him there so was sad to see him go. the same day we headed for panaji which is inland goa, the old portugese settlement. its just fantastic. small european feeling streets with small quaint botutique type retaurants and shops. we ate lunch down a small alley and swear we were in europe, not india. we stayed with a fabulous portugese family who had been there for centuries. they invited us to a family dinner with them. we sat out in the street drinking whiskey and soda (weird) and finally ate at about midnight. mu tummy was grumbling ferociously by that time. but the food was good. aside from..paul got a little sick off it, so was a bit crook for a few days after. the experience we had in panaji is like no other i've had. it was just unexpected and special. 2 days later we headed for our final goa stop- a beach called Arambol. its the northern most developed beach. well if you consider a few small shops and restuarants developed. but it was a lovely beach and we stayed at a great guesthouse right on the dunes. and you guessed it...we spent a few days swiming, walking, swimming, eating and all that stuff. again, it was just bliss. arambol is a mix of palolem and anjuna, nice beach etc but instead of the people being middle aged tourists, they are a little more family with kids or young hippies, or russians. SO many russians here. why? who knows. maybe its the latest holiday destination for them or something. anyway, we loved arambol and were very sad to leave a couple of days ago. we are now in MUMBAI!