Yummymummy
we first went to Goa in November 1994, as far as I can remember it was the first year it had appeared in the main T/O brochures.
We stayed in Calangute, it had quite a lot of places to eat in but they were not very sophisticated.
There were only about half a dozen beach shacks around Calangute - no sunbeds at all.
No jewellery shops.

There was a ship beached near Fort Aguada (the far side of the harbour wall) at that time.

I'm not sure what your Dad's friend experienced before this, the North Goa we saw in 1994 could not in any circumstances be called 'touristy'.

Polly

Our first visit was 1990,and was very different then,We stayed in Candolim. top of Beach road was mostly local village houses, waste ground both sides very dark , from top to the bottom, HBR was there at the same place,Alexandas was there and i think maybe Teama all at the far end. bit further round the corner was the old Ava maria guest house and Cockerel plus a few more near the pond.
On the beach were maybe 5 or 6 shacks from beach road to the Taj, the main one being the original 21 coconuts .No sunbeds with straw umbrellas and metal fold up seats.
Shops were very limited,but a few beach sellers.
I remember the other ship that got washed up just on the rocks, was around 91 or 92 i think.
Restaurants were limited but good

Went to Palolem in Feb 1993...absolutely deserted . Only restaurant was Draupadi near the entrance which still exists. Nobody on the beach, except for fishermen bringing their catch in and a handful of foreigners. No hotel accomodation, no shops, no entertainment. All local purchase was done in Chaudi about 3 km's away on the main road. We stayed with a local family in exchange for my uncle rigging up his television antenna, they were the first to get television in the village! To be honest, I was just 15 and didn't really appreciate the whole "castaway" scene...what I'd do for that now!

Calangute, 20 odd years ago, was a very different place, the main street had only a quarter of todays buildings, lots of palm trees lined it, and all the out of state traders just put a sheet at the side of the road, and sold from there. No Tibetan market, there was, only eight tibetans selling jewelry, they used someones front garden, we still know one of the original ones, Shewang, who's still going strong. No roundabouts of course. Most people on packages were on a half board basis, the hotels I remember were the Alphaville, the Mira , the Falcon resort, the Onidas del Mar down Holiday Rd. and the one facing the chapel in the middle of the road, which has just changed its name. Towards Baga was the Ronil Beach. Lots of little b&b places for the backpackers and the remnants of the Hippies
Only a few eating places, Sousa Lobos on the beach, The hexagonal building which was called the Lobster Pot, just up from it, but is now a pure veg rest. then came Capricorn and that was about it. Along the Baga Rd was a super chinese place called Taste of China, which was actually someones house, you ate either on the porch, or upstairs on the flat roof.
One chemist, no supermarkets, no fake tee shirt shops, far fewer Indian tourists, hardly any beggers, some years a few shacks, some years no sunbeds (history might be repeating itself there)
A very different place, sadly missed I'm sure, by all of us lucky enough to visit in these long gone days Alan

I first went to Calangute in 1994. There was one shack at the bottom of Calangute steps and then about 3 more a good 10 minute walk to the right. There were about 5 or 6 little stalls down by the football ground which got chopped down by the police while we were there. Souza lobos, the lobster pot and Mr Caters were the 3 main restaurants by the steps....then the lobster pot closed down because someone murdered the owner. Souza lobos was so popular (and one of the only places to eat) that there was always a big queue outside. There was also a fab little bar/restaurant full of hippies down a side street across from the football ground ..I think it was called Petes. Brittos at baga was a small ramshackle shack with a few tables out on the sand and the Infanteria bakery was there but was a small place frequented only by locals and there was absolutely nothing around it. There was one chemist on Calangute main street and nothing further up beyond the fish market. We stayed on the Calangute/Candolim border roughly where the little church is in the middle of the road. We walked one night from our hotel to Calangute main street and the road was totally dark - no shops, hotels or people.....it was so quiet. 2 years after a Goan friend of ours took us to Agonda beach. There were no shacks and no people it was just the 3 of us all day. A couple of years later our friends brother (who was a budding entrepreneur)opened the chippie and the red lion pub...it was the first place to have pool tables and full of excited locals (same guy also owns plantain leaf)and when I went back the following year I didn't recognise the place it had changed so much.

Thats the hotel I was mentioning, we stayed in it once about that time, we had a room overlooking the church, no traffic much then to bother us, but the chapel bell about 6.00am, that was another matter !! Alan

It was called something like San Antonio resort then ???? it was very nice but at that time in the middle of nowhere !

Thats the one, I've been trying to remember its name, we stayed there a couple of times, we used to go down the road at the side all the way down to one of the only shacks that year, Sip and Dip, it was built on the owners land, so he could put out 10 sun beds, and you went down from there to the beach. I'ts unrecognisable now, all built up and tarmaced, and leads down to Fishermans shack among others Alan

First time we visited Goa was in 1984 and stayed at the Taj in Sinquerim and have visited almost every year sinced - sometimes for a few days or as much as 7 months.
Gramps if you remember the Lobster Pot do you remember the time when the owner - an ex policeman - murdered his wife in the kitchen during evening service and left her on the floor until someone found her the following morning. Still have the cutting out of the paper somewhere.
When I am at home will look out the photos of Calangute steps area taken in about 1989.
I forget the dates but one Christmas the police shut down all the beach shacks on Christmas Eve afternoon for reasons only known to them and they stayed shut until New Years Eve afternoon when they came to the beach and said they could now be opened. No food or drinks prepared for the evening so needless to say NYE was a damp squib. People who had just come for their holidays were openly crying when they came to the beach and the police informed us we could not take our own chairs and brollies to the beach or we would be arrested. What a rotten Christmas that was for people who had just come for the holiday season.

Sim1 & gramps
The hotel you're talking about was called Resorte de Santo Antonio.
We stayed there in Nov 1994 with Thompson, the hotel was graded as 1*.
There were elections at that time and the staff came round and took away all the beers out of our fridge until they were over.

We ate a few nights at a hotel/restaurant on the beach, turned left towards Candolim from the hotel. We used to sit with our feet in the sand and there was almost no light polution towards Fort Aguarda.
We didn't return to Goa until 2002 and things had changed so much.

Does anybody remember a shack called V-Spot?
It was run by a guy called Lorenco (Lawrence).

Sounds bliss.
So Calangute road was still busy like it is now?

Ah happy memories. beach road Candolim, I can only remember Teama down there in the early days, and the hotel opposite, rest was just wasteland. The cows used to congregate there to sleep at night. Used to be lots of little wild pigs running about, blooming scary if you stumble across one in the middle of the night.
Yes Calangute road was busy even then

yes we remember those huge queues for souzo lobos !! packed out and the rest of the place dark and quieT!! capricorn was there then though aswell but more seedy in those days! ahh they were the days eh
chilly

Am I right in remembering that in the early 90s there were only indian style toilets at souzo lobos or is my memory failing???

Dont recall them being "squats" Squigs, yes I remember the pich black walk over towards the Lobster Pot, Chilly, not keen on it at all then, as my phobia for rats took over every time. Just about there there was a grotty little drink place, I can never remember it's name, all the old dopeheads sat there, you could smell the "smokes" a mile away Happy days Alan

I drank too many honeybees in those days Gramps, memory must have gone!!!!

talking of which gramps one of my not so nice ... experiences of rats happened in souzo lobo all those years ago, we had gone there for dinner there was no outside seating and entertainment as such then and the power went every 10 minutes it seemed... but anyhow we looked up and there was the most enormous rat walking along the rafters above our heads...all evening he meandered, my friends hadnt been to Goa before and were pretty shocked (still love it now of course!! funny how you accept things!) ... I know there are many rats in Goa i see them all the time but that is a memory that stuck with me and my friends over the years.... so alien to us back then.. rats in a restaurant... well visible rooftop ones ..