We returned a couple of weeks ago, but life has been pretty hectic since with my husband having spinal surgery last week. Getting back to some kind of normality now so here goes:
Trip Report 18 Jan - 7 Feb 2010

I don't really know where to start so I'll start with the Flight. We flew Kingfisher via Mumbai, we were very apprehensive about the transfer from international to the domestic terminal but this was really straightforward and the Kingfisher staff were excellent. Plenty of legroom, good IFE and they really take good care of you so we will definitely do this again.

We stayed at the Nazri resort in Baga and it was everything we hoped it would be. Lovely hotel, beautiful pool area, large comfortable room and reasonably priced food and drinks. The staff were lovely - all very attentive without being intrusive.

We spent the first couple of days on Baga Beach getting acclimatized. The first shack we went to was far too near all the water sports with a strong smell of diesel in the air. Moved further along, nearer to Titos Road where we made ourselves very comfortable at the Skylark shack. Nice staff, really comfy clean looking beds - even complete with towels!
On Wednesday we went to Anjuna market, and as we liked the taxi driver we bit the bullet and booked him for a day out on Thursday. On that day we visited the Falls, did an elephant wash and visited the spice plantation. The highlight of the day was the elephant wash - great fun and we have some really memorable photos. Personally I would never go back to the falls, although a beautiful place there were hundreds of tourists scrambling all over the rocks far too many for safety. Certainly at least 20 times the amount of people I saw there in 1997.
We spent a couple of days at Xavier's shack - again really nice staff, good food and they provided buckets of water with a jug to keep your feet clean! The beds were very hard and lumpy through so after that all Baga beach days were spent at the Skylark.
One afternoon we braved a bus ride into Panjim and stood all the way, an interesting experience but we bottled out on the return journey and got a taxi back, Four hours into the city and all we bought was a bottle of Shower gel!

For other trips out we went to Ashvem Beach, Mandrem Beach, an overnighter to Khola beach (stayed in a Rajastani tent) and also a boat trip, which included snorkeling (but no visibility), lunch on Monkey beach and Dolphin spotting on the way back. Khola beach is beautiful but has lots of rocks although they had roped off an area without rocks for swimming. The funny side though is that when the tide went out our ‘swimming pool' went with it!

Resaturants - We ate at the following: Happy Days Baga, the Carvery at Candolim, Jamabalaya at Candolim, East Meets West Baga, The Phoenix Bar Baga, Domingos Baga, Pacci Baga, Poco Loco and Kim Faas Baga. The best by a mile was Kim Faas (ate there four times) closely followed by the Phoenix Bar. The worst was Domingos (so bad the waiter wouldn't even let us pay for drinks) and Poco Loco (very expensive and nothing like any Mexican food I've ever seen before). Pacci was interesting - an Italian restaurant where they didn't have most of the things of the menu so we ended up with Pizza!
As you can probably guess from the above list we had many evenings listening to Blues mania (from TA)and his lovely daughter Emily. The three times we went to the Carvery at Candolim we met many of the members from HT - we were made to feel most welcome and spent the evenings in some excellent company. Thanks to Chilly and the gang for their hospitality, interesting conversation and some good laughs.

To sum up. We had an absolutely terrific holiday, the weather was perfect and we met some truly wonderful people. This was my fourth trip (with a gap of ten years since the last time) and my friend's first trip to Goa. Yes there are lots of changes and not all for the better. The big plus for me was better beds on the beach, more choice of continental places to eat and ooh the toilets (the improvement there is incredible).
Would we go back again? Too true - for me Goa still has it's magic and my friend having discovered it wants to sample it again.

... and chilly if you read this - a gentle reminder about sending me a link to your blog