Hello everyone, hope everything is good back in Blighty!

Just beyond the north end of Palolem beach, a great man called Jo-Jo has built his bar on an isolated spit of sand. He has good stories to tell and an extensive cocktail list, although all he can make is Old Monk (rum) and coke. He tells us he is an architect and had a major role in the Bourne Supremacy, but none of this can be verified. As the day goes on his measures and stories get taller.

Next to Jo Jo’s is a cave where an old hippy called Gosh lives. He has bronzed skin, long grey hair and a much younger wife. Gosh wafts around the place in nothing but a loin cloth, teaching yoga and dishing out reiki on humans and animals alike. We like Jo Jo and are intrigued by Gosh so intended to spend a bit of time in the beach huts nearby, but not before heading to Cola Beach for Valentine’s Day.

There are two ways to get to Cola. One is to take a taxi around the headland at a cost of 300 rupees – about £4. The other is to wade across a river with your bags above your head, climb up a dusty ‘path’ patrolled by three aggressive bulls and finally trek through snake-infested scrub land, with more bulls lurking in the bushes. Embodying the backpacking spirit of saving money at every opportunity we chose the latter, and arrived at one of the most beautiful beaches in Goa remarkably unscathed.

We intended to spend one, maybe two nights at Cola, but it was so nice that we spent a whole week there! We did a lot of reading, took the kayaks out for some dolphin watching and some rather unsuccessful fishing trips; and played a lot of poker, using our malaria tablets as chips.

We also got our ugly mugs on Indian TV again after a holiday show which was filming there asked us for an interview. We hit it off with the programme’s presenter, South African model Sarah- Jane, who has offered to show us around Mumbai when we get up there.

A week on a paradise beach left us yearning for some wildlife in our lives, so we hired another motorbike and scooted inland to an animal sanctuary. Here we wandered in the wilds of the forests taking our chances against the frogs, lizards, snakes and jaguars. We also climbed a very precarious ladder to take position in a watchtower overlooking a watering hole. The animals obviously weren’t that thirsty because all we saw was some sort of giant squirrel. Thankfully the nice people at the wildlife sanctuary had captured a few deadly snakes for us to gawp at, one of which made repeated bids for freedom, all of which looked like they might be successful.

Anyway, that’s us for now. As you may have noticed we haven’t done that much since our last update, which should tell you that we have properly settled into the laid-back Goan lifestyle.

We leave our latest hut on Tuesday to head further south to the beaches of Gorkana, and then East to ancient temples in Hampi. This will give us our first expereince of the (in)famous Indian railways, and a taste of real culture. We feel like we have eased ourselves into India now, so lets see if we can properly rough it!

Love to all, Michael and Pip. xxx