Leaving Palolem really was harder than we thought. The street food wasn’t done with us, and I spent most of the night running to the toilet to puke or poop. The water was turned off , so I had to be inventive with where and how to deal with the waste my body was expelling.Our emotions ran high as we dismounted at the taxi rank in Palolem..We were mobbed by touts , ofering beach huts, but we shook them off and made our way onto the beach, headed towards the Banyon Tree. We knew ecactly where we wanted to stay. The same pace that we’d try to say at on our first visit, but was always booked-Presley. This time , our luck was in, we blew twice our 500 rupee budge on the room with the best view on the whole beach. Presley was a lime green tree house, sitting pretty much in the centre of the quieter half of palolem beach, next to a small local beach restaurant.

Bikes parked, luggage dumped, we were in the sea a few minutes after we were given the key.

The view of Palolem from the Ocean is stunning. Tall palm trees form a beautiful curtain behind the pristine beach, dotted with tree huts, restaurants and fishing boats, the place is idylic. It was easy to see why Phoebe and I had fallen in love with each other and this place at the same time.

We watched the sun set below the horizon, strolled along the beach, ate street food from our favourite vendor form our last visit-his food just as good as we remebered it, and we stuffed ourselves for 140 rupees.

A night cap at the Banyon Tree, another old favourite, saw our luck run out. A new team, no music, and no other customers meant that this place at least should have been left in our memory.

We sat on the balcony and listened to the waves and watched the stars. A fireworks display lit up the sky at 10pm and the mellow basslines of distant house music accompanyed the calming rhythm of the ocean. It was going to be hard to leave here, but we’d been here before,and we were itching to make new memories.

ILLLLLLLLLLL.

Leaving Palolem really was harder than we thought. The street food wasn’t done with us, and I spent most of the night running to the toilet to puke or poop. The water was turned off , so I had to be inventive with where and how to deal with the waste my body was expelling.

Come morning I felt worse still. Phoebe spoke to the manager to let him know we were staying another night because I was ill. He came up to see me and then offered to take Phoebe to the Ayurverdic doctor for some remedies that came in the form of a multitude of little white sweet tasting pills. As directed by Nurse Phoebe, I took 6 pills from one packet and 4 from another. This was to be repeated hourly.

My head was splitting and my guts were in full revolt. I confined myself to my quarters while Phoebe went for a swim.
I began to feel a bit more human after midday, and decided to leave my sick bed to join Phoebe on the beach. It was 3pm so the sun was not as vicious as it had been and I was covered up.

We snoozed under the shade of our parasol. The monotonous thumping of distant house music and the crashing of the waves aided our slumber.

An hour or so later I woke, my headache was back with a vengence so I skulked back to our hut.

Phoebe joined me a little while later alas complaining of a headache. She lay next to me, she just had time to say to me”I’m feeling a bit sick….” before jumping out of the bed and rushing to our overused loo.

I heard the coughing and wretching through the thin wall and my heart went out to her. Well, al least we were both in the same boat.

Phoebe got back in to bed with me as we turned off the lights and went to sleep, at 8pm.

Thankfully we both woke up that morning feeling better. My stomach was still feeling fragile, but I was in high spirits and we were both really looking forward to hitting the road and heading for the hills.