First Trip to Goa - Neel's Notion

I have been to Goa last weekend, though I missed the water sports there I can say that it was an awesome and relaxed trip.
We had no intention to go to Goa in July, we just booked the tickets as there was some sale from Spicejet 4 months before the trip.We have got the tickets for Rs.5000 (to and fro) per person, which I thought was a good deal. Though we know about the trip much ahead of time, we deliberately did not make any attempt to plan the trip. We wanted the trip to be a relaxed one and also want explore different things there. I just spoke to my colleague about the place and his experience in Goa. As per his suggestion we booked a resort in North Goa.

After reading many reviews I booked So My Resorts in Calagute. We got that at Rs.1300/night, the same room costs around Rs.3000/night during on season. My only worry after booking the resort was that it is 43 kms away from the airport and we are going to land in the airport at 11.30 pm. I was not sure if it is safe to travel 43 kms at 11.30 pm in an unknown place. My colleague told me that there will be no problem. I wanted to make sure that it is safe to travel at that time, so I asked my co-passenger the same thing. He told me that it is absolutely fine to travel at that time, Goa is a safe place.

We reached Goa around 11.45 pm and took a prepaid taxi, which says recognized by Govt.of Goa, in the airport. They charged Rs.900 to take us from airport to Calagute. We reached So My Resorts at 12.45 am. As we were very tired with the journey, we couldn’t do much but sleep.

The next morning, we had breakfast at So My Resorts. They served us Upma and Puri, which were ok. Then we went to Calangute beach by walk, we were there at the beach for 2.5 hours and we enjoyed it. I was desperately waiting for the water sports, but as it was rainy season there were not water sports. We walked along the beach to reach Baga beach where my friend had tried sea food. He didn’t like it at all, as they hadn’t cooked that properly. So one has to be careful when trying food there, its better to know where to eat before hand. We reach our resort by walk after that. The first thing we did after reaching the resort is hiring a bike. They charged us Rs.250 per day and asked for some ID proof. I thought this is a very good option as you can go wherever you want without waiting for public transport, which you have no idea about or hire a taxi, which might be expensive.

We freshened up and went to Infantaria to have lunch. The restaurant was not that crowded and seemed fine to us. I ordered vegetarian food and my friend ordered non-vegetarian. The server was very rude and also it took us long to get the food. Vegetarian was ok, I liked Veg. Manchurian there. But I stopped eating when I found an ant in Palak Panner. My friend who ordered Red Hot Chicken Wings was not at all satisfied and told that it was the worst Chicken he has ever tasted. In the evening we went to Anjuna beach and spent a couple of hours there.

The next morning we tried breakfast at So My Resorts, but we had to leave many things in the plate as the breakfast was terrible. The chutney they gave along with the idly looked like 5 days old and the bread was of a very low quality. So we had breakfast at Krishna restaurant beside the resort. The food there was great. Then we went to Aguda fort which is 10kms away from Calagute. The fort has two sections one is the upper fortress and the other one is the lower fortress. The lower fortress is near the Senquarium Beach. We spent 1.5 hours there at the fort and went to see the Aguda jail. Visitors are not allowed inside the jail, you can just go till the jail entrance. We were exhausted because of the humidity in Goa, so we wanted the go back to the room to relax for 15 mins.

While going back to the resort we saw Wagah Border restaurant about which I read in some reviews, so we wanted to try that. Ambience is good in Wagah Border, but they took very long to serve the food. Once the food has arrived all our anger about the delay has vanished as the food was very tasty. Then we went to see Basilica of Bom Jesus which is the oldest church in Goa. There is also a Portuguese museum opposite to it, there is nothing special about both but you can visit those just to know things about the Portuguese culture and architecture.

We went for the boat cruise at Panaji in the evening, which is Rs.250/person. The boat cruise was not that exciting. You can skip it. The next day morning we had breakfast at So My Resorts which was decent and again went to Calangute beach to spend a couple of hours. After spending 1.5 hours there we went back to the resort freshened up and went to the airport to take the flight in the afternoon. I suggest you have food somewhere before reaching the airport because the food at the airport is damn expensive.

On the whole, I loved Goa because of the beaches, climate and the fact that you can rent a vehicle and go anywhere on your own.