North South Goa

As we have now booked and paid to stay for the remainder of our holiday in Star Beach now I start with a few pictures around the place. The first one is a garden block which all has aircon and I think they charge about Rs1500 a night for them. The second one is looking along the front of the building and the next is another of the pool which we have yet to visit. I have also put a photo of one of the restaurants in Colva where they have only vegetarian food upstairs and meat downstairs. The last one is of the very colourful apartments on the way down to the beach in Benaulim. We have stopped there several times before but not this year it’s called Cost’s Montage and the best contact is the girl that works in reception called Fay at faybobmik@hotmail.com if you want prices as they vary throughout the year. I think they were around Rs2000 a night and they wouldn’t come down on the price either but they are fine and they also have a pool and you can walk directly to the beach from a back gate but beware of the large pigs.

Last night we started with a quick drink in Williams and watched a bit of the Aston Villa and Arsenal match before going up to Viva Goa at the top end of Colva. Hilda’s adopted son Sebastian works in there and on a Saturday they have live music and they said that they may come over. Claire wasted no time in dancing with all the waiters and most of the clientele. There are few white tourists in this bar mainly local and Indians but we had a ball. You can’t miss the large palm tree growing out of the gent’s urinal and I couldn’t help myself from sniffing around a little, barking a couple of times before cocking my leg up. I wonder if it was a full moon last night. Anyway, unexpectedly we had a ball but drank rather too much and woke up this morning with a bad head.

The best thing to do is to go off on the bike and blow away your hangover so we decided to have a drive up to the extreme north of South Goa. For those of you that followed our very first blog you may remember a place we used to walk to that we called “The restaurant at the end of the universe” but was really called “Wow 619”. It is miles from anywhere except the beach and we found it by walking from The Horizon Beach Resort along the beach but there is another way that you can drive there but it’s only a little dirt track that goes through a shanty town. We always wondered how they survived being so remote but alas they are no more; another one bites the dust. We rode back to the Horizon but we weren’t sure if that was open because they have took the sign down and there wasn’t a single beach shack along the beach any more. The lack of tourists is really sorting the men out from the boys over here. We had already decided to drive past another place that we have stayed at in the past Called Casa Ligorio which has lovely rooms and is really clean by Utorda beach. The lady owner does the best breakfast ever, see www.casaligorio.com or email on casaligorio@rediffmail.com and she said that she intended to build on a restaurant during the close season. This is called “J the Top” and is already up and running; we really must try that just on the strength of her breakfasts. They have a huge fridge freezer in your room and satellite tv which you need as it’s a long walk to anywhere. You really do need your own transport to stay there otherwise you will be constantly using taxis but we highly recommend this place. Their normal price is Rs2000 a night and they only charge Rs3000 over the Christmas period but you will have to book up early as they only have 9 rooms which are always full up with returning customers. She spotted us and came out to greet us, then took us in for a glass of fruit juice and a chat. The lack of tourists doesn’t seem to affect her as she has been full up most of every year; I wish we hadn’t paid for Star Beach now as she did have one room left.

By this time we were starving and had not even had breakfast yet because all the beach shacks in this area have gone so we headed back to Colva and walked north stopping at Anthony’s first base because their sun beds looked the most comfortable. We did the German thing and left our towels down before going to the shack for an early lunch. The sun beds were really comfy and we both fell to sleep after our lunch. Of course, today’s Sunday and that’s when Colva beach fills up with Indian day trippers all along the coast. We didn’t have much lunch as we intend to try a new restaurant tonight called “Fish World” which has been recommended to us. I must say I don’t feel much like it tonight, I would rather have another HBO night but Claire wants to because she is a real Goa girl.