Longing for the ocean and the beach we raced down the long way from New Delhi to Goa searching for a place where we wouldn’t have to think about where to go next and how to get there every day. Making all these decisions and struggling with some of the situations we found ourselves in along the way, the tension was high, and a break was needed. Since the rainbow in Nepal, we had so many questions about ourselves and our relationship and hadn’t been able to make the time to process. So, when we finally arrived in Arambol I crashed a little bit, overwhelmed with emotions and life we rented a studio and let go of controlling the days events. We found ourselves in the beautiful community of two of our fellow Princesses we had arrived at the rainbow with together, and dove into the busy hustle of touristic Goa.
My time here was therefore intense in terms of navigating through relationship and personal processes while keeping up with social life and all the things to do here. I wanted to surf, to enjoy the beach, to rest, to attend some of the amazing workshops, yoga classes and events happening, I wanted to party, work on my relationships, and spend time with the beautiful souls in this place. The two weeks we spend here surely weren’t enough for all of that.
There are many many guesthouses, hostels, and private accommodations to find in Arambol and finding the right one for the right price is a negotiation game as much as finding a good scooter deal. Having some form of transportation is vital in Goa to be able to freely cruse the different beaches, towns, and beautiful places in between. With all you can generally get a better price if you know you’ll stay for a couple of weeks or months, we could negotiate a scooter for 300 INR/ day and rudimentary quipped studio for 3,000 INR/ week deciding our stay weekly. I did not wonder further than Mandrem and Corgao away from Arambol and in this region, even before the season, there was an abundance of activities to do and people to meet. Many projects and event locations lie outside the main towns, and some are down little empty roads so that you kind of need to know where you want to go to find them.
Google Maps works well and there is an app called Partyhunt that displays the majority of happenings, it is quite convenient since you can filter by distance to your location and entry fee to get a preselected overview of what’s going on. Also, the choice of restaurants is huge and ranges from 80 rupees omelette sandwiches at a place we named ChaiNot? on the main road parallel to the beach, to 600 rupees seafood curries at dream of goa. Therefore, it is really hard to make and get recommendations without having some key point of what one is looking for. Let me give a few of my favourites though in case that is what tickles your fancy:
Chai Not? – which will get a sign with the new name really soon when our OG princess finds the muse to make it. It is a small cart on the main road parallel to Arambol beach, that sells delicious omelette sandwiches on especial tasty bread and Masala Chai at night. There is one table with few seats the owner puts out and make sure to take your mosquito repellent when visiting this lovely place for a midnight snack. The first time we went here the guy just put the big thermos of chai on the table, a few of the small paper cups and told us later to pay whatever for it.
Migela – is another special place we spend a lot of time in. Raja the owner and only constant worker here, makes a special tali every day and serves all of his food, milkshakes and drinks with a lot of passion. He has a beautiful garden to sit in and it felt to me like a living room of the community that comes here. There were always nice people to chat with, make music or just hang out in a chill, shaded place surrounded by love and happiness. It is not the place for a quick meal but more of a place to be for a while and if you find the fridge in the garden, open it for another fun surprise.
This is it – attracts a big, diverse crowed for its brilliant open mic nights on Mondays and other events throughout the week. They Serve alcohol and have a big space for party, hangout and socialising that is definitely a good place to start if you don’t know what to do with your night.
Cookie Walla – is a super chill place just off the main road where I spend some mornings with my laptop trying to write and work on my website but ended up having inspiring conversations with other guests, if seems like a popular hang out place for people that are moving around on their own and are open for sharing smokes and thoughts in this living room flair. Cookie runs the place coming from selling cookies on the streets to having a big, tasty menu with too many tempting dessert choices he collected from travellers sharing their favourites with him.
Often the beauty of the places rises and falls with the people that surround you and more than anywhere Arambol was amazing due to the beautiful people I had there. While the beginning of the high season brought more and more groups of young party-oriented people that were roaming the beach in matching swimmers and I <3 goa singlets, I was able to stay in the niche community of the rainbow family and people we attracted with our princess camp on tour. Towards the end more and more family arrived on their way south from the gathering in Nepal and it was pure joy to bump into brothers and sisters in town while shaking heads at the social media addicted crews asking (or not even asking) for selfies and holding phones in my face.
Waves were non existent to extremely shitty this time of year, though I did not expect anything else from my research prior our arrival. Still there are some people paddling out whenever a tiny swell arrives. There are a couple rental places in Arambol and Mandrem beach but due to scarcity of boards the prices are quite high. I heard that Gokarna further south and the east coast has more promising wavs this season.
At some point during our time here we decided to slowly move to the east coast and take a plane from Chennai to Colombo, Sir Lanke before my partners visa runs out in around three weeks.
My birthday I decided to spend in a ridiculous resort in south Goa. I have no idea where this came from since I always make fun of people spending their money on places like that, but I have to say I quite enjoyed the two days with a bathtub on the balcony. This was a very special, once in a lifetime experience, I am almost embarrassed to talk about and can’t without a big grin on my face, but sometimes weird urges hit us, and I was happy to start my new year with following what my heart calls for however much my head might reject it.
After those days we went back to Arambol for just a few days to host our legendary first Princess Camp event, a conscious pool party with workshops, a little market, and very good vibes for the community. Especially our OG princess had put all his energy in this happening, and it got him going to create a range of further happenings with a similar objective, bringing good vibes and conscious events for everybody.
