November 4th – Goa to Chiplun

With just two driving days left of the Great Tour of India, today we had a comparatively short drive of under 350 kms. Our route took us on minor roads running parallel with the coast for about 150 kms. We then turned inland and joined a main highway for the next 200 kms to our hotel in Chiplun.

Goa and the surrounding area is quite different from the rest of India. The Portuguese influence still remains with small churches in many villages and towns and old colonial buildings.

Whereas most of the rural India we have driven through has been very poor today we saw a much wealthier area. Though, on occasions, you could see back in time as when we saw these fishermen fishing in one of the many rivers we crossed. Each time we rose up from the rivers the vegetation changed from tropical to grassland.

It was quite a surprise to have such a change when the areas were so close together. Not long after we left the coastal zone we came up behind two of our group who travel in convoy, Karen and Mike Perry and Leif Inge and Siri Slethei from Norway in Cars No. 21 and 28.

One interesting sight, that is particular to this area, are the haystacks. They reminded us of Monet's paintings.


We wanted to arrive reasonably early so we could do the final sorting of our luggage and the car, making it ready for shipping in 48 hours. Before that I had a swim in the hotel pool and then we enjoyed another wonderful sunset.

Our room looks out across the valley with the Vashishti River winding its way through the hills.

We are up early tomorrow as we need to be in Mumbai by noon. The finishing ceremony is at 2pm in front of the Gateway of India and then I have to take the car to the port, about 10 minutes away, for shipping back to the UK.

PS Blogger wouldn't download all the photos for today, I'll try again later.