Most people go to Goa for the beaches, and the beaches are excellent, but the Goa I keep returning to in my head is the inland one — the part you only find if you take the long way around and let the road decide.
We drove without much of a plan, which in Goa is less a strategy than a state of mind. The main roads peel off into smaller ones, the smaller ones into lanes shaded by enormous trees, and somewhere in there you stop being a tourist and start being a person on a slow afternoon.
Ferries, churches, and old quiet
There are still little flat ferries that carry you and a handful of scooters across the river for a few rupees, and there is no better way to feel the pace of the place. Old Portuguese churches sit white and enormous in small towns, far too grand for the sleepy squares around them, like someone overestimated how many people would ever be in a hurry here.
We ate fish that had been in the sea that morning, drank something cold, and argued happily about nothing under a fan that turned slightly too slowly to be useful.
The case for the detour
Every good thing on that trip came from a wrong turn. The best meal, the emptiest beach, the temple we weren't looking for, the viewpoint we found because we missed the one we were aiming at. Goa rewards the unhurried and quietly punishes the over-planned.
What I'd do again
- Take the ferry, even if the bridge is faster.
- Drive inland until the beaches are out of sight.
- Order the fish. Always order the fish.