Goa - Arambol & Anjuna

Goa a place that we always wanted to visit... rumours about wonderfull beaches, crazy parties, warm ocean and nice people made us curious about goa and obviously we imagined a lot of things... arriving to Goa wasn't easy as we wrote in the post before so the expectation and curiosity was really high. Also... we both needed a small break to relax from the "crazy India".
On the last bus to Arambol, we met a guy called Goram that is travelling for four years so he had already been in Goa several times.. we asked him for some tips for acommodation and talked for a while. He told us he teaches yoga and also makes good thai massages so we exchanged phone numbers in case we needed classes or massages. When the bus was approaching the main road to the Arambol Beach he started to yell to the driver to stop the bus but the bus only stopped a few meters away... Pedro and I looked at each other thinking "Is it here?!" We could only see jungle and unpaved roads with a redish tone.. everybody started to leave the bus and we just followed with our backpacks... we made a few circles around the street without knowing where the beach was and ended up asking Goram.. he pointed to the opposite direction that we were thinking and we both started to walk... excited about the jungle around us we both questioned how Arambol would be... After crossing some dunes with palmtrees, our feet finally touched the sand and our eyes saw the ocean... in front of us we had a small paradise almost virgin... we felt accomplished and extremely happy.. but we had a task.. we needed to find a room or a hut. We decided that our bargaining power would be low if we walked in with our backpacks so Pedro went to the guesthouses/huts while I waited at the beach. He tried to go to the left side of the beach first but there wasn't much offer so we both walked a bit to the right side and immediately saw two places... one of them wasn't that nice but they lowered the price really easy so we both thought it wouldn't be that hard to find a place..  the other one was nice and for 450 ruppies it was a bamboo hut with private toilet and mosquito net... it was really cosy but we didn't want to choose that fast so Pedro kept walking through the beach while I waited at the restaurant of the nice huts "laughing buddha". After almost 1h Pedro showed up all sweaty and exhausted... he had visit a lot of places... some of them he wanted to show me but they were a bit far from where we were and we could definetly feel the heat.. we both decided to stay in the cosy hut for one night and we could both visit the other places later. Happy with our choice and after nice lunch and a cold beer, Pedro started to show me what he had found, one apartment with kitchen for 700 ruppies (we could cook and save on the food) and another hut with shared toilet but facing the ocean and for only 250 ruppies.. after visiting the two places we agreed that with should go for the cheap one.. it would facilitate our budget and the view was simply amazing... it also had a front yard where people could get together... and the manager said we could have a mosquito net as well... we moved the next day!
We had in our minds that Goa would be to relax and to stay for a bit longer than the usual... with no plans ahead except the fact that we needed to be in Sangolda on the 8th of November to work in exchange of a room and food we faced Arambol really calmly. Arambol had nothing to do with what we had imagined, it was way less developed than we were expecting, it really looked like a jungle that ends on the sea.. with a few huts and houses and some bars by the beach. It also has a path that surrounds the mountain and leads to another beach... that path, like the main Arambol road, is full of stores selling clothes, jewelry, shoes, bags, swimwear, flipflops and sarongs. During the night we walked through the beach several times trying to find the popular parties but nothing was happening... a few bars passed transe music all day but around 10pm everything was closing... some would keep open but only with ambient music nothing like a party... we were told that the season hadn't started yet. We could see locals building more bars (all in bamboo) and that things were still slow.. the only thing that happens in Arambol after 10pm are fireworks... random fireworks at the beach with no special reason... the fireworks happen every night but sometimes they are a bit dangerous... in one of the days, we were at the beach when the fireworks started but instead of throwing them to the sky they threw them to the beach... One, stopped a few meters from us and everybody decided to leave the beach...
On the main beach of Arambol things were not as expected as well, we could see foreign tourists in the sand but there were also a lot of Indian tourists and as most of the Indians they couldn't avoid staring... they stop, stare and they even take pictures of female tourists without any discretion... at one point it became uncomfortable... not exactly the relaxing beach we were thinking about. But on the other hand, the water was really warm and it felt very good to swim and refresh..
On our third day we decided to rent a motorbike and visit the beaches around Arambol, first the Kerim Beach that was 10 minutes north of Arambol, the beach was almost empty... just a few people on the beach beds that belonged to two or three restaurants.. no unwanted pictures and looks... we could definetly relax there and enjoy the beach... On the way back home Pedro shaved the hair and the huge beard.. he hadn't shave for one month and a half..  it was a nice experience.. I could see that Pedro was tense by the time the guy was shaving on the neck area! On that night we met Laura, a girl from Germany that was studying in Pune for four months and now that her studies were over she chose Arambol to relax. Laura became our partner for breakfast and dinner. On our second day with the motorbike we went to Anjuna, we were told that most of the parties were in Anjuna but Anjuna was expensive so we went to investigate.. check the room prices and also to see the famous Anjuna Market where we bought our beautiful beach towel. We also had one of the weirdest experiences so far.. a guy started to clean Pedro's ear, he cleaned and cleaned and even removed stones of sand and wax... another guy did it to me as well... obviously they wanted money and we didn't want to spend it but both of our minds blocked with the wax and stones that we were seeing coming out of our ears... at the end we negotiated the price and left but we still couldn't believe it.. gross but nice at the same time. We were surprised with Anjuna.. seemed a bit confusing and very spread... not compact like Arambol but we would have time to know it better... we were planning to stay in Anjuna for a few days before starting to work in Sangolda. Our third and last day with the motorbike was to go to Paradise beach, a beach that people talk as being perfect located in Maharasthra.. We had our omelets at the Red Cabin and bought some fruits for the day.. one huge papaya, three bananas and two custard apples (anonas in portuguese). When we stay for a longer time in one place it becomes easier to find cheap options to eat... The paradise beach was huge and when we arrived it had no one except a few street vendors by the palmtrees. Later, some people arrived but not even twenty. It was a nice and relaxing day. After dinner, we went with Laura to a bar with live music.. there we met her yoga teacher and talked for hours until the bar closed. In Arambol our curiosity about yoga increased a lot, we definitely want to try it and maybe make it an habit. Our days after the motorbike had zero plans at all, we went to the beach on the other side of the mountain, we found new ways to lower the budget by making vegetarian sandwichs ourselves (bread, tomatoes, capsicums, garlic, cucumber and salt for 40 ruppies +- $0.60), tried an excelent pineapple at the beach and investigated about yoga classes, we found one place for 250 ruppies per class so we ended up deciding to go but we would have to wait for the next day since the classes were at 8h30 am. We setup the alarm for 7am but it was so hard to get up that we ignored it.. we could try to call the teacher and schedule classes in the afternoon. We don't know if it was good or bad that we didn't go but the truth is that when we woke up, Pedro couldn't move the left side of his back... it was blocked and hurting a lot... maybe if we had gone to yoga it would have fixed it or make it worse or maybe if we had gone the pain wouldn't even exist... but it happened like that so now we had a problem. Pedro stayed at the hut while I went to search for a credible place for massages and I found one guy that teaches other people how to make massages so we both went there. He analyzed Pedro's back and said it would need a special treatment, we both believed in him and Pedro went for an hour and a half of relief and pain at the same time... the guy pulled, pushed, punched, streched, cracked Pedro's back but at the end he left with free movements again... he had a strong pain from the massage but he could move... at the end the guy said "no yoga for three days" it has been hard to finally start practicing yoga. Since the day was basically to rest, at night we decided to do something different, we went for dinner at the "Eyes of Buddha" where we had the delicious chicken Tikka roll in Naan bread but this time we would eat desert... we tried the famous "hello to the queen"... we shouldn't have done it.. the desert was one of the best deserts we had in our lives... it's fried banana, smashed cookies, ice cream and hot chocolate. That desert became a small problem..  now, when we are on the budget we always think about having an Hello to the Queen... we definetly need to be careful with the walet and with the belly! On the next day Pedro still had some pain but he was feeling better and better, we walked to the left side of the Arambol Beach for hours until we reached the Ashven Beach. We got tired but the walk was excelent... On the way back, almost at sunset a group of people were playing music at the beach, others dancing and others just chilling... an environment that was closer to what we had imagined in Goa. In Arambol we could see a lot of people with children, we both agree that Goa is a nice place to bring the kids... it is safe, nice and cheap and so far.. no parties. After nine or ten days in the ssme location, we both felt like we needed new experiences, we were already getting used to the confort of Arambol and this trip is to try new experiences and to get out of the confort zone. We also felt like we really need to work on finding a volunteering place with children.. we are going to work for an Eco Farm Stay but it is not volunteering, it is working abroad in exchange of food and bed. We agreed that after the two weeks in the Eco Farm Stay we would look for an orphanage to stay during the month of December and maybe spend our Christmas there. With the feeling of getting new experiences, we rented a motorbike for one more day in order to book a room in Anjuna.. we were ready to leave. We went to Anjuna very early and we found a place to stay, Mary Holiday Home, we booked the room for next day.. we would have 4 days in Anjuna before going to the Eco Farm. We stayed in Arambol for a total of 11 nights, it was the place that we stayed longer so far and a place that even different from what we expected we both feel like going back. Maybe for new year's eve or maybe for vacation when we have kids.. on our last night in Arambol we met a nice couple that checked in in the hut next to us, they were from Finland and they had just started their 3 months trip.. we had had a great conversation and even had dinner together! In Arambol it wasn't as easy to connect to people as we thought.. the majority of tourists are from Israel or Russia. With Israelis is hard to connect because they are with big groups and they speak only in Hebrew. With the few of them that we talked, we learned that in Israel everybody goes to the army, the guys for 3 years and girls for 2. It is weird to think about a country where everybody has military training.. if all the portuguese population had gone to the army we wouldn't be as pacific as we are. Curiously everybody thinks we are from Israel.. at the beginning we thought it was because of Pedro, brown hair and beard but actually it's because of me, they said my face looks like Israeli..
We checked out from the Noah's Arc (our huts), said goodbye to the amazing family that runs the place and lives from fishing and we went to Anjuna. We arrived early, we had our room with private toilet and a motorbike waiting for us everything was pointing to a great day. We grabbed the motorbike and started to explore, we went to a supermarket that we saw on the way but surprisingly we were stopped by the police... the police said that Pedro couldn't drive a motorbike with his drivers license so he immediatly said we would have to pay something... a ticket was around 950 ruppies but we could give him 500 and he would be able to forget it.. he even said that after giving him the 500 ruppies we could drive the motorbike for the following days that he wouldn't stop us again... it was the first time that we saw the curruption in the police in India.. we could see that they are after the tourists.. they don't stop locals. That was a bit disappointing but we tried to forget that episode. We tried to enjoy the beach by the most famous bar in Anjuna, Curlies... we had some beers and suddenly a party started. We stayed and enjoyed the party that we wanted for so long but because we were not used to clubbing anymore we got tired around 2/3am. The way back home was through the middle of confused paths in the dark, we used our phone's flashlights and eventually got a ride from some nice guys. On the way we heard about stories about the police... in Anjuna the bars are not allowed to have loud music after 10pm but Curlies has an arrangement with the police, they pay them to close their eyes and the bar is open almost until 6am. We also heard that police hides in the paths behind the bars and searches the foreigners looking for drugs, they scare them and ask for bribes or sexual favors and obviously the ones that are caught pay without thinking twice. We know corruption exists and actually people shouldn't be doing those things but the image of the police becomes ugly and dirty and with time it might even ruin the tourism in the area. The next day was hangover day, everything was done very slowly... our body is not used to beers anymore. We chilled in the room, restaurant and beach but nothing major happened. Same for the following days, we were about to start working in the Eco Farm so we used the time to enjoy the beach and the ocean. We saw that Anjuna has more parties than Arambol, we saw people drinking at the beach.. we notice that a lot of Indians come to Goa to party and they are not used to freedom so they don't know their limits.. we saw one guy completely wasted, rolling on the water and sand like crazy and none of his friends knew how to help...
Now that we are about to leave Anjuna we are happy that we came but we are not sure if we feel like coming back... the energy is not as chilled as in Arambol. We are now ready to work and to meet new people ate the Eco Farm Stay, it will be a different experience and a nice way to stay under the budget... we will see how it goes! 

From Pushkar to Goa

We don't even know how to start this post... so many things have changed on our way to Goa... when we were in Manali we thought about the option of going to Goa by plane, it would be a bit expensive but we would be there very fast.. after thinking a little bit we decided that travelling is not about the destination but about the journey... as we wrote on the post before, our first stop was in Chandigarh and we had an amazing experience that would have never happen if we went by plane... after Chandigarh we took a train to Pushkar, a familiar place for us.. we stayed there for 2 nights, we were able to be with Mavi and Ravi and also visit our friends from the Nirvana cafe. It was nice to be back to Pushkar, we met other people as well... a couple from Spain, a lady from the Netherlands and a girl from Canada.. we shared experiences and got some good ideas for a possible business... who knows... when we arrived to Pushkar, Mavi recommended us to go by bus until Ahmedabad (11h) and from Ahmedabad we could take another bus till Mumbai (around 11h) or even Goa (23h).. we chose the bus straight to Goa.. we bought both tickets in Pushkar  and the journey starts.... the Bus from Pushkar to Ahmedabad was 1200 ruppies and the one from Ahmedabad to Goa was 4200.

The adventure started as soon as we left the hotel... On the day of the departure there was a big festival one the streets, a lot of people celebrating and dancing, fireworks, camels decorated with a lot of acessories and the typical confusion of India.. we walked fast trying not to get caught on the mess but a few steps ahead we noticed that we forgot the passports at the hotel.. Pedro had to run to get them back.. we had to catch a public bus to Ajmer and in Ajmer we would also have to get a tuk tuk to the bus station. As we arrived in Ajmer we notice that the traffic is chaotic because of the festival... starting to get late, we took a tuk-tuk and asked the guy to drive fast to the bus stop. The street was blocked, cars didn't move so the driver told us that we could take a faster option but for 50 ruppies more... at that moment it could have been 200 ruppies.. we needed to be at the bus stop at 7h30 or we would lose the bus...
After some stressing time on the tuk-tuk the driver stoped at 7h35 on a random street with some buses and said it was there.. we checked the buses but none of them had the plate number that we had on our ticket... no one spoke english but between gestures and some random words we were told that it was one of those buses our plate number was wrong..
The bus was a sleeper bus, it had seats and beds (individual and double) we were given a double bed, we arranged our bags and waited for the bus to start.. we waited, waited, waited and nothing... one hour later the driver says we need to change to another bus because that one was broken... we switched and went to another double bed in another bus... we waited, waited and the driver says we have to go on individual beds... we argued but nothing worked, at one point we just went to the individual beds.. we wanted the bus to start... people started to get in the bus we should be departing very soon.. an Indian lady pointed at us and to the beds and said "separate?!" And laugh... we tried to explain that the driver had told us to switch but she spoke no english at all... another guy helped translating and she said that our ticket was for a drive double bed and it was more expensive for that so we should at least ask for the difference of price... while Kika was talking to this lady, a group of Indian boys started to talk to Pedro and asking for pictures... the Indian lady was very upset with what the driver did by changing our beds and even called the agency asking for the refund... at the end, she talked to the father of the boys that were taking pictures with Pedro and they offered to switch the beds... they would go to our individual ones and we would go to the double one... we didn't want to accept because they were 4 and we were 2.. it was really unfair... the dad and the lady insisted and we ended up changing.. poor guys, 2 on an individual bed is probably not confortable at all.. at the end the lady also asked for a picture and the bus finally started... 2h after the scheduled time. The bus ride was probably the worst ride in India so far.. we were in the last bed of the bus and the roads were not that great so it felt like we were in a waching machine and the waching machine was on a trampolin. We slept a few hours but we were definitely not refreshed when we arrived in Ahmedabad at 7am. The bus from Ahmedabad to Goa was only at 1:30pm so we decided to walk to the bus stand..  that way we could stretch a bit, see the city and save some ruppies on the tuk-tuk.. we walked for almost 1h30 until we reached Paulo Travels, the bus company... super happy for being able to find the agency by foot, we walked in to ask if we could leave our backpacks in the agency but as soon as we got in the guy said...... "your bus to Goa was canceled..." we couldn't believe it.. that was the last thing we wanted to hear...

After some deep thoughts we decided that we wanted a refund so that we could keep going south via Pune. We asked for our money back but the travel agent said we couldn't give it to us, the maximum he could do was to refund online (since we booked with an agency, the money would go to the agency account) or give us an hotel night and we could take the bus the next day... we started a discussion and the guy was saying he couldn't give us the money in hands due to a technical issue... we could totally see he didn't want to give us the money so at the end and tired about the argument Pedro said he was going to call the police... Pedro picked up the phone and we stepped away.. a few steps later the man started to yell... we went back and he immediately gave us the money. Happy about our victory we went to the other travel agency to buy the tickets to Pune.. much cheaper compared to the ones to Goa but it was only half way.. we waited a few hours and we were back to our journey... the way to Pune was much better than the way to Ahmedabad, the bus was much more confortable, totally not like a washing machine on a trampoline ... we were able to sleep...

We arrived in Pune on the next morning around 7am, we went straight to the bus stand... as we arrived a guy immediately approached us asking if we were going to Goa, we said yes and he told us to follow him to an agency... the Bus would leave in half an hour... in the agency there was no bus to Goa but only to Kolhapur, a city 160 km away from Goa.. after considering the price we looked at each other and we both said that at least we would be closer... the Bus would arrive in Kolhapur in 4h and 160km away it would be very easy to reach goa... and so we went... instead of 4h, the bus took 5.5h but it was ok... this bus was confortable, had space and even screens on each seat so we could enjoy the journey... at one point, a guy that was on the seat next to us tried to communicate, he wanted to be our friend but his English was not very good... a few seconds later he started to show his mobile phone and he had wrote some words... we communicated via sms for a while, and he was really curious about us... he even said that next time we would go to Pune we were welcome to stay at his place.. he exchanged contacts, he showed us some family pictures and he left a few stops before us, hoping we could meet again...

In Kolhapur things were not as easy as we expected... we thought there would be much more buses to Goa but we only found one that would depart at 4pm and would arrive in Mapusa (Mapsa) around 10pm.. Mapusa was only 30km from Arambol (our final destination) but we didn't want to arrive at night because we wouldn't be able to negotiate the hotel prices nor take a bus to Arambol... we ended up going with the flow and took that bus, we survived this far so if we need to sleep one night watching the stars it wouldn't be a huge problem...

We arrived in Mapusa at 10:30pm, exhausted and with no clue where to sleep... we went to one hotel in front of the bus station but it was 2000 ruppies.. we were saving so much money when compared to the initial bus straight to Goa that we couldn't ruin the budget just for one night... we asked in that hotel if they knew of a cheaper hotel and they recommended the Hotel Atmaran but we would have to walk for a bit... we walked with our backpacks through the streets of Mapusa, sweating and not sure if we were in the right path to the hotel... we asked here and there and one guy ended up showing us the way on his motorcycle... the hotel looked very old and dirty but it was our only option at that time... we walked in and... FULL... we couldn't believe it... where would we find another hotel... we went back to the street and walked back to the direction of the bus stop... one guy saw us and asked if we needed any help.. we said we needed an hotel and he recommended Suhas Hotel. We walked to the streets that he had pointed and walked, walked, walked... but we couldn't find the hotel. It was close to midnight and shops were closing..  there was almost no one on the street... we found a shop and he pointed to the hotel, we could see the hotel signs but we couldn't see the entrance... we went around the building and heard some people singing.. we approached the window of a house and inside there were two Indian guys singing karaoke, around us we could see some rats.. we didn't want to interrupt but we needed help so we call them and asked for help.. the entrance was right next to us but we needed to go up the backdoor stairs to get in...this hotel was also very dirty and we couldn't stop thinking about the rats but we had no option and we stayed there for the night... we don't know how but we slept really well... and we were only 30km away from Arambol... 

Next morning we checked out and had a great shower  (yeah, I forgot to mention that we didn't shower for almost 3days...). We went straight to the bus stand and got a ticket to Arambol... only 30 ruppies and also 30 km... we were so close... it took 1h30 but the feeling of being so close was great... when the bus stopped we stepped out of the bus and we saw jungle.. pure jungle.. totally different from what we expected..  it looked like we were not in the Arambol Beach yet... we asked for some directions and walked through the jungle village with our backpacks.. we could feel the sun and the heat but the will to see the ocean didn't allow us to stop.. after some long steps through the palm trees, papaya trees, mango trees.. all trees...we reached a small dune.. we walked faster and there it was.. we had arrived to Arambol!!!

This was a looong journey, with ups and downs but at the end we consider it great... it is great to feel that we were able to reach where we wanted, even when things didn't go as we wanted.. it was nice to see us going through obstacles that would have made us stop one month and a half ago... and at the end the journey to Goa ended up being almost half the price... 2600 ruppies from Ahmedabad to Arambol compared to 4200 of the bus that was canceled that would drop us 60km away from Arambol... if we translate the amount to euros or to dollar it seems stupid... we are talking about $25 but when you want to live on a budget that makes all the difference... plus all the amazing experiences we had and the people we met...

...easier isn't always better...

:)