Hi, i think we are going to give Goa a miss for a couple of years.

We are a young family and i have only been to 5 places outside of the UK, so we are trying somewhere new.

Going to Cyprus for a week this summer, leaving the little one at home with grandparents, then planning Egypt for summer 2009.

Maybe we will be back in Goa in 2010, im not too sure.

I have to say when I was there in nov we were in candolim ..there was some trees and rubbish at the side of the road and with in days it was gone ......they had big holes by the side of the road and again with in days they were filled in ..everyone said hello good morning how are you ..yes the ladies asked every day come look at my shop I just say no thankyou as for the taxi men I dont even look at them or answer them they are just down right rude ...two can play that game .......candolim it is for me all the time .colleen

well i went for the very first time over christmas and new year and to be honest i wouldnt go back, the thing that put me off the most were:

1. indian men wandering up and down the beach gawping and taking photos of anything in a bikini. and the pervs on the beach masquerading as massage specialists

2. the unbelievable hard sell from taxi drivers to shop owners, to beach sellers and beggars

3. not been able to walk down a street without hastle from traffic

4. dirtyness, litter, hygeine etc.

The whole of candolim kind of reminded me of an eastern version of blackpool, everyone selling the same old tat, all they need were kiss me quick hats

On the plus side however the weather was great, the food was very cheap (also i go compylobacter from contaminated chicken was was ill for two weeks after i came home), and the people were generally quite friendly.

I know you arrived shortly before I left Colleen and stayed at Prazeres too. The rubbish, fallen trees outside the temple were there the whole time we were there as were the road works all the way up the main road.

colleen i am the same as you, i know its rude but i get the dark glasses on and just completely ignore them and keep walking, even when they say hello how are you today on the beach, you know that they are only going to sit down and try to sell you something!! as i say to my other half i dont come all this way to get pestered!!
the hassle is the one thing that makes me not want to go back

Lukey,

Seems to be that more and more people are getting campylobacter from chicken, going back 20 years or so most people I knew who went to India would not eat meat. Maybe standards are slipping. I got it last year and boy I NEVER want to get that again!!

Back on topic...

I'd go back again but it's a case of weighing up the pro's and con's. I'm making these points on the assumption that Goa is supposed to have a tourist infrastructure and is not really India.

Pro's

1 Relatively cheap assuming you know what the 'right' price is.
2 Weather

Cons

1 Rip-Off Factor ever increasing
2 Hard Sell
3 Filth/Hygiene
4 Blackpool factor (certain areas)
5 Dangerous Traffic
6 Pollution

All the 'Cons' could of course be addressed by the Tourist board.

I doubt I will be back next year, this will be mainly due to having a new kitchen fitted, but I am having 3 weeks in March and will be seriously assesing Goa as a future destination. The comments from regulars who have visited this year are syaing that it is getting much more of a hassle as if it wasn`t bad enough before. Many times I have sat down with my beach seller friends in Vagator and tried to explain a more reasoned approach to selling their stuff such as ask politely,sell something that somebody wants and different from the other sellers, never touch people and tell people that if they would like anything, please come and see me. They will do this with me, but as soon as a white body lands on the beach it is like a free for all. I am very thick skinned after travelling through a good part of India in the past so it doesn`t bother me at all, with the exception of taxi drivers.

Taxi drivers have got to be the worst thing in Goa, so much so that I have considered having some little Dick Turpin masks made up, I will tell the drivers that they are the latest fashion in London and hand them out to them. A little British `in` joke , that would be very funny

I saw most the things that have been mentioned last year. You can also address them yourself.

Ignore rude people
Only eat vegy or seafood
Stay in the south or travel to better beaches further north.

Still love it.

Will let you know my 08 opinion come march.

maybes i was just too naive when i booked for goa imagining an authentic cultural destination, funny thing was, i noticed a lot of the tack up for sale inthe shops had made in china stickers on them.... how bad is that.

at the end of the day goa is the blackpool of india so i should have expected it really.

I cannot see myself going back, I have seen a few reports on here about people being ill when back. I was very ill was having to go to hospital several times to be put on drip, turned out I had salmonella and "an unidentified bacteria infection". I was ill for 3 weeks and lost nearly 2 stone, I was only 8 and a half stone before! Also as previously said I got tired of the constant harassment off the Indians taking photos of me and my children, some the cheek even asked to take them! Then they do stop at end of sunbed and gawp, if they that desperate to look at women they should get the sun paper and look at page 3! It was predominately worse on Sundays, we ended calling it pervy sunday. And then you see locals weeing and the other in the street! Even in blackpool no one does that in broad daylight
!

Apparently i was told that these werent the local goans but indians from other parts who come into the region as the rules of alchohol consumption are not as stringent. We were given a flyer by a fellow holiday that she had come across which openly advertised weekends away in goa with the thrill of being able to see the naked european ladies.

My wife didnt seem that bothered but myself and my son were enraged a lot of the time, she couldnt get off the sunbed without a gang of men standing staring at her on the, and your right sundays were worse, i assumed that was because it was a weekend.

We even had people stop at the end of the sunbeds and attempt to strike up a conversation under the excuse of gawping at my wife, this nearly came to blows a couple of times. Whilst i understand that we are in their country and they are not used to seeing women dressed down but surely there is a limit to the levels that some of the men will go too just to try and get a thrill.

Apparently the photos are to take back home to show off to their friends, some of them will even ask if they can take a photo of themselves next to you, the worst thing is that some of the women were so gullible they actually let them...
and as for men openly urinating in the street, thats another story......

You are right there lukey, you would think as there are police on the beach they would do some action against these men. On numerous occasions i was asked for my photo, I ended up shouting and telling them where to stick their camera/phones. On a few occasions when I saw them trying to take a photo I threw my towel over me, and also a friend who was bigger than me I hid behind her lol.

Yes roxey the trees were outside the temple but dont forget i was away for almost 6 days to the taj mahal so by the time I got back it was all gone .......roxey did you see the big monkey out on the road outside the prazaras or even the ones that run over the roof of the hotel we saw them they were so funny

Slightly OT.

Noticed that there are a few posts about Salmonella/Campylobacter. It looks like we all should go back to the rules of travellers from a good few years back as it seems nothing has changed in the last 20 years regarding food hygiene in India. Maybe there is not much information given to those incomers who work in restaurants/hotels. Since Indians are predominantly Hindu (although Goans are RC & Hindu) and do not eat meat maybe it's a case of stick to veg' .... or fish.

Anyway I'd go back but a bit frightened I get Campylobacter again as I think it would hospitalise me next time.

Well it's not a case of would we go back, we will definitely go back as we have already booked for Christmas 2008, however I will take note of people's comments and observations of this season when we are there in March.

Debs

We,ve been going for about 20yrs or so but we've decided that one visit will do next year, and after that who knows
It's always been a struggle to get to Goa from the likes of Scotland and the added time and cost to get down to link up with flights from Manchester or Gatwick bumped up the price. Now we use Emirates from Glasgow via Dubai & Mumbai
We always overlooked the Monarch flights, spartan rooms, hard beds and the rest to enjoy the warmth of the welcome from the people and some wonderfull local foods and sights
It all started to change a few years ago, getting a taxi became a task rather than a delight, the beach sellers became more insistant, prices went up yearly (400 Rps for an untrained rub with oil !) and so on
The visiters started to change too wanting different things, it seems looking at the favourite eating places lists, that fillet steak and the likes is what most people are looking for, and cider and Bacardi Breezers to wash it down. I,ve no problem with that,you pays your money, but it seems a long way to come for that.
Some Restuarants, to name 1-95 for one, seem to me, to be charging way way over the odds, when you see the price of the local produce in the markets, and know the wage the catering staff and waiters are paid, someone is exploiting the customers big time.
This season seems to have been a bad one and the visa hassle alone does'nt explain it, the Goan answer, put up all the prices seems to be their solution, a tactic more likely to worsen the situation than improve it
We're off for our second visit in 10 days and will spend some time out of Goa seeing some more of India, I'm afraid Goa is getting less and less like what we fell in love with all those years ago every visit.
Alan

I didnt see a big monkey Colleen, used to watch the little ones running over the roofs early morning funny little things.
I feel disloyal moaning about a place that I do love, I can't imagine never going there again but I too don't like the Blackpool 'feel' . Having said that I love Blackpool in England, just dont need it in Goa. Problem is they think they are giving us what we want. I dont want English Breakfast, Roast Dinners, real Fish and chips mushy peas, Karaoke etc.etc. I don't want big screen sports TV, HP sauce or Branston Pickle, but lots of people do so is what we get.

Must agree the spell has been broken
The Goa we once loved has lost its charm its always been dirty in places but the places are now everywhere also the beggers are starting to touch and wont take No for an answer Even outside a shop or a bar there there so upsetting when they push a baby in your face
When we first went the shack owners use to make sure the beggers left you alone not this time and we went to many shacks and bars
Hopefully they will learn the lesson and realise that lThailand has recovered and is now No1
winter destination
Ive booked the MD for jan 09 Taking our grand daughter hope itll be great

Ok,this is my take on things.The majority of people on this forum seem to go to the Baga/Candolim belt and they are the one's saying how Goa has changed for the worst.If you speak to people who come to Goa but go elsewhere you might find a different story.The south has changed,but not alot it is still Goa as it was 10 years ago.To be honest i realy don't understand why tourists go to North Goa it is more like a Spanish Costa before they decided to clean up their act a few years ago.The one thing i will agree on is that the locals are getting greedier and we have told them ,that but they are so oblivious to it that i don't think that will change now.

Goa is still here but try and find it.

John