Goa is a magical land where you generally do not travel with a checklist in hand. With over 35 beaches having numerous water sport options and cozy shacks offering mouth watering Goan delicacies, historically rich Portuguese establishment, numerous beautiful churches, amazing night life.. the true essence of Goa is difficult to be felt unless one stays for a long time and we had barely four days in hand. So in order to make the most out of our short stay in this magical land we prepared our itinerary after going through several tourism websites and travel blogs. For fellow travellers who have the hunger for exploring but shortage of leaves this itinerary will surely come as great help.. So here's how we explored Goa !
Day 1
We landed at Dabolim Airport around 1 pm in noon booked a pre-paid taxi from the airport exit and headed towards Panjim where we had our hotel booked on the banks of Mandovi river. [link to pre-paid taxi rate as on September 2016 : https://sumarutravel.blogspot.in/2016/09/revised-goa-taxi-rates.html ]. In the evening we planned to go for river cruise on Mandovi river. There were several options like sunset cruise, dinner cruise, backwater cruise [ the details of these can be availed from Goa tourism website. ]. We bought our passes from hotel travel desk for sunset cruise for an amount of Rs.300 each. Our hotel was barely few minutes walk to the Santa Monica Jetty Point so we walked along the banks of the river with cool breeze kissing our faces gently.
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| Santa Monica Jetty Point |
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| River Cruise on Mandovi River |
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| Sunset captured over Mandovi River |
We reached the jetty boarding point and found a long queue of other tourists already waiting there. The queue moved and tourists started boarding the cruise once the capacity of the cruise filled the second cruise lined up to take the other tourists.[Currently Priyadarshini Royal cruise, GTDC cruise, M/s Aqua World cruise and Paradise Cruise have all formed a single window system under "Goa Boat Cruise" and they provide uniform entertainment and sightseeing program so do not worry on which cruise you board.] On the cruise local Goanese music and dance was performed by the artists which was quite nice to watch. There were refreshment counters serving cold drinks and snacks. We witnessed the show for sometime and then moved to the upper deck which provided a breathtaking view of Pamjim on either banks of Mandovi River and the gigantic Arabian sea in front. Multiple cruises drifted past us during the entire journey. We witnessed the sunset followed which our cruise drifted back towards the jetty point. It was dark by the time the cruise started the return journey and beautifully lit floating jetties, houses on banks, restuarants on banks offered a lovely view. We went back to our hotel that served authentic Goanese cuisine we tried chicken xacuti along with other items and it tasted yummy. Post dinner we settled in our rooms which had balcony facing the Mandovi river and the view of floating cruise with lovely wind added to an extra charm. Day one in the beautiful city of Goa was one of its kind and we were extremely eager for the following days in the amazing destination.
