Our first three hour flight from Kota Kinabalu to Kuala Lumpa was pleasant if uneventful. We were both quite impressed by Kuala Lumpa's flashy geometric-patterned wooden roof on the international terminal. I think that it possibly qualifies as the only vaguely attractive piece of airport architecture that we have encountered on our entire trip.
From Kuala Lumpa we had three more hours to reach the incredibly huge shopping mall that is Bangkok airport. We then had our final seven hour flight from there to Mumbai. The big last flight had enough films and House episodes to keep me and Clairy entertained for the whole journey. We were quite savagely pooped when we arrived at Mumbai at nine in the evening. Due to the time differences it had been a very long day of mainly not doing very much in Airports. I am always amazed at just how feckin knackering that can turn out to be.
Our arrival into Mumbai was amazingly painless. We were both pleasantly surprised with the ease with which we got through immigration. The arrivals area wasn't nearly as hectic as I had envisaged. There was a tiny moment of panic when we realised that there wasn't an ATM anywhere nearby, but our combined collection of random currencies almost exactly covered the cost of a pre-paid taxi into the city.
The fact that we arrived quite late in the evening meant that the only flights available to Goa were for the next morning, and we had spent some time in Borneo trying to book a place for the night that sounded half decent over the internet. It had actually been a total mission. Accommodation prices in Mumbai have rocketed in recent years and anything near the airport had been insanely priced. In the end we found a place that was in the Fort area near the huge and impressive Chhatrapati Shivaji train station and various other majestic Victorian buildings.
The taxi took about an hour to reach our hotel. The roads were very busy and the apparent total lack of road safety as we know it, or any kind of fear became immediately apparent. We had been told that the journey back to the airport could take up two and a half hours with the daytime traffic. We then found out the the Mumbai marathon was on the next morning and half the city's main roads would be closed. It was going to be an early start.
The Residency Hotel was a little pricey but was immaculately clean and had decent beds. This was exactly what we needed and we crashed out immediately. The next morning we had a tiny wander to get our bearings and to check out the marathon outside our front door. I think it was actually a half marathon, and like these events in the UK it seemed to mainly consist of enthusiastic company employees running together. Our waiter at brekky assured us it was a competitive event as well with lots of international entrants. It was just the smog and the heat put me off having go.
In fact, despite all the road closures and traffic our speedy-Gonzales taxi driver had us at the domestic airport in insanely fast forty minutes, meaning we had yet another morning of hanging around in an airport. It was fine though and we were soon on our way to Goa with the seriously good value Jet-Lite airways.
Clairy snapped a couple of pics the extremely smoggy Mumbai cityscape as we flew out. Nice day for a marathon!
On arrival into the tiny Goan airport, we were met by hordes of people. One of them was our bestest friend Caper who we had come to see. Fortunately he stuck out quite well not just due to his sensibly purchased Aussie sun hat, but also for his pasty white British winter tan. Capes had organised a taxi for us back to the apartment he had rented for a couple of weeks in Palolem.
It was blood lovely to see such a familiar face after such a long time away. Capes had done us well proud with the apartment, hiring a little sound system for it, getting some Christmasy lights up around the place, and filling up the fridge not just with the essential beverages, but also with various little luxuries that we hadn't seen for our entire time away. There was cheddar cheese from home, pickled onions, Marmite, Coleman's English mustard. We were in heaven. What a total legend!
There was a lot of catching up to be done, and that first night we didn't make it out to see Palolem until the sun was well down. We took a wander and I was definitely surprised at the scale of development. It was all quite basic, mostly beach shack type accommodation. It was wall to wall though, all the way along the large stretch of beach, with restaurants lining the waterfront. They all had made quite an effort with lighting, and I was quite pleased to find that each one wasn't pounding out a different trance tune, but I can see where the Glastonbury festival-by-the-sea label comes from.
It was very pleasant and we had the first of many lush Goan meals on the beach.
The next day we explored the beach. It was seriously hot in the sun, but I found it a much drier and more bearable heat than Borneo.
Clairy took some great snaps.
They sky is an incredible colour in these pics, for a few days afterwards though it was much hazier.
We stopped for a bite to eat (well, me and Caper did anyway...poor Clairy's meal didn't turn up...boo), and watched this lad with a drum set up a quick tight-rope apparatus as his little sister hopped up and glided back and forth.
A familiar sight. These chaps are everywhere. They were all over the beach and were poking around and seemingly munching on cardboard on every rubbish pile. I even saw one licking a surprised looking chubby tourists sweaty arm. Mmmm...salty.
Check out that carved front door.
The apartment had been fairly recently renovated and they were in the process of working on the one above. There was a vague idea that we would be able to move to the more airy first floor when it was finished, but it was only finally ready on the day Caper was leaving. We ended up thinking the landlord was a tad cheeky, using the option of moving us as an excuse to carry on banging away while we were there, but he did give a Caper a free night at the end in compensation.
We headed into the nearest small town Chaudi, to stock up from the offy. Caper purchased a nice set of steel food containers while Clairy took this shot of us outside.
Slightly bedraggled rice paddies absolutely stuffed with egrets.
Chilling out in the apartment. Caper not only bought us over tasty delights, but he also had cards and pressies for my 30th birthday and a couple of bits for the lady. It was super nice to have some family photo's tucked in the cards from home.
A smouldering Clay-pole.
This was a personal favourite, the Cuba restaurant.
Slight serial-killer expression from me here, sorry.
That's almost the same look as well...freaky.
A prettily lit tiny church on the way home.
The next day we grabbed an auto-rickshaw to take us to the next major beach north of Palolem called Agonda.
Oh hi!
Agonda was much more low key than Palolem, and as a result felt a bit cleaner too.
Me and Caper went for a swim.
Capes provided some quality entertainment when his super cheap Goan trousers practically dissolved on him in the water, requiring me to procure a sarong to protect his modesty. He then managed to somehow put it on in the water only to find that it turned out to be just as transparent as his barely there trousers.
Capes had also purchased a set of padda tennis style bats for us to play with. Naturally we were utterly rubbish at it, but we persevered. I do think in this shot below I'm almost swan-like in my graceful athleticism.
Furry wet beast.
Burn baby burn.
Quite a lot of the bars had dubiously knocked up second (and even third in one instance) storeys sort of lashed on top of them. I found these quite fascinating and dragged Clairy and Caper up a number of seriously wobbly staircases for a quick drink.
There was a bit more of a breeze higher up so it was nice and cool in the shade.
The retirement look.
Back in the network of tiny trails between the guest houses in Palolem Clairy took some pics of the communal well...
...that sometimes gets used as a rubbish bin.
There were lots of healthy looking piggies despite the detritus they were running around in.
More tidy crops.
Our very brief stop in Mumbai hadn't really been much of an introduction to India, and Palolem felt like something different again. The beach was full of businesses but it didn't feel quite like there was enough tourism at the moment to sustain the vast amount of people who's livelihoods depend on it. Most of the beach shack accommodation seemed pretty empty.
One of the main reasons for this is the government's crack down on unauthorised parties by banning any loud music outside of private venues from 10pm until 6am. The enforcement of this has apparently been quite enthusiastically undertaken by the local police resulting in a fair amount of smashed PA equipment. When this legislation came in in 2006, the full moon (and pretty much any other excuse) parties were stopped and nearly 200 'illegal' businesses in Palolem were bulldozed by the authorities. It was hard to believe that this had happened just 2 years earlier as every tiny space seemed to have already been filled with some new enterprise. Combined with the Mumbai attacks though, it has obviously heavily reduced the number of visitors to the region.
Palolem, although a little empty and so developed, still retained a certain charm, and I could imagine what it could have looked like 30 years ago before the toll of intensive tourism. This wasn't to be the case for some of the places we would be heading to.
2 comments:
lovely, good ol'caper, really glad you're in inja for some reason, can't wait to here about the madness that will probably turn up. does it feel like you're closer to poverty there or are you both well seasoned to that now? love you both, jepper. x
Oh god! Just brilliant to see you altogether. Can't wait for Capes to come home so we can hear all about it. The beaches look fabulous, was the sea a bit iffy as Clairy didn't swim. We have just slithered back from the pub on incredibly icy roads! Just think of that; we are having such a cold, cold winter. Love you xx
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