Hello Hello. Back again. It's 11pm at night and hot as hell. Today was just another relax on the beach, sitting around eating and drinking kind of day. Man oh man. I'm not exactly sure where I left off but there really isn't much to talk about either. I've come to the definate conclusion that 10 days is no time at all when traveling around another country. Of course I knew my time was short but I kept thinking that for sure I would be able to at least see a couple of the Main attractions. Well it's just not going to happen. The decision has been made to just stay here in Paradise for the whole of my time and fly into Kolkata the day before I leave. I'm disappointed of course at not seeing the Taj Mahal but I'm just going to use it as motivation for coming back. At least when I do come back I'm pretty damn sure I know where my home base will be. I guess the one story I have to tell is the day we hired a driver and drove around the State of Goa. At least if felt like we drove the whole state. This guy was great and very friendly but I think a prerequisite of being a taxi driver in Goa is that they have to be certifiably insane. How else do you explain driving in the wrong lane towards a vehicle easily 3 or 4 times our size. Like that puny horn will stop that thing. Anyway, we left at 9am and headed for Old Goa. Everyone who knows me knows that I'm not in the least bit religious but that doesn't mean I don't have an interest in old ruins or ancient artifacts involving the "Church". We hit Old Goa and made our way through a number of ancient catherals and Indian temples. One of the coolest things we saw was the Chapel of St. Fransic Xavier which houses, believe it or not, the consecrated body of... St. Francis Xavier, who died in 1552. The legend goes that he died while out of the country on Missionairy work in China. When he died the people of China didn't want to give up his body and so covered him in quicklime to destroy what was left. Despite the quickline the priests body instead was unharmed and in 1554 was sent back to India. His body is still held in the church today and every 5 years his intricatly carver silver casket is opened up so people can view his still preserved body. I guess we're supposed to believe that, despite no embalming, some devine intervention prevented his body from being destroyed and instead he has been preserved for all time. Oh yeah, one of his arms was taken to Rome in 1614 and is preserved at an altar somewhere. I hope I got all that right. We also went to the Chapel of St. Francis of Assisi where we were able to touch a cross used in the Goan Inquisition. Super old but I can't remember the date. We visited some Indian temples and tried to understand what the hell we were seeing but I've got to admit I was a little lost. I do know that the altar room itself can only be entered by certain people but the rest of us can circle the altar in marble walled corridors. If we circle these corridors 108 times our blood will be purified. I made it around once in each temple. Not quite pure yet but getting there. Beautiful places none the less.
After the Churchs and Temples we headed out to a spice farm where we got a great tour. When we got to the farm a guy threw handfulls of flower petals at us and a young lady put flowers around our necks. Kinda cool but I'm still finding those damn pedal in the strangest places. We had a really nice and knowledgeable guide who played it more like a game quizzing us and making us work for the answers to the spices we were looking at. I should have known and I'm sure I did buy why was it a surprise when he peeled the bark off a tree for us to chew on and we discovered it was cinnamon? Did you also know that Bannana trees are in the "GRASS" family??? At the end of the tour we were then surprised by a cup of ice cold water poured down our backs which was actually very refreshing. We got a free shot of some coconut liquor and a buffet style lunch before we were again on our way. If we had wanted to we could have gone back and ridden some elephants but Corina and I had both done this at some point in our previous trips. Just before we left I bought some saffron which I hope I can get home through customs since it seems to cost more than gold back in Canada. We headed off again and our driver took us to the Goan Zoo. Not a very nice looking place and the animals were somewhat bored looking if not a little lethargic. Must be the damn heat. We saw one bear that looked a little sickly but after discovering that it was called a Sloth Bear didn't feel so bad for it. The animals where all pretty neat and the snakes great since they scared Corina. The funny thing was that at a zoo of ours back home the monkeys would be in cages but here they roamed free. We left just in time as a bus full of kids showed up and started to terrorize the place. That was basically it for the day. By the time we got back to Arambol it was 7pm and after 10 hours we only paid the driver 2000INR which is only about 50 canadian bucks. Split 2 ways not bad at all. Since then we've just been lazing on the beach and wandering the village. We found a restaurant called the Double Dutch (they're Dutch) and had a great dinner. We starting with a cheese plate with bread and garlic butter and then Satay Chicken for an appy and then we each had a steak dinner with mashed potatoes. mmmmmmm soooo good. I had a Garlic Cream Steak and it was by far the best steak I've had in ages. Better by far than the last time I was at the Keg and twice the size. The whole dinner was 600INR ($15.50) Anyway, it seems that the days ahead are more of the same. Beaches, swimming, sleeping, reading..... just plain relaxing. Tomorrow we buy our plane tickets to Kolkata and then we may rent a moped for a drive around the country side. Damn cows better stay out of my way. If I have time or if anything interesting happens I'll write another blog before I leave. Till then Go Canucks Go. Oh yeah.... Go Seahawks.

Ah where to start. I'd love to say that the flight went perfect and the adventure started in Mumbai, India but I can't. As much as I've traveled I thought I would never have to say this but it's happened. I missed my flight out of Vancouver. When I got to the airport at 7pm I went straight to International Departures and excitedly looked up at the huge Departures List. I was dumbfounded when I couldn't find my flight anywhere. I wish I could have seen the look on my own face when I pulled out my tickets and confusedly stared down at the 12:50pm departure time. The nearest I can figure is that I confused my Departure time from Kolkata with my Departure time from Vancouver. Needless to say I missed my flight by about 7 hours. In panic mode I tried to find a Singapore Airlines rep in the Airport but with no luck. Being that it's after 7 at night now everything was closed. I called the Travel Agent in Abbotsford but closed. I called Singapore Airlines in Vancouver but closed. I quickly found an Internet Kiosk at the airport and through Orbitz.com found that the quickest and cheapest way to get to Mumbai was on Lufthansa Airlines out of Germany. I got their toll free number but decided I would give Singapore Airlines one more try. I finally called Singapore Airlines in Singapore and something I quickly found out and had never really thought about or realized is that if you miss a flight, without calling ahead, you are classified as a "No Show" and the whole of your Itinerary is canceled. So not only did I miss my flight, but my entire trip had been canceled as a result. The woman on the other end of the line who I could barely hear and scarcely understand somehow got across to me that Singapore Airlines flies out of Vancouver only on Saturday (it was Saturday), Monday and Thursday. That would put my departure off for two more days. Since I only had 12 days to travel I thought this was unacceptable. I did manage to get her to reinstate the last leg of my flight home from Singapore to Vancouver but from Kolkata to Singapore she could only put me on a waiting list. I decided to worry about getting home later and for now just get myself to India. I called the toll free number for Lufthansa and booked myself on their first flight out the next morning. I would have to pay for the flight at their airport Kiosk when it opened at 11:30am. At some point I had called Jack and left a message that I was at the airport with no flight but that I didn't have my cell phone so if he got the message I'd be hanging around in International Departures. He managed to get the message and showed up at the airport just as I was speaking to Decann Air in Mumbai so that I could reschedule my charter flight to Goa. This woman spoke great English and after charging me 650 Rupees postponed my flight for one day. After spending the night at Jacks I was back at the airport the next day by 10am and anxiously waiting for Lufthansa to open up. There was a nice woman there and after hearing about how retarded I was she took pity on me and also took $85 off my flight. So... One day and $1200 later I was on my way to Mumbai. All in all I had only lost about 12 hours. Now the adventure, the good part, could begin.

After 27 hours in the air I was in Mumbai International Airport. I've got to tell you that the smell was something else. Garbage mixed with burning garbage mixed with whatever else they could throw in and just a little sprinke of Urine but I was excited none the less. This airport is not one of the most advanced I've been to and actually for the wealthiest city in India I was somewhat dissapointed. I retrieved my bag and made it through customs. Everything was so much easier without having to go through the U.S. I made my way to the Domestic airport, which is 4 kms away, crammed onto a shuttle bus with twice the number of people there should have been. That just added to the smells. Once I got to the Domestic airport I realized I was there early enough to switch flights once again on Deccan Air to the morning flight. It was another 900 Rupees ($24) but I saved myself 11 hours of sitting in the Domestic terminal. While waiting for the flight I met a really nice girl Susanne who was from Sweden. She and I were both heading to Goa so we chatted it up while we waited for the flight and then on the flight down. There were only 5 of us on that flight so we just sat where we wanted. She, the lucky girl, worked at an airport back home and only paid 10% of normal airfares and so traveled all over the world. I've got some very interesting ideas of places to travel to now. Once we got to Goa we said our goodbyes.... she was traveling south and I was heading for the north. I hired myself a mini Taxi van with dark pink and black leapard print apolstary and loud 80's music and headed off down the road. Once again the smells were almost overwealming but I was just in heaven. To be traveling again, bopping down a road through crazy traffic in a foreign, unknown land was just wonderful. It's hard to describe. I sat back and stared out the window at everything while my driver cut in and out of traffic honking at everything and everyone.... even when the streets were empty. There really are cows everywhere. One thing I really noticed is that there are many many people around. You can't really go far at all without there being Something. After about an hour and 1/2 I was in Arambol. Road weary and confused by the directions I'd been given I just headed towards the beach for my first look. Before I could reach the beach I heard Corina call my name from a little restaurant. What a sight for sore eyes. She looked beautiful and just radiated life. Smiling and tanned and bright eyed. We hugged and then sat for a bit so she could finish her coffee and breakfast. We chatted about my little fuck up and how her trip has been going since the last of her new friends had left only two days before. With that we headed back to the little room she had and after changing decided to go for a litle walk around and then that was about all I could take... I didn't even really notice this wonderful place around me, I passed out and slept for the next 6 hours. Corina woke me up, we went for dinner and then went home to sleep and that was the end of my first day. Not very exciting that first day, besides getting there, but let me tell you that I just fell in love with this place on the second. It's paradise here. We hang out on the beach, wander around the village, and basically just relax. The second day I was here we headed to a town called Anjuna and went to a huge market. They sold everything and although I missed taking a picture, a couple of times we had to make way for the bulls (yes bulls) heading down between the rows of stalls and sellers. Slow and lazy they just go wherever and do whatever they want. Today we made plans to just relax on the beach and swim so thats what we did. There is this one part of the beach where you can lay by the ocean but behind us there is a little salt water lake which the tide fills each night. Nice and calm and a little colder than the ocean which is nice in this heat. We relaxed all day and then headed to a nice restaurant along the beach for dinner and then the sunset. This really is the life. I had one of those moments last night when I woke from a nap... it's one of those times where you wake up and it takes you a moment to figure out where you are. I looked around and then it hit me... I'm in India, and I'm loving it. More than once we've described this as paradise. I have to say not just this place in particular but this setting and this life style. Living just off the beach with sun and sand and people from all walks of life and corners of the world. I'm not sure what the plans are for the near future but for the next few days we're going to stay right where we are. This isn't really fair to me I understand because once I fall in love with this part of India I'm going to have to drag myself away and have to deal with the "real" India. I'll deal with that when it comes, just as I'll soon have to deal with how I'm going to get home. For now the Adventure continues and I'm loving every second of it. Ciao for now everyone.