Goa Retrospective 4: Being in Beni!

After our fifty nights in Palolem it was time to move about  35 km north to Benaulim. This would be our third stay there - and with a bit of luxury at Palm Grove. Our beach base was often at Castello, on the way to Trinity Beach, where our Paleo pals spend each day of their long stay. It is a very pleasant shack, and typical of the less densely packed development along this long straight and wide stretch of beach. The resort itself attracts many more Russians than Palolem, has more facilities, is a base for parasailing, a gentle, generally quiet vibe and a throng of women selling stuff! There are fewer backpackers and more British long-stayers. It made a pleasant change in preparation for going home. The main disappointment was the state of the sea, which remained too rough for Greyrocks to swim!


On two days we walked to neighbouring beaches. First we planned to get a tuk-tuk from the village centre to Sernabetim, but we could only find proper taxis so we walked on the road, which is a very long and winding one! "Are we there yet?" The beach was wonderfully quiet with a view up to Colva, which clearly isn't! We did not however linger there and walked back looking for an in-between shack we recalled, but failed and were soon back at the Beach Road junction. On a second day we aimed to find a recommended shack in the opposite direction. Once again we were not exactly sure what we were doing, but ended up skirting the posh Taj Exotica hotel. and did emerge on the beach at Sun and Moon as planned! It is, indeed, a very appealing place and we might have eaten there if we had stayed until a bit later, but the down side was a very vocal group of Brits (and a German) whose discourse started to turn racist!

Why did the cattle (and egrets) cross the road?

More usually we would walk to the beach along "Fish Road". This has been described before and there are still very striking swathes of drying fish, but in addition on one such walk we encountered an enormous trawling net drying all across the road. Traffic had to drive across it, and then a large herd of cattle was led from one field to another across it, leaving a few deposits on the net!



And on the subject of cattle another site seen only on Benaulim beach was the leading of a bull with a log weighting down its neck. We learnt that this is to strengthen the neck in preparation for dhirio - banned since 1997, but still popular!

We also ate well in Beni - including Ruth having a very messy crab masala, and Bob a "beef sizzler"!