The Beach

May be the name of the post sounds more like an "Hollywood" movie but I didn't find a more suitable name for this. We had this plan ever since we reached Pune but couldn't manage to squeeze some precious hours in to our calendar for this. Finally, it happened one day... We got in to the bus to Goa. It was my first travel in a "sleeper" bus. I was quite impressed by the "innovation" they have done to help us stretch our legs during our long journeys. We got in to our "rooms" and quickly we slipped in to deep sleep. We got up in the morning hearing the people getting down for a quick "break". It was raining heavily almost as in Kerala. It was different from the showers we used to see in Pune. In Pune, I haven't seen continuous rain of more than 30 minutes. It is always like the leaders before the election. They promises a lot but deliver very few..

We were told, we had to get down at Panjim, even though we had booked the tickets to Margao. From there the travels will arrange another vehicle to reach our destination. It was around 8.30 on a Friday morning. I could see the people going for their daily business. I silently wondered..how I managed to go to office and school during monsoons. It is a mystery to me how monsoon strikes Kerala exactly on reopening day of the school which was in sharp contrast to the Indian Railways of yesteryears. To be fair, Indian Railways has improved a lot these days. You cant hear the announcement of trains running late for 1 or 2 days these days.

Suddenly my phone rang, it is Gince, who will be joining us in Goa during our three day "relaxation" trip. We had actually planned for this kind of trip immediately after his marriage almost a year ago. But always we use to blame our "busy" schedule and kept on postponing the plan. I attended the call. He told train is on schedule and will be reaching Margao on right time. Still it was raining heavily and we could see the boards on the road side saying "PANJIM". After some time, the bus stopped and we got down collected the baggage and went to the travel agency office. There were 2 more young gentelmen whose tickets were for Margao. So travel agency arranged a cab for four of us. After around 30-40 minutes we reached Margao railway station. It is supposed to be the gateway to one of the most crowded tourist spot in India - Goa but the station was full of mud and water.  To make it worse, I felt number of stray dogs inside the station outnumbered the passengers waiting for the train. That sight made me think about the Indian bureaucracy. I think India has a very dubious distinction that it can boast one of the most efficient private sector and at the same time one of the most inefficient public sector. But even though they are opposite in that direction, both competes in the case of corruption.

Finally the wait was over, the famous "Rajadhani Express" from Trivandrum to Nizamuddin came ..surprisingly.. slightly hesitatingly.. We met Gince and Indu. Its been a while since we had seen them but they were perfectly the same except he has gained some weight. Indu greeted us with a lovely smile and Gince as usual was having that mysterious aura.

Hotel had arranged our pickup and was taken to the hotel. From the first look, Hotel was grand and impressive. They received us with the welcome drink and took us to our rooms. Rooms were not having a luxurious look but the sight of the sea from the balcony compensated it to an extend. We got ready and went to our lunch hall. Even though the buffet was having different variety of dishes, there were no sea food dishes. One of the reason we chose Goa was for seafood and other obviously was --BEACH. Unfortunately we were not able to eat any traditional Goan sea food dish in the entire length of our stay. After a heavy lunch, we went to our rooms, played cards for some time and then had a quick nap for about an hour. Then we went to the private beach of that resort. It was a beautiful sight. Even though, the "girls" want to see the "sea" more closely, we "boys" were not in that mood. After enjoying the beautiful sight and counting the waves we returned back. After a quick shower we went to "Attrium" - the bar which is one of my favorite places to visit in any resorts. We thought of tasting the traditional feny and ordered a cocktail called Blue Goa and the girls drank Hawaii Passion. After gossiping for some time, it was time to have dinner. Dinner had more choices than lunch. Even though we went to the Disc after the dinner, since there were not much "activities" we returned back quickly.  After a long day, we were so tired and slept instantly.

The next morning, after the breakfast, we went to Colva beach and did some street shopping. The cab driver was a man named Lorenz. He asked us where are we from and when I said, we are from Kerala, he shared the experiences during his prime years when he was a football player. He told us that he had many friends from Kerala and he used to play in many places in Kerala. I could see different emotions on his face. Some times he shows a proud face when saying about Football but I felt mostly it was a feeling that he spend his life for football but didn't achieve anything. At that moment, the footballer inside me decided to give a good tip to him but later other part in me prevailed and had to limit my generosity to 100/-. One very rare thing happened in this short trip when considering my phobic nature especially to height, water and speed. I DID JET SKIING. If any one says i did it in river and it should have been done in sea, the answer from me will be I DONT CARE.

We returned by the time to have lunch and then in the evening went to the beach. We had a great time in the beach. This time may be two bottle of wine had some impact on us. We did went closer to sea. We were fully wet this time and had to taste the saltiness of sea water lot of time. After spending 2-3 hours we came and had some drinks and then dinner. Since we were too attracted with that beach, we went again after the dinner. It was a different kind of mood. We just laid down on the beach chaises totally relaxed. The cool breeze was hitting straight on us. That was one beautiful way to relax. At around 11pm we returned back to our rooms. And that was going to be our last night in Caravela Beach Resort.  By next day morning 11.30 we checked out. Train to Kozhikode was at 1.30 PM. So we went to railway station, said good bye to Gince and Indu. From there me and Chithra went to visit the Basilica of Bom Jesus and a nearby by museum. The basilica holds the mortal remains of St. Francis Xavier. It also contains interactive show about the life of St. Francis Xavier.

We got in to our return bus at 8.15, slept nicely and reached by 6.30 in Pune. When looking back, we enjoyed every moment. This was the perfect weekend getaway we were looking for. Even though the resort was grand, food was amazing.. the stand out thing was the time we spent on Beach. Hence ..This post is named as THE BEACH.