Hey from India [again!]

We've been in India a week - the first night at the Marriott was lush.
God, i got good girl! The place was a God send at 11pm and free too
... thought that said, we couldn't wait to get out because we felt
like freaky impostors, with thoughts like, 'I'm not dressed right. My
backpacker chic just doesn't fit in with this Marriott look.' So we
bailed out from there ASAP and headed south for the infamous Goa.

We jumped on an overnight train south to the beaches. That is, after
we did all the checks on weather websites and crossed referenced them
with other sites. Just to be sure. (Sandy's obsessed with weather at
the moment, it's her new weird hobby) and we decided it was a safe bet
and the monsoon was not gonna be a problem.

At the train station we were meant to get off the rain bucketed down in
sheets, you know like when you're hosing the garden at home and you've
got it on the open nozzle setting with in a thick stream coming out,
well it was raining like
that from the sky with a zillion thick streams pouring from the
clouds. I'll never trust a weather website again (and the BBC!) We
jumped onto the platform with our back packs strapped like
scuba-divers ready for the deep sea and bolted for a taxi.

The beach, if wanted to look at it, was like staring at an un-tuned
channel on the TV with pure static and white horizontal lines coming
down towards the shore. Don't get me wrong I'm all for a beach holiday
and I did have a mad time, it was just a comedy of errors. After
walking down river of mud, what would of been a dirt track, to find a
guesthouse we went straight back out in search of parties.

We found other travellers in the same situation, that was cool because
the ones we found had discovered the perfect remedy, it's called
'fenny,' an Indian rum that comes in two flavours, coconut and cashew.
The guys we hooked up with are from the north of England so with thier
accent, 'Fenny' produced loads of jokes.

Three days later, with a massive hand over like you would have when
you've been sleeping and drinking in the mud, the sun came out.
Beautiful waves rolled in, it was a tropical paradise with palm trees
hut and everything, a true postcard setting. But Sandy had a cold and
we had to go back to Mumbai to meet Gus.

So the next time some stoned monkey starts telling me about his Goa
experience, I'll put him straight and say, 'it must've been the
fenny, mate, cos i had wicked time there but i wasn't that wasted.'

We're in the middle of India somewhere at the moment- a town called
Bhopal(spelling?) on the way to Varanasi. Travelling with Gus rocks.
There's something about hooking up with old mates overseas that really
makes a wicked adventure. We should in Nepal next week or so to do a
three week walk through the Himalayas. That, i'm looking forward too,
because there's no amount of hype that can't be true about how
beautiful those hills are.