A long toot meant , budge over , and the rule was the bigger you were, the more rights you had, so scooters got out of the way of bigger bikes, who got out of the way of cars, who got out of the way of busses. The exception to this rule seemed to be trucks.
They would either be wollowing up hills in 1st gear, belching black smoke behind them, or thundering down tiny lanes with no ability to stop in less than about half a mile!
And pededtrians, who strolled along the road as if it were their own.We said our goodbyes over a cup of Raj’s exclent coffee and loaded up the bikes.

We plodded along the sand to the back road, headed out of town, and off to the unknowm. Or Mapsa, or Mapusa, or however you say it. The bikes thudded along happily, drumming out a slightly unsteady beat, I pulled in the clutch to slow for a bend and Frankie just died on me. I pulled into the shade, beeping wildly to try to attract Phoebe’s attention but she’d already rounded the corner.
Les than 1 km and I was already in trouble.
I tried the strater, the bike turned over but wouldn’t catch.
I pulled out the choke and tried again, but nothing.
Phoebe reappeared round the corner as I was getting off the bike. Her concerned look softened as she saw I wasn’t in serouus trouble.

I turned the bike over one more time and the motor came alive.

Phoebe and I gave each other a nod and we hit the road. At the next junction I paused to push in the choke and the revs slowed to its more habitual clack clack clacking.

We found the highway towards Mapsa and opened up. Phoebe sat comfortably behind me, her grin reflecting in my mirrors, I gave her a qustioning thumbs up sign and she raised her left hand high above her head with a fist pump ending in a thumb popping out at the end of her triumphant movement.

My speedo read 0 so I had no idea how fast-or slow, we were going , but our pace was comfortable somewhere around 45mph I’d imagine.

There was the usual, constant tooting of horn. Most trucks had painted script on the back of their vehicle ‘HORN OK” or “Please use horn”.

A long toot meant , budge over , and the rule was the bigger you were, the more rights you had, so scooters got out of the way of bigger bikes, who got out of the way of cars, who got out of the way of busses. The exception to this rule seemed to be trucks.
They would either be wollowing up hills in 1st gear, belching black smoke behind them, or thundering down tiny lanes with no ability to stop in less than about half a mile!
And pededtrians, who strolled along the road as if it were their own.

We were honked at constantly, and my thumb hit the horn every time I went to over take anything.

We slowed for cows, pigs, dogs and tuk tuks, weaving our way along the NH17 until we hit Mapsa. The city came at us remorselessly. Black and yellow cabs were everywhere, tuk tuks bounced along the potholed road, and 6 lanes of traffic came at us from two directions at a totally lawless junction.

We came to a large square and pulled over in the shade.

Phoebe was off her bike enquiring after a helmet shop, I followed Phoebe out of the square and round a couple of tiny back roads, we passed two bike shops both closed, and stopped outide a third, “Helmet Store” Open 7-9am and 3-7pm.

Uh oh, we’d been told the shops would open before 9am, and so we’d delayed our departure until then so we’d get to town around 10. We’re not going to wait til 3, I said to Phoebe, maybe we’ll find one on the way to the highway.

From Mapsa the road changed to two lane highway, and Pritsh had said we’d need to get helmets bedore we left Mapsa to avoid getting some grief form the constabulary.

We rode out of town, the insane, unregulated, free-for-all style traffic, although scarry at times seemed to work. I ws trying to maintain a balance between holding my line, and keeping out the way. It was a tough one.

OOPS POWER CUT_2230 in PALOLEM

As luck would have it, as we left Mapsa behind, I spotted a roadside shack with racks of helmets glistening in the sun. I signalled and Phoebe follwed me to the side of the road.

On display were two types of helmet, open face or piss pot, 250 rupee or 500 rupee.

I picked up the piss pot- this one strong ? I asked as I squeezed the helmet between my hands. It flexed limply. –No No , not strong, but legal. He said.

He did have a point. We bought a couple of totally useless skid lids , turned on the head cam and continued south.

The afternoon we made slow progress in the searing heat, trying to avoid the Highway in favour of the beach road. This lead to a series of wrong turns, stopping for map checks, and asking directions. Problem was, every one we asked gave us different directions.

We came off the road we were riding and headed west, towards the beach, following another narrow dusty, twisty lane across green marshes.

As we approached the beach, shops began to line the lane, their owners waving us into their stall .The road ended at the beach and we dismounted. Immediately we were surrounded, ‘Hello, you come see my shop?” they all asked, “Where you come from, you buy nice Sarong. “

We made our excuses and jumped down onto the beach, aimimng for the restaurant on the sand to our right. We took a table at the front, ordered lunch , then ran down to the water.

The long beach was sparsely populated, a sand surfer sped passed us as we paddled in the calm , clear water. The sand crunched like snow under our feet aas we walked back to our table.

We ate and ran. Time was runing out on us. It was 3pm. I wanted to stop by 5 so we could sit and watch the sunset knowing our bed for the night was secured.

We got lost again and again, were constantly given contradicting information aout wether we coud or could noyt get to Palolem on the beach road, until finally, we came to the end of the road.

A uniformed military type officer manned a gate and he turned us around- no beach here, no village, you go back over new bridge, go back 2km and turn right.

We’d been told to get a ferry, but it seemed now there was a bridge, so the frerry no longer ran

We trurned around, got lost again, and finally gave in and took the highway . We found the road to Agonda, and from their rode down a familiar road to Palolem, the site of our first
visit to Goa, 2 years before.