Not that you can tell, though there are more Indian families here than there have been during the week.
Last night, we just walked up and down the beach after dinner and chilled with a beer in a bar further up. There are a lot of dogs (and cows) on the beach, all of them pretty friendly and well-fed from the restaurants. The place we popped into also had a puppy, one of only two I’ve seen. It turns out, it’s an import from Mysore. An Iranian girl had adopted it there and is now staying in Goa until the pup is old enough to be vaccinated so she can take it home!
The dogs have one serious downside – at dawn they all start barking and howling like rabid coyotes. On and off for an hour. It doesn’t matter where you stay on the beach, you’ll pretty much certainly get awoken by dogs at around 6:30am.
Today we ran out of cash money as well. If you checked out the tips page, you’ll have spotted one which mentioned getting a Nationwide account if you’re in the UK as they don’t charge a fee for ATM withdrawals. You may also have spotted one which says you should check ATM availability.
Palolem has exactly zero ATMs. This means we had to resort to using a cash advance service from one of many places on the main street. As it turns out, this was remarkably reasonable with only a 2% charge being levied for the withdrawal. It’s treated like a purchase, so you may even find that your bank doesn’t charge a fee.
The way we’re working things is that Hans is paying for our Bhutan trip next month. I’m withdrawing all the cash from holes in the wall as I pay no fees for it, and what Hans spends he knocks off the amount I’ll send him via PayPal once he’s paid for Bhutan. That way as little of our money as possible goes out on bank fees.
Aside from that, I’ve just downloaded a few files and I’m going to try to spruce the blog up even more! So here I am, sat by the beach, waves crashing, chilled Coke next to me and tapping on a laptop making this site better.
I don’t need to get a life. This is the life!
Late on in the evening, after the usual run and lukewarm shower, Caroline, Hans and I wandered up the beach for dinner. We settled on a place near where we started out sunbathing a couple of days ago simply because it was busy. Too busy to get a table! As luck would have it, the couple from two doors down were sat there and they squooshed some chairs around so we could sit with them.
Having said that, I ended up sat at the bar with a chef called Ian watching the ManUre game on the TV. Towards the end of the match, a young lady was standing next to me asking the bar staff if they had another stool so I offered her mine. We got chatting for a couple of minutes as the game was getting a little dull and she said she was waiting for a friend. Then, looking over my shoulder she saw the friend – it was Shauna!
Glad to say she’s looking a lot better than she was, though by her own admission she’s not got back to the whole “eating” thing yet.
After a while, they wandered off for a gossip and I got talking to another girl called Leigh, who I’d actually seen a few times on the beach and in other bars. It’s a small place, Palolem!
I walked Shauna “home” (she’s moved to another block of apartments), got talking to a Swiss guy at the bar for another hour and then wandered home with Hans and the others. That should have been the end of a good night, but the couple at the other end of our row were up drinking with a couple of their friends. Over the next four hours, people came and went and we burned the early morning oil till around 4:30.
If this is what Saturdays are like here, I can understand why people stay for so long!
