Goa…here we come!!! We come out of the hotel to meet our driver to the airport, and I’m so excited to see it’s Prakash again. Yayyy!!! I’m going to give a good plug for Prakash Singh, our awesome driver who valiantly drove us around the Golden Triangle of northern India. He’s a married man with a beautiful baby girl, and he said goodbye to his wife and daughter to come adventure with us for four days around India. He drove us to out of the way places, protected us from the beggars and street sellers, bargained for good prices for us, took us to good restaurants and even greater shops to buy the best quality items, held our bags during photo shoots, told us funny stories and jokes, amazed us with his knowledge of the sights we saw, took photos for us and hooked us up with good tour guides. He’s a keeper, I reckon. We’ll definitely ask for him again on our next India tour next year. He’s happy to tour our whole team around India he said.
He works for Total Holiday Options, and they have offices in Australia, NZ and India. If you want a great and memorable holiday experience that is all planned out exactly how you like it, then contact this company, they are great. My travel agent in Australia, Andrea Turner, put the finer details of our trip together. Nothing was too much effort or challenge for her. Message me if you’d like her details to book your next holiday. You won’t be disappointed.
Airport security was tight this morning at Delhi airport, with armed police everywhere checking boarding passes, passports and bags. Apparently there were some terrorists making threats from Pakistan, and the result is greater security around the country. All good though. The police we saw were all bored stiff doing their very important jobs.
I saw a couple of elephants in the airport and a monument to Surya Namaskar, a series of yogic poses meaning Salutation to the Sun. Both monuments were cleverly done.
Delhi had been hot and humid. Goa was rainy and humid. And green and tropical. Such a contrast between the north and south of the country. The monsoon season is officially over, so this rain is the tail-end of it.
It doesn’t seem as crowded in Goa, well, not in the area we are at in Benaulim Beach. Or maybe it’s just that everyone’s inside to keep dry.
The resort we’re in for the next two weeks, was a prize I’d won two years ago when we first went to Bali. It’s taken me this long to get here. This is the view from my room. I like the white and blue (a touch of Greek colours to satisfy my heritage), and it contrasts well against the green background of the garden. I noticed lots of little shops in the village we’re in, so it’ll be fun exploring those. The beach is close-by apparently. That’ll be explored tomorrow.
One of the food specialities of the area is Goan Fish curry. We had some for dinner at the resort. Very yummy! It’s lovely to have fresh fish and seafood options to choose from. I’m rather cautious of eating fish when there’s no fresh and clean water sources around. I’ve seen the muddy, crowded fish farms in Laos and Bangladesh, kinda puts me off eating fish from those sources. Fish freshly caught from the ocean or clean free-flowing rivers is what I like.