Goa offers the best holiday villages on its beaches. The Goan landscape, dotted with Portuguese architecture, exudes an old world charm. The Baga Beach with its gentle waters offer opportunities for boat rides, sea scooter rides, spot-the-dolphins rides and motorboat rides. The Calangute Beach attracts most tourist and has wonderful shopping and food places around it. The Miramar Bay in Panjim and the Colva and Benaulim beaches are less crowded.
The Fort Aguada beach offers gorgeous views that merit a visit. Sinquerim and Candolim are relatively quieter beaches that afford anonymity. The south of Goa has many quiet secluded white sand beaches for the discerning traveler seeking a peaceful and tranquil holiday.
With its fluorescent painted palm trees and full moon parties, Anjuna
Beach, 8-km west of Mapusa, is one of the most popular beaches of Goa.
Most people's reasons for coming to Anjuna are the same as they were in
the 1970s: dancing and lying on the beach slurping tropical fruit. While
browsing in the area have a day trip to the famous flea market of
Anjuna, a major shopping hangout, beside the beach.
Bathing is generally safer at Anjuna beach than at most of the nearby
resorts, especially at the more peaceful southern end of the beach,
where a rocky headland keeps the sea calm and the undertow to a minimum.
Taking long walks under the moon on the silver sands of this beach is
something that any visitor would love to do at Anjuna, beside the
favourite pastime of watching the sun going down.
At the north of the Anjuna Flea market ground, the beach area broadens,
running in an uninterrupted kilometre long stretch of steeply shelving
sand to a low red cliff. The village bus park lies on top of this high
ground, where small cafes, Bars and Kashmiri handicraft stalls are
lined, making a perfect hangout zone near the beach site.
Entertainment
Anjuna beach is a rave-venue for big parties that take place over here
from time to time, especially around the Christmas-New Year full moon
period. At other times, Anjuna's nightlife centres on the Shore Bars, in
the middle of the beach, which has a pounding sound system and play some
real funky music that always keep the atmosphere alive.
The biggest crowds show up accompanied by the latest ambient trance
mixes from London. The music gains pace as the evening wears on winding
up before midnight, when there's an exodus over to the Guru Bars, further
up the beach, or to the Primrose Café in Vagator, both of which
stay open until after midnight.
The Alcove, over looking Ozran Vagator Beach, is another worthwhile
nightspot to hangout near Anjuna. More mainstream musical entertainment
is on offer at Temptations, in the Red Cab Inn just below Starco's
crossroads, where Indian classical recitals and guitar based cover bands
feature with fire dancers on Mondays.
Eating Places
Both the beachfront and village at Anjuna are flooded with good places
to eat and drink. Most are simple semi open-air, thatched palm leaf
affairs, specializing in fish and western food. All serve cold beer,
invariably with thumping techno music in the background. On the beach,
tourists can buy fresh fruits, including watermelons, pineapples and
locally grown coconuts from the local vendors.
One of the unique features of Arambol beach is that it is secluded and
manages to look quite untouched and primitive, though it is every
tourist's dream beach and is often frequented. Arambol beach in Goa, can
be a sheer delight if a person is looking for just the sea, himself and
tranquillity.
The main beach at Arambol is good for a swim, but as you walk down the
beach you will come across small fresh water pools where you can float
and relax. Or you can give yourself a mud-treatment.
Places of stay are scarce here. So it is always better if you can take
a sleeping bag with you if you are planning to stay the night over,
listening to the crash of the waves. Or you can check in at some other
beach hotel in Goa and go to Arambol just for the day.
Tourists visiting Arambol beach can take one of the many buses that
regularly ply between Arambol and Mapusa, and also between Arambol and
Chopdem. It takes around 40 minutes to reach Arambol from Chopdem for a
distance of 12 km. On market day's tourists can take boats to Anjuna. To
move locally in Arambol, vacationers can hire taxis or bikes that are
easily available.
Baga Beach is part of a 30-km stretch of beach coastline along the west
coast of Goa by the Arabian Sea, 10-km west of Mapusa, is basically an
extension of Calangute beach. Lying in the rocky, wooded headland, the
only difference between this far northern end of the Baga beach and its
more congested center of Calangute Beach is that the scenery of this
beach site is more varied, unspoiled and scenic.
The quiet atmosphere and isolated location of Baga, beside the scenic
beauty that surrounds it, with the creek and the Retreat House perched
have contributed to the beach being a favourite of the beach lovers.
Baga beach is very popular with western tourists who love to use it as a
base for water sports and fishing in the area.
Entertainment
Baga's nightlife is the liveliest in the area with live bands playing
at most restaurants oulets. Most of the travellers end up at Tito's,
Eating Places
Baga has arguably the best range of restaurants in Goa, from standard
beach shacks to swish pizzerias and terrace cafes serving real espresso
coffee. Tourists can opt for a candlelit dinner at the beachside, or a
traditional Goan meal at the shacks and restaurants offering continental
as well as tempting seafood.
Candolim beach is situated in the north of Goa and lies close to the
Sinquerim beach.Its an ideal beach for those who are slowly getting
tired of the crowded beaches of Calangute or Anjuna. Though tourists
quite often frequent Candolim beach, you can still find some quiet
places for yourself. If you want to try your hand at fishing, you are
welcome to do so too. The beach also offers various water-sports
activities-right from parasailing to water-skiing… name it and they
have it for you. There are special guides also who can help you through
these activities. Goa Candolim beach also arranges special beach
excursions wherein a tourist is taken right to the middle of the sea
from where he can capture some memorable sunsets.
Under the shade of palm trees, bathes the Queen of Beaches—Calangute.
Calangute seems to be a distortion of the local vernacular word—‘Koli-gutti’,
which means land of fishermen. Some people connect it with Kalyangutti
(village of art) or Konvallo-ghott (strong pit of the coconut tree)
because the village is full of coconut trees. With the advent of the
Portuguese, the word probably got distorted to Calangute, and has stuck
till today. In a green semi-circle, the villages of Arpora-Nagoa,
Saligao and Candolim do their bit to enhance the divine beauty of
Calangute. There are picturesque agors (saltpans) at Agarvaddo,
Maddavaddo is full of madd (coconut trees), Dongorpur skirts a
bottle-green hillock and Tivaivaddo laces the beach. It was the hippies who discovered the pristine surroundings, blissful
serenity and golden sands of Calangute beach. The hippies also spread
the word around and this brought hordes of European tourists.
Calangute beach is often crowded with people, children making sand
castles, colorful crowds surging towards the sea and the young and old
alike lazing on the golden sands. This picture of a perfect tourist
haven is completed with shacks and stalls under the shade of palm trees
selling everything from fried prawns and beer to trinkets made of
seashells. Entertainment
Entertainment
Calangute's nightlife is surprisingly tamed and provide a nice break
from the wild parties at Anjuna. All but a handful of the Bars wind up
by 10.00 pm. One notable exception is Tito's at the Baga end of the
beach, which stays open until after midnight in the off-season and into
the small hours in late December and January. The other places that
consistently stay open through the night at Calangute are a couple of
hippy hang-outs in the woods to the south of the beach road. Pete's Bars,
a perennial favourite next door to Angela P. Fernandes, is generally the
liveliest, offering affordable drinks, backgammon sets and relentless
reggae. Further afield, Bob's Inn, between Calangute and Candolim
beaches, is another popular Bars.
Eating Places
Calangute's Bars and restaurants are mainly grouped around the entrance
to the beach and along the Baga road. As with most Goan resorts, the
accent is firmly on tempting seafood, though many places also serve
vegetarian dishes. Western breakfasts also feature prominently at some
of the restaurants in Calangute.
At the place where two of Goa's famous rivers meet the Arabian Sea is
the secluded bay of Dona Paula with a fine view of the Marmagoa Harbour.
This beach of Goa carries with it an aura of both romance and myth -
haunted by Dona Paula de Menezes; tourists throng the Dona Paula beach
not only in search of the deceased beloved, but also to indulge in water
sports on the clear waters. The Dona Paula Beach offers an opportunity
to the tourists to have a sunbath and enjoy water scootering and motar
boat rides.
Named after Dona Paula de Menezes, the Dona Paula beach is popularly
known as the "Lovers Paradise" due to a myth that has been
attached to this place. According one legend the Viceroy's daughter
after facing objections from her family about her love affair with a
poor fisherman jumped of the cliff.
Another legend says that punished for captivating Francisco de Tavora,
the Count of Alvor with her charm the Viceroy's daughter was pushed off
a cliff to drown in the waters below. Her irrepressible spirit still
continues to haunt every visitor with legends of her lovers. She is even
supposed to have been seen emerging from moonlit waves wearing only a
pearl necklace.
Located 7-km from Panjim, nestled on the south side of the rocky,
hammer-shaped headland that divides the Zuari and Mandovi estuaries,
this former fishing village of has now become a commercialized beach
resort. Beside the beach water sports attractions, do visit the official
residence of the Governor of Goa, known as Cabo Raj Bhavan, situated on
the westernmost tip of Dona Paula. Along the road leading to this place
lies the ruins of the small military cemetery the British built at their
brief occupation of the Cabo, to deter the French from invading Goa.
There are several shops along the beachside, which sell variety of
goods ranging from eatables to clothes. Fishermen-turned-local vendors
also sell straw hats, lace handkerchiefs, and spices in these shops.
Feni and port wine-the two Goan liquor specialties-are a must buy and
local liquor is easily available. Indian handicrafts and jewelery are
available at the Indian Arts Emporium in Dona Paula.
On the way to Dona Paula, 1-km ahead of the confluence of the Arabian
Sea and Mandvi River, under the palm shade, is "Gasper Dias"
or Miramar Beach and is just 3-km away from the capital city of Panjim.
In Portuguese language 'Miramar' stand for viewing the sea. Situated on
a good location for evening walks, the coast is spread upto 2-km, having
a fine silvery sand bed. From here one has an excellent view of the
Aguada fort just across the Mandovi River.
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