[mclaren1885]

Had been to Goa earlier this month. The trip was filled with lots of adventure, good roads, bad roads, beaches, clubs, pubs, casinos, good food, awesome scenery (of all kinds) as well. This trip as a successor to Munnar was just the icing on the cake. Haven't got the time to put up the full travelogue right now. Here is a teaser. The rest of it will be up by tomorrow.

[Surprise]

Make It Quick, Rahul

[rjstyles69]

So you are back is it ? I thought you decided to settle down there and whats with the picture thingy, post larger pics man.

[benbsb29]

Okie, so we viewed the teaser, Rahul. Bring up the rest.

[Nutty Nair]

Liked the teaser! Nice collage of pictures you have put up, Mclaren. But I hope the travelogue will have normal sized pictures for viewing. Also that we don't have to wait much long for the same.
Ranjith

[mclaren1885]

We had this destination frozen for several weeks now but never knew when this trip would materialize. Munnar, was awesome and I hoped Goa would only be as good if not better.

One fine day, I got a call.

MTP: We are going to Goa tonight. Get ready, pick me up.
Me: No reservations, season has just begun. We might end up not getting any acco at all. Its not possible to leave just like that. I wasn't able to do any planning you know.
MTP: I don't care, we are going to Goa tonight. Come pick me up.
Me : (thinking to myself) Its going to be quite adventurous all right! Lets do it.

Time : 2 am.
Location : BIAL, Kingfisher counter.
Me: Two tickets to Goa please on the first flight out of Bangalore.
Hot chick : Sorry sir, but we have no tickets available to Goa. All sold out.
Me (to self) : Damn, is this the sign of things to come?

Check with other airliners and get the same response. Disappointed, I return to the parking lot to head home. See the swift parked and suddenly I am like "Shall we drive to Goa as planned earlier?". Yes is the immediate answer.

So we pack our bags and leave to Goa at 3:30 am. Decide to change the headlamps on the swift from 55/60 W to 100/90 W. Accidentally manage to drop the right bulb somewhere into the engine bay. Its still yet to be found. One 100/90 W fitted. And this is when I figure out that its almost impossible to replace the bulb on the left headlamp on the swift without having to take out either the battery or the headlamp assembly. So I am running a 100/90 on the drivers side and 55/60 on the passengers.

Wondering if this whole trip would be jinxed like this, I carried on. Not long ago, I was stretching my right leg. Now I had reached Peenya in no time and havoc began. Truckers out dragging each other at 10 kmph. It was a nightmare till Tumkur toll gate. Started from the toll gate at around 4:30 am. The journey had indeed begun, with one hiccups too many.

Jay recommended this route as he had been to Goa just a week before us.

Route taken : Bangalore - Tumkur - Tiptur - Shimoga - Jog Falls - Honnavar - Ankola - Karwar - Goa.

Tumkur toll gate to Tarikere was an absolute breeze. Beautiful two lane highways, speeds averaging around the 140 kmph mark. The roads didn't spring up any surprises as Jay had mentioned. Then we hit Tarikere. Roads went from bad to downright non-existant. The poor swift had to go off roading for a good part of 25 kms me thinks. But, Jay had warned me of this. Carefully we snailed our way out of this bad stretch in about an hours time. Took left before entering Shimoga and good roads greeted us yet again. Roads were nice, cool breeze flowing in the early hours of the morning, greenery everywhere. The trees came and went, small villages came and went, so did towns, several 1000's of milestones later we reached Karwar. Took a break by the beach, then continued driving till we hit the outskirts of Goa. Roads go bad again for about 10 kms. We finally reach Goa, at 3 pm.

We still don't have any reservations. Luckily I had picked up a Goa guide which had all the numbers of hotels, resorts, restuarants. Name it and you have it all. So on the way we dialled up a couple of places we had chosen on. First on cards was Taj Holiday village. The said they could give us a room only after 4 days. So I asked them to keep it reserved and that I was drop by once I reached Goa and make the payment. Next, we called up Wildernest, the resort where Roadies 5 was shot. This place has some amazing eco-huts and a view from the pool that most people would only dream of. Even they said, they could arrange for a room only after 5 days. Countless number of calls later, we figured out that most of the places were booked for the first three days atleast. So we decided to head to Baga, too meet up with an old friend of ours.

He had just one room available. Luckily it had AC. We checked in, only to find out that AC was not working. Goa was getting hotter by the micro second. And it felt like I had just stepped into an oven as I got out of the car which had its AC switched onto level 3 since Karwar.

Francis had promised us to get the AC repaired. So we left for quite a late lunch to Subway. A couple of sandwiches later, we returned to room to find it nice and cool. The AC had been repaired.

Here are some of the pics I managed to click en-route.

[mclaren1885]

Some more pics when I took a break after Shimoga.











On reaching Jog Falls. First few pics are from the 1st entrance. If one takes the 2nd entrance you can walk up right to the tip of the falls.

[akroy]

Rahul, Nice pics, keep them coming. BTW, who is MTP?

Abhi

[hemanthisgreat]

Nice pictures.

Are the pictures taken in the new canon slr you were supposed to pick up.

[mclaren1885]

Originally Posted by akroy

Rahul, Nice pics, keep them coming. BTW, who is MTP?

Abhi

Hehe! My Travel Partner.

Originally Posted by hemanthisgreat

Are the pictures taken in the new canon slr you were supposed to pick up.

Yes hemanth, the pics are from my new Canon DSLR. The trip was so hectic that I hardly got around to explore the camera better. Most of the times it was either too sunny to shoot or too cloudy.

[mclaren1885]

The Ghat section after Jog.


The roads we took.


From one of the view points. This view point and me have quite a long history. I almost killed myself here, also one of my favourite pics of the Baleno comes from this point.



Some random swift pics for the gallery.






Suddenly, I came across this and began to wonder if I was in Kerala.

[nevertouchme]

MCL, awesome teaser and great photographs. Please keep them coming...

so ~12 hours to GOA from Blr?

[mclaren1885]

Then we hit Karwar. We were just moving around at snails pace soaking in all the beauty. Suddenly, there was this beautiful layout I saw to my left. It looked out of this world. I stopped by to check it out and take a few pics. I could hear a few whistles coming from somewhere but didn't pay heed. My eyes were too busy quenching in the fact that some people lived there.

Suddenly, I looked out of my window. 3 armed personnel were staring at me with guns pointed at my head. Obviously, I went speechless to downright scared. Silence engulfed in the car. Then one of the said "This is Blackbird. A secret navy layout. No one is allowed to stop here or take pics".

Only then did i strike to me what I had just been upto. Anyways, we carried on without even looking at Blackbird anymore for I feared the idea of seeing a gun pointed at me again . After I got to Bangalore I heard that a few friends even heard shots being fired into the air to make cars move from there.

Some pics I clicked at Karwar beach.

A few kms after Blackbird, I decided to stop to take a few snaps.

[mav2000]

Awesome man, the pics are really good, keep going.

[ASHISHPALLOD]

@mclaren1885 and @HEMANTHISGREAT,
if pics posted by you are of blackbird/seabird or naval base, please remove the pics for best of you, navy and nation. please.