The taxi from Candolim took us the 80km or so to south Goa, to a place called Palolem. We watched the countryside become more green and rural as we went, ending with stunning green hills and forested areas. We went to Palolem on the strength of a recommendation from friends. After comtemplating what to do with our remaining time in India, we had opted for more rest and relaxation time, and Palolem seemed like a good place to do it.

The taxi was smooth going, and the driver pointed out things along the way, such as the floating river casinos, local rivers, the only Sikh temple in Goa, and major 'highways' to places like Mumbai and Bangalore . When we arrived in Palolem, nearly two hours later, we had to find our accommodation, Mika Mocha, as the driver didn't know where it was. We stopped and asked various people, none of whom seemed to know until we were directly opposite the turning to it. One chap had the audacity to tell us that Mika Mocha had no rooms available (another scam). We cast him a scowl and kept going until we found the place.

Mika Mocha's accommodation was a shack near the main entrance to the beach. It was pretty reasonably priced, and had a good fan to keep us cool at night. In the day, the shack was basically not accessible because it was hotter than the sun. The shack was pretty basic, but it met our needs, and the cold shower dribble just about washed off the sand and dirt accumulated during the day.

We headed to the beach to check it out, and found that it was a long curve of golden sand, fringed with beach shacks, places to eat and sleep, and shops . These were backed by lovely looking palm trees, giving a serene air to the place. It came with the usual touts trying to sell us anything (taxis, clothes, sunglasses, boat trips, canoes, food, jewellery, shells, massages, bikes for rent, beach chairs) that we roundly ignored. We found some food for lunch, and headed back to the shack to skype our good friends, Mike, Jen, Thomas and Wills, at home. Amazingly, the internet was good enough to use Skype (on this occasion, it would later prove less fruitful) and we had a lovely 45 minute catch up. After this, we went for a swim in the Arabian sea in the late afternoon sun. The water was predictably murky, but the view back to the beach was handsome.

We ate dinner (not curry for once!) on a table on the beach, watched the sunset, and relaxed.

On Monday 23rd, we woke up late. We'd expected to wake up with the sun heating the shack to supernatural temperatures, but the day was overcast. Humid, but overcast. We used the poor shack internet and drank coffee until hunger forced us out to buy lunch, from yet another shack on the beach, and watched the world pass us by for a while. We stretched our legs and walked to Monkey Island at the north end of the beach, accessible at low tide. We crossed a couple of small rivers to get there, and climbed on the island to find a sign which said it was private property and warned trespassers to keep off . So we wandered back down the beach, had a drink in another beach front property and read our books for a while, before completing the walk of the length of the beach. All the while, we were fending off the touts, including one woman who felt it appropriate to follow us into the rocks at the far south end of the beach, to try to get us into her shop and to tell Jayna how pale she was. We walked back up the beach, full of lethargy, and stopped into another shack for a drink. Jayna went for a swim to cool down, and we got an early dinner (curry, again) whilst sunset didn't happen in front of us.

In the evening, we drank a bottle of wine courtesy of Jayna's parents (thank you Pat and Roy) and relaxed in the milder temperatures.

We had a disturbed night when the power went off several times, meaning that the fan was not doing it's job of keeping us cool. The fan was pretty noisy, which was fine because when it worked, it drowned out the noise of the multitude of dogs barking and cats fighting outside of our shack . It was a relief when the fan eventually came back on again, only for two more power cuts to give us the same problems. The rain eventually stopped the dogs and cats at least, and again we woke up late because it wasn't hot, or even that humid, in the morning.

On Tuesday 24th we got breakfast at Mika Mocha, drank more coffee, and used the bad internet for a while. We decided to stretch our legs, something we hadn't done properly since walking the length of Rajpath in Delhi. So we walked on the road south, past a small beach to another, called Patnam. This place was more like what we were looking for. It was a smaller beach than Palolem, but still had the same gorgeous curve, fringed by palm trees, with golden sand and a serene atmosphere. It was much less populated, with only a couple of touts trying to get business from us. We went to a beach shack for lunch, and stayed there for some time, enjoying the ambience. Ken went for a dip in the sea before we walked back for 40 minutes into Palolem, and the calls from touts interrupted our warm fuzzy feelings about the place. Jayna went for a dip in the sea and we went to yet another beach shack for dinner, enjoying the place as it got dark, as well as some good food.

On Wednesday 25th, we woke up early, took breakfast at another beach front shack (we were enjoying spreading the wealth), packed and checked out, ready for the next leg of the adventure. First, we had to mentally prepare ourselves for another India city, and the chaos that came with it. Kolkata was the next stop.