Goa-September 2012

One can never have enough of Goa! No matter how many times I’ve been there, it still has so many facets to explore…….I’ve decided to explore some aspects of it each year.

This year we decided to go to Goa to celebrate my husband’s birthday. It was early September with the rains still making its presence felt. We thought Goa would be refreshing during this time of the year…….and we were not proved wrong! J

Day 1: 6^Th September 2012: Pune- Goa

Our day started early and we were out on the road at 4am sharp, with our little kid sleeping on the backup seat. My friends had mentioned that this was the best time to travel when you have kids as you can cover a lot of journey while the child is still asleep. So we decided to try it out. This was the first time we travelled during the dawn. It was pitch dark and almost seemed like night driving. The road construction work on the Pune-Kolhapur highway was making the drive adventures. We also crossed the Khambatki ghat during this time. By 7.45 we reached Kolhapur which was very much in time! Till this point our morning was peaceful …….. and to end our peace our kiddo woke up. In time for breakfast, we stopped at McD on the highway. After a quick break we again hit the roads and then followed the highway upto Nippani. We took the turn at hotel Kaveri and the bumpy ride began for upto around 15Kms, after which the roads were better and we were enjoying the lush green surroundings with little drizzles of rain. The climate was so refreshing that we did not realize how many miles we had covered already and the many more to go.  We passed Gadhinglaj-Ajra and were on the Amboli road. Amboli is an amazing place in this season. There were so many waterfalls on the way. We stopped at one of them for another break. There was a light rain and the cool water from the waterfall was very refreshing. We were now very eager to reach Goa, and we hit the roads again. Passing Sawantwadi we now entered Goa around 12pm. It was a long journey indeed. We still had to travel further down as we had selected a resort on the South of Goa. By 1.30 we reach our hotel…….Martins Comfort.

     

Martins Comfort is a small neat resort in the south of Goa, at Betalbatim. It was a reasonable one and we had got a good off-season deal for it too. The famous goan restaurant Martins Corner was bang opposite this place and they shared the owners. We checked in our room and my kid was running all over the place exploring the place. We soon got to know that the pool was under repair and that was just one let down to that place. We had lunch at Martins corner and then had some rest. It was the time to hit the beach!!...........

The betalbatim beach was very serene and clean. There was hardly any crowd except for a few fishermen and we were to ourselves. Got a close look at the fishermen at work and witnessed how they gather the catch. Our kid loved playing on the beach with his beach set. It was amazing to just sit on the beach and watch the waves come and touch your feet!

Back to the hotel we washed up and had a good dinner at Martins corner before we retired to sleep.

Day 2: Drive around Goa.

The next day began on a lazy note. We rose late, dressed had good breakfast at martins comfort and then just drove out exploring Goa. We always love South Goa for a laid back feel. The unhurried pace of living, the tradition of afternoon siestas, the friendly simplicity of the Goan culture is able to embrace all while retaining its own unique identity. There is a sense of history and antiquity in the old churches and forts and the delightful Portuguese architecture. We were simply amazed at the use of bright colors used for the Goan houses and simply couldn’t stop us from clicking these colorful sights.

The goan language is another aspect of Goa that we love. There is a lot of warmth and sweetness in the language. We tuned to Radio Mirchi and were soon swinging to the Goan tunes.

We did not want to cover the usual Goa and decided the skip the old Goa this trip. Our drive landed in the outskirts of Goa, in the lush green paddy fields.

We decided to lunch at Sawantwadi at our usual Kamat hotel. To our surprise the hotel had closed down. We then searched for alternative and had our lunch. We also took to opportunity to buy some wooden crafts for our kiddo as this place is very famous for it. We explored a place called “Chitar Ali” here which is a small market for such wooden crafts.

After our lunch we deiced to go to Calangute beach, which is also known as queen of beaches. The beach itself isn't anything special, with steeply shelving sand, however it's capacity is large enough to accommodate the huge number of high-season visitors. There were high tides when we reached there.

The sounds of young voices, the whisper of the wind, waves that froth as they collapse at your feet, crumbling sandcastles and the dreams that remain...seashells that carry the sound of the ocean...the glorious colors of light as the sun sets into the sea...the warmth of waters that envelop you...horizons that stretch forever……..the experience was mesmerizing.

Suddenly it started pouring heavily and we rushed for shelter. Experienced the rain by seaside for the first time and it felt good to have a nice hot coffee in the rain by the seashore.

We then headed back to the hotel to freshen up. It was Friday night and nice music was being played at the Martins Corner by a local band. We had dinner by the music and were soon asleep.

Day 3: Goa – Pune

It was difficult to head back home leaving this life behind but we had some plans back home and had to be there to fulfill them. The journey back was uneventful and never ending…..as we thought of it as the excitement had now died down. J We reached home by around 5pm and were wrapped in the routine stuff.