Bagpacking Christmas in Goa

Hello people
I’m currently in Goa, Arambol to be precise, and am yet again sweating my arse off and loving every minute. Last time I wrote was Cochin I think? which feels like absolutely years ago now, time goes so quick but so slow all at the same time. We have completed most of our long journeys now (thank the lord) and are moving about by a mixture of scooter, rickshaw and sea.
After I last left you in Cochin, we headed a little further south along the backwaters to Alleppy where we stayed in a family’s house and experienced real Keralan life and possibly the most amazing food ive eaten in all of India. To get there though we really did ‘rough it’ per say and almost lost ourselves and our precious precious back to the mercy of the keralan river. The big taxi boat wed got dropped us off at the wrong side of the river to what we needed to be on, so we had the choice to either swim or find an alternative method. Naturally we went for the alternative, stumbling across a five year old boy who spoke perfect english and showed us to a tree where he said a ‘ferry’ came every five minutes to take people across. Relieved, we relaxed and put our bags down, looking out for a boat like the one we’d come on to take us across. Instead, along swam a man who looked as though had been dug up from a grave at least a century ago in a canoe that looked as though it was barely a float with his own weight. We looked at each other in despair, thinking that it would probably sink with one more of us on there, let alone all four of us and our massive bags that practically count for another person each. But he insisted we all got on and despite our protestations, we kneeled inside and prayed for dear life … Definitely the most hilarious/terrifying five minutes of m life so far.
From the homestay we went on to rent a houseboat, a massive expense but so worth it, where we experienced a real tropical thunderstorm and lizards aplenty, again along with food to rival the best restaurants. However, the fan in our room was so poor and the heat was so intense that both Frey and I woke up with our sleeping sheets soaked through with sweat, mosquito nets drenched and hair that looked as though it had just been under one hell of a shower. India is definitely the most difficult country to look in any way shape or form acceptable in because you are ALWAYS shining with sweat and smell like crap.
From there we caught a train down to Varkala, the first leg of which was an hour and a half for which we paid 7 rupees. 7 rupees is less than 10p. Absolute madness.

Varkala was a lovely little beach town in which we topped up our tans, met a crazy harmonica man who KEPT calling me Mar-CHA (emphasis on the cha, almost like the sound you make when you karate kick), Freya got her back abused by the sea and we were about a metre away from a huge floating dead shark in the sea.
After Varkala We went back up to Ernakalum where Fiona left us to fly back home, and we left the next day for Coimbatorre, a stop to break up our journey to Ooty. It was the sweatiest, longest bus journey ever, and the situation was not much improved when we reached Coimbatorre. It is the worst town in existence by far, the dirtiest, smelliest, noisiest hellhole I’ve ever been to. So naturally my body decided then was the perfect time for a spot of delhi belly. It hit me like a rocket, I was being emptied from both ends simultaneously all night and the next morning, having eaten nothing but a banana for two days. Thanks India.
Ooty was the next stop and a massive temperature shock. It went from sweltering heat to freeeeezing cold at night, all three of us cuddled up in one bed and about 20 layers of bedsheets, blankets and sleeping bags between us, a definite contrast to the houseboat situation. Ooty was nice, we saw a rose garden, tea plantations and a tea factory and went to the highest peak in south india, but after a couple of days of the cold air we were definitely ready to head back to the beaches.
From Ooty we went to Mysore where Frey and Heath got devoured by bedbugs and from there caught a sleeper bus!!! yes thats right sleeper bus, that we sweated our arses off to find, nightmare, then got a train from Bangalore that we were promised would be two hours and was actually about 7 (bearing in mind we hadn’t slept all night) arrived in Goa finally about 3 oclock the next day. But it was all sooo worth it cos Goa is great. Our first stop was Anjuna, which we were initially kind of disappointed by because there seemed to be very little going on and we were SO ready for fun after a nightmare journey, but we soon met a couple of swedes and two aussie girls who were up for fun so we organised to meet them and start our own party the next night. As expected when alcohol is involved, we were soon joined by more people and met a group of four aussie boys and one new yorker who we have decided to spend christmas with, so I think were in for a good time, yay!
Were in Arambol now, the hippiest place we’ve been to in India so far but were leaving tomorrow to go down to Palolem in south Goa for a bit of chill out and so we can give Heather a good send off as she’s leaving us to see her sister in london for christmas on the 20th, before we head back up to Anjuna for christmas and new year.
This has taken me a long time time to write and my mental capacity has been just about exhausted so no apologies for spelling grammar mistakes and i’m now going to sweat some more on the beach and maybe get licked by another cow.
Oh, also thank you so much to everyone who has written individual replies back, i really appreciate them and found reading them most enjoyable, but living up to my name of worst replier ever I haven’t replied to a single one and don’t intend to either (this by no means means you should stop sending me them, i very much enjoy any home news) because I am lazy, but also these mammoth emails take it all out of me and my brain physically wont let me formulate any more sentences than is necessary.
I probably won’t write before christmas now so HAPPY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!! Frey and I are having a palm leaf christmas tree this year so were not being totally unchristmasfied
Merry christmas and i promise to update you all again soon,
big love
Marta xxxxxxxxxxxxxx