Mark's World Tour 2007-08

Friday 21st December

The hut in which I am staying is less shaded that the one in Agonda, so it hot up quicker in the mornings, making it less comfortable to lie on later than 10am. Which is a great pity, I do like a snooze. However, I don’t feel overly guilty about the desire to sleep in, having had more than a few early starts since my trip began, so I feel like I deserve to get up when I want. But that’s what it takes to be a beach-bum. It’s tough at times.

I got a bit of a burning at the beach during the day, my sunscreen clearly having come off as I lay on my towel over the course of the day. Best to keep reapplying the cream, I suppose. Later in the evening, Pete, Conor, Jamie and I went for dinner in a place at the end of the beach where the guys had stayed the last time they were in Goa in 2005. They obviously knew the owners from before, while we were also met by a friend of Conor’s from London.

Dinner was pre-ordered before we arrived and after a considerable wait for the food to arrive, it didn’t stop arriving for about 2 hours: prawn pakoras, masala prawns, stuffed calamari, fried cabbage, naan bread, yet more prawns, fried shark, salad, rice, and even a plate of chips made it onto the table. We didn’t finish it all but not through a lack of trying. We took a break for a while to play the brand new game of night-frisbee on the beach. It didn’t really work to well, as you might imagine, despite the moonlight above us. This small bit of exercise helped work some extra space for us to fit a pancake in, and this rounded off a wonderful feast. There wasn’t any other word for it.

The best thing for me was that it was cooked by the family who ran the place: father, mother, daughter, and son. It was cooked in the same way as they would prepare for their own plates. It was unlike anything else I had tasted in India or other parts of Goa. The company was very good and we were made to feel very welcome, so it turned out to be a very enjoyable night.