Hi Everyone We are well, relaxed and sunkissed after almost 2 weeks in Goa. After charging around north and mid India in our first couple of weeks here, we ground to a lazy halt when we arrived in Goa around the 13th. We were so excited about seeing the beaches and finally chilling by the sea, but unfortunately we arrived just in time to experience the tail end of Monsoon. We stayed first in an idyllic beach in the very south called Palolem. It was so pretty, with hundreds of palm trees fringing the crescent coastline and beach shacks and brightly coloured fishing boats along the shore. We stayed in one of the beach shacks, ate in the restaurants and bars along the beach and when the sun did come out occassionally we chilled on the same beach. With no need whatsover to leave the sand on the beach it would have been perfect if the weather had been!!! As with all of India though- the beach was populated with numerous dogs and cows. Why a cow would want to live on a beach is beyond me. We made friends with many of the stray dogs and even took to feeding some of the incredibly skinny stray puppies that lived outside our shack. We have photos but, as you already know, uploading photos is impossible here so you'll have to use your imaginations until we find a photo-uploading solution! After a few days we took the coach up to northern Goa which is better known for its party scene. We are too early for the beach raves and outdoor parties in Disco Valley that we have heard all about, but there is still plenty going on to keep us occupied. We made some friends at our first hotel, two English guys who are pretty much doing the same route through South East Asia as Dave and I are doing, on pretty much the same dates so we have planned to meet up again in Bangkok. The others have already moved on but we still spend alot of time with our little Danish friend who cracks us up getting stuck on English words, and teaching us Danish words. She told us today that the Danish word for goosebumps translates into ant t***. How funny. We went to a Goan Trance night at a club on Sat night. We ended up meeting the weirdest bunch of people ever. We started late, with drinks in a little bar overlooking the beach cliffs around midnight. As Indian people go, they are quite curious about foreigners and aren't shy about interrupting your conversation and joining in. We didn't really mind as these particular guys were very nice and easy to talk to. They ended up joining us in the club. Then they became a bit too friendly, inviting us to come to their party the following night, wanting to meet up the next day, one of the guys wanted to photograph me for his next jewellery brochure ...... Anyway, we tried to loose them in the club which was luckily very dark. At one point during the night Dave and I had front row seats for this random fight that broke out of the dance floor, that kept restarting as there were no bouncers to do anything about it. When the club closed we heading back to the bar where we started to find it blacked out. They too, had housed a massive fight and there bar was all smashed up but they served us anyway, by candlelight which was really sweet. As the walk back to Baga was too much at that time of morning, and there were no taxis around we thought it would be a fabulous idea to go down to the beach and watch the sunrise. We were walking through this tiny village when a bull started charging us!! Panic is not the word! We nearly threw ourselves off the edge of the cliff in fright but luckily it turned and charged at a fellow bull and then started a fight. This place is clearly a very aggressive one. Using the distraction we ducked from tree to tree until we were out of sight of the scary bulls. Got to the point that we were thinking - is tonight really real?? After everyone else that happened we weren't that surprised when walking through the tiny, quiet village just before dawm we suddenly hear some music up an alley, and this slightly gay sounding voice call out Hell-low! We looked up and this guy was jumping up and down in excitement of seeing us and calling us over to join his party. His party turned out to be him, and 2 of his employees who looked bored out of their brains. He was also out of his brains but in another way. When we turned up he shooed his employees away and pulled us up some seats outside his guest house. Probably one of the grubbiest guesthouses I've seen, but he had some music and we had time to kill so we stayed there for a while. He was so funny at first. Completely eccentric, dancing away to the music which was blaring out of his room. This odd man thought that he was very deep and spiritual, and kept looking into out eyes seriously, holding the gaze for way longer than necessary and saying, you know what I mean, we're on the same wavelength here etc etc. He also thought that high-fiving was necessary after every 30 seconds or so of conversation. If we asked anything, he would answer with helloo!!?? In the Clueless type of way that suggested, how could we think not. It got pretty annoying quickly. He also showered us with the most revolting gifts ever. Firstly he gave me a vomit-yellow headscarf, which I kept trying to give back, or hide but he kept giving it back to me. Then he bought out this massive box of stuff he clearly sold in some cheap market and started giving us really ugly candles, and a vomit-yellow paper latern. We resisted, tried not to take it but he stuffed it all in my bag and that was that. Anyway we escaped after the sun rose, although he tried desperately to get us to stay in one of the free rooms (they were probably all free) and then stay for a party he was apparently throwing that night. We promised to return in a few hours and fled, never ever to return to that part of Goa. We were however hunted down by one of the overeager Indians we had met in the club. I made the mistake of telling him what beach we were staying at and he must he spent the whole day down there waiting, and pounced on us when we came out for a late lunch!! Spooky! I am very happy that Monsoon seems to have lifted. This happened within 2 mins of our Danish friend gravely informing me that she had just checked the weather report online and it was going to continue raining in all of South Goa for a further 10 days. So we have hired mopeds and visited all the surrounding beaches, made friends with the locals who own the beach bars and at long last spent hours each day on sunloungers and dipping in the ocean. Did you know most India people can't swim? Its hysterical. They also don't wear swimming costumes. They either paddle in all their normal clothes, or (men only) strip down to their knickers and splash around - even those who have white, see-through-when-wet briefs. Nutters!! They can't go deeper than their ankles either. Well we leave in 2 days for Mumbai and then Delhi to catch our flights to Sri Lanka. Will send you updates from there!! Give us a quick email or notice if you are receiving any of our updates - its seems loads of people from our contact list are not. Lots of love Danielle & Dave xxxxx