Новогодние каникулы на Гоа 2011 январь New Year holidays in Goa 2011 January

January 16.2011 just returned from Goa from India. They flew away on the second of January and for 14 days. The hotel was taken by 4 * Holiday Inn Resort, although they say it has already been given 5 *. I chose for a very long time, read reviews, thought about Coconut and Majorda Beach, but it’s good that I didn’t choose them, because they are more modest (when we were driving tourists from excursions, we delivered a bus. We drove into the territory of the aforementioned hotels, ours was much better, judging by even at the reception and the entrance to the hotel). The Holiday Inn is excellent, I liked it, beautiful, big, not worse than the fives that we saw in other countries. The sea is very close, the area is green, large well-groomed, little white herons walked along the grass, crows fly a lot, they try to steal something from tourists at breakfast, but there is a specially transparent net hanging there so that the crows could not fly up. We took only BB breakfasts and it’s good, there are 5 shakes on the beach, local cafes where they have everything, they feed normally, you won’t get poisoned, fresh juices, grilled seafood, whatever you want and whatever you want, Indian cuisine is very diverse, better than Thai, not tired even for 2 weeks of stay. Breakfast at the hotel got tired at the end of the holiday, it seemed a bit poor compared to breakfast in hotels in Egypt and Thailand, everything seems to be there, but somehow there was not enough variety and the choice was small. Delicious tortillas in the tandoor with garlic and butter are cooked in necks on the beach, I even helped to record a video of how they cook. Now it is winter there, ripe fruits, very tasty, juicy pineapples, small bananas, some other exotic fruits, strawberries, not ripe mangoes, the season of oranges, tangerines and apples. On the first day they ate pineapples! Breakfast is as usual omelettes, fried eggs, bacon, pastries, fruits, juices, tea and coffee, local dishes are not spicy. In the necks, if you ask them not to cook spicy, they cook normally. We ate at Sam's (there is a very friendly atmosphere, sincerely, on the first day the owner of the cafe came to meet us, everyone speaks Russian, the menu is also in Russian), then we went to the Betty Shake to the right of the hotel at the exit to the beach (there is also good cook). Everywhere there is a menu in Russian, in the evening they went there for dinner, in the evening they put tables in the necks right on the sand near the sea, they put a candle on the table, well, romance, you sit and dine by the sea itself. The dishes in the necks are clean, although I constantly took antibacterial wet wipes for hands with me (I bought a lot at home) and antibacterial hand gel, although I noticed that they don’t change rag tablecloths on the table during the day. Chilled drinks are available. I really liked the shark meat, grilled large shrimp, vegetable salads, grilled royal fish with lemon. By the way, my favorite mojito is prepared perfectly! Arriving at the Goa Dabolim airport, we were a little upset when we saw a shabby little airport, this is the Goa military airport. Then, along the way, the surroundings were not entirely clear, because they arrived at night, their roads are like our 1.5 lanes in total, very narrow, continuous serpentine, a bunch of turns. I almost got sick, the hotel made me happy, very good, brightened up the poor of India. But then, having come to the sea, having walked, looking, we were amazed by the latitude and length of the beach strip, after a week of stay, we realized what the charm of Goa is, it is the beaches that are huge in length and breadth, where there is practically no one, complete solitude and unity with nature. Great! You can go for a walk along the beaches and meet all 3-4 people, but this is exactly the south of Goa, I don’t know how in the north and in the center, the beaches in the south are clean, we have Mobor beach, the sand is white, creaky, like on Karon beach in Thailand. Beauty !! ! We took a taxi from the hotel, the two of us went to the vaunted Palolem beach, arrived and realized that we were almost on the beach, like in Thailand, full of people, all the sunbeds are occupied, nothing special. In general, we did not appreciate the “beauty” of this beach, there is nothing like that there, our beach near the Mobor hotel is even better. And Palolem is built up entirely in cafes, in mini-hotel houses, some plywood houses 2 * 2 meters are rented somewhere for 2000 rubles. per day with breakfast, cleaning and a shared toilet, young people apparently like to live and hang out there. But it's definitely not for us. . Then we met two couples, also from Russia, and together we booked an excursion from Pegas Touristik for the whole day: Dudsagar Waterfall, where there were cute monkeys that you can feed from your hands, Spice Plantation, where we bought cinnamon, vanilla sticks, black pepper, turmeric, "laughing nuts" that grow on a palm tree, they can be chewed = 50 mg of whiskey, Elephant riding, Indian temples, Catholic temples are very ancient, on the way back we stopped in the capital of Goa, Panaji, there is a little shopping for an hour. The guide, who was from Pegasus, told so little and everything, nothing about the history and traditions of India, in general, the guide was uninteresting. But the trip will go for a change, and for a change of scenery, we looked around a bit how and what is in Goa. I didn’t say right away, but I’ll write that when you leave the hotel, across the road there is a minimarket where you can buy water, alcoholic drinks, and so on little things, there are jewelry stores where you can change money. From the hotel, about 15 minutes walk along the beach is the village of Cavelossim. Everything is there: pharmacies, shops, souvenir shops, cafes and restaurants. But we never ate there. . They didn’t dare to buy jewelry either, because they started asking the seller of one such shop specifically about the composition of gold, and he doesn’t really know chemistry at all, although he says that he creates his own jewelry. He names the sample, we ask him to decipher the percentage of metals, he really does not know. In this scenario, we did not buy. It is not known what they sell there, and what kind of gold, and whether it is gold! Money was changed in the same village in the D'mello pharmacy at a good rate of 1 dollar = 44.4 rupees (as I think), the best rate than in the hotel and in the shops opposite the hotel, it will be lower there. They also bought fruits: pineapples and bananas. And I also bought Lays chips in the store, they are different there, not the same as in Russia, very tasty. In the pharmacy there I bought coconut oil, hair oil. The water there in the hotel is very hard, so the first days I just didn’t know how to comb my hair, then I bought local oils, started using it and everything became fine. We also bought after-sun products, they are good there. Protective sunscreen 30-ku was brought from home, but it was not used. In Goa, the sun doesn’t bake much, it’s so gentle and warm. You can, of course, burn out if you lie under the sun all day, and then you won’t notice it right away, the sun is very gentle. All other days we spent on the beach enjoying the sun, the sea, the beach and excellent Indian cuisine. The sea there is not turquoise, dark blue-gray, but transparent, because of the sand it is suspended, because it’s shallow and shallow right away, you will go a little later already deep. The rescue group is very well organized there, every 100 m the rescuers sit and watch, a helicopter flies over the beach - they look, the "Guard of tourists" drives away the beggars. And so on our huge beach, only 2 hotels were Leela 5 * and ours, few people, 5 sheiks. The pool at the hotel may have swum a couple of times, the pool did not have enough sunbeds from time to time, and the sunbeds can be seen that they are no longer new. Towels fresh every day by the pool were taken by calling the room number. January 13-14 flew on a tour of the Taj Mahal. From Goa they flew to Mumbai, then to the capital of India, Delhi, from Delhi 5 hours to the city of Agra 250 km, but the bus was driving slowly due to their traffic jams. At first, when I read the reviews of other tourists on the sites, I didn’t understand why people were so negative about Pegas Touristik in India, we rested with them in Thailand and everything was fine. But in India, indeed, their vacation is not very well organized, I would rate it as satisfactory. Firstly, on the first big tour, no one warned us that we need to take swimsuits, because you can swim at the waterfall. Secondly, when traveling to the Taj Mahal, no one warned us that we were flying there through Mumbai yet, for us it was news only at the airport; no one said that Agra is the north of Goa and the temperature there is only 10 degrees in the evening, but we went in shorts and T-shirts, we just froze there, my husband caught a cold, we were in flip flops, it was so cold, the locals go in jackets there and hats and here we are half naked ; thirdly, the Pegasus manager assured us back at our hotel when he told us about the Taj Mahal tour that you can spend the night there in one of two hotels 3 * and 4 * and they are absolutely no different, only the price is 3 * -615 dollars per person trip , 4* - $640. The price includes air tickets, excursions, guide, meals, overnight stay at the hotel, entrance fees. We thought, well, since hotels are no different, then we went to 3 *. There is a 3 * Taj resort hotel in Agra (then we had something to compare with, our hotel and this one, there is no window in this three-ruble note, floor -1, everything is not very good, the water is hot only from 4 in the morning-tin), It’s good that good our tourists found pants for me, it's good that we had 2 warm sweaters. On the morning of the 14th, we arrived at the Taj Mahal complex, built in the name of love by one of the rulers of India in memory of his beloved wife, who died while giving birth to her 14th child. A very beautiful building, it fascinates, it is unimaginable how it was possible to cut out all this decoration from a layer of marble, the building is made of marble and semiprecious stones. Great! The Taj Mahal is one of the 7 new wonders of the world and is a UNESCO heritage. The control there at the entrance is very serious, you can only take a camera and money, water, food, paper, batteries, matches, lighters with you, inside only in shoe covers. We stayed there for 2 hours and flew back to Goa. All other days we spent at sea. We didn’t rent a moped, the traffic there is creepy and incomprehensible, very narrow roads, dangerous. The prices there are low, because the exchange rate of 1 rupee is approximately equal to 0.7 rubles. With seafood, it also seemed to us easier there than, for example, in Thailand, it’s not so expensive and everything is there. From drinks, very tasty freshly squeezed juices, in packs in stores, are also very tasty, not like ours. The rest was a success, great, we got the sea and the beach, fruits and seafood too, knowledge of history and the expansion of the worldview too, and a lot of impressions !! ! If you have any questions, write, I will definitely answer. Have a good holiday everyone!! !