This is our, my and my wife Tiina's Trip Report from period from Christmas Eve to 13'th of January 2010. Pictures that tell the story you find at:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mustlane/sets/72157623228693110

We travelled to Goa via Delhi and Mumbai. When started planning our trip I had no idea that the Hotels would be fully booked as early as in the end of the October. Only expensive ones were left and we decided to get by with simple accommodation. We phoned to Goa and booked the Guesthouse of our stationary Beach Shack. It was called Pinewood Guesthouse and I would definitely NOT recommend it to anybody. The rooms were basic, without A/C but as complimentary we found large assortment of different sizes of Cockroaches. Biggest ones with the size of matchbox and as I was the stronger part of our team, I had to execute them. I was busy, no danger of going out for "one more", till late night. OK, it was not as bad but close .
The lower part of the shower room wall had its best days of its existance in previous century and now the wall was simply rotten.
The Committee of the holiday in persons of me and my wife gathered and decision was made: "the accommodation is for sleeping at nights and all disadvantages of our rooms will/cannot spoil our vacation!" And it didn't.
Christmas was quieter than we expected, New Years Eve was the opposite way ie.more crazy I ever imagined that it can be. It is not the urban legend that there are about million people coming to Calangute for celebrating the New Year. I tried to calculate the people (I took roughly number of people per 10X10m, length of the 3 Beaches and approximate width of the Beach) I got a result of 700-800 000 people!!! The fireworks were long and miraculously beautiful. People were friendly and happy. When Tiina danced with one of our Indian friend, about 150 - 200 people gathered to watch and to applaud. I teased Tiina later that it was her biggest moment of glory - she had never given a show to such a big audience and possibly never will.

As two previous holidays had been a lot of travelling, we decided to have a relaxing beach holiday this time. And this was exactly what we did - we relaxed till we were tired of having leisure time.
We had booked a Dwarka for two nights (please look at the pictures at web address above and their homepage http://www.dwarkagoa.com ). This is not a cheap place but it's worth visiting. In the beginning of January the price was Rs 2000.- per person per night, all meals included. We booked two nights and were happy that we did. It is amazingly beautiful place and huts did have all the luxury we did miss at our Guesthouse in Calangute. No A/C of course but everything else earned top rating.
The power was supplied by generators and a hint to possible visitor - take the flashlight with you because at two o'clock at night the power will be switched off and next time you will see artificial light is about six o'clock in the next evening. Charging the batteries of laptop or other equipment can be done only at night.
There is beautiful lagoon with nice refreshing water and as long as you do not ask, where wastewater and toilet goes, everything is perfect.
Beach is quiet and nice and if you are lucky, you can spot kingfisher flying, dolphins playing early in the morning and black faced monkeys on the trees.

As a summary - we spent there two full, one half day and we were satisfied, missing a little the action of Calangute, on third day.
I will not specify but all the signs starting couple of days earlier showed that something bad was going to happen.
Driving back from South Goa it happened. Local taxi driver offered us his services to take us back to Calangute. We started our journey and had been driving about a half a hour. I was busy with my camera and when I raised my eyes I saw that the bus was standing in a bus-stop and we were heading directly 70 km per hour to it. Only thing I had time to do was to cry "stoooop!"
Driver raised his eyes from mobile phone and tried to avoid the bus. My corner of the car hit the back of the bus. When I opened my eyes I saw a broken windshield about 10cm from my eyes. My face had smashed into it and I was all in blood. My first thought was - my legs?! Below my chin everything was ok and after asking I understood that Tiina on the back seat was OK and so was the driver. I was strapped into the car and some men started to cut and press the door to open. Car was totally demolished and it took some time. When they finally got me out of the car, the ambulance was waiting. God bless the man who invented the seat-belts "¦ we all had them on and it saved my/our lives.
In government hospital they put the stitches, 4 inside and 3 outside of my nose, disinfected the wounds and to the police station we went. All treatments free of charge, pennies to pay for pills.

To cut the long story short- the doctors were professionals, and my decision that a small accident will not spoil our holiday, made it possible to request on a third day that they would remove my bandages. Doctor doubted mu mental wellbeing but after checking the injuries, she agreed. It must be your strong will that made these wounds to heal so well and quickly, she said.
In the same day I went to swim in the ocean. And"¦ people get punched on the nose every other Friday in Discothèques and it does not keep them away from the places.

You can look the pictures of me in bandages at address above and laugh .. I will not be offended because I did look funny and I laugh at them myself .
On 15'th of February I go to surgery to correct my nose.
After that extreme event everything went as expected and we enjoyed our stay in Goa fully.
Wish you all well and "¦.
- keep away from mobile phones when driving
- keep your seat belts fastened
Argo