Our tickets are booked for December and luckily we are touching Goa this year too. It reminded us our last year’s vacation in Goa at the around same time. Goa is a popular vacation spot internationally, famous for beaches & nightlife. But traveling with a toddler doesn’t allow much of nightlife, plus keeping our tradition of responsible travel during every vacation; our last years’ Goa vacation involved a lot of Eco-tourism and we were totally satisfied with it. Rather this part of Goa sightseeing is still off the beaten and slowly picking up popularity locally and internationally.
Spice Farm in Goa
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| Clockwise- Black pepper, Nutmeg, Clove, Chilies |
The best part of our trip was visiting Sahakari Spice Farm in Ponda. Being Indians we love using spices in our food, but never knew much about spice farming. So it was a great delight to take an educational tour to know more about spices. I didn’t even know that Indian bay leaf comes from a cinnamon tree. One of the big attraction for my son in spice farm was elephants. They have kept few elephants, you can also bath them in the stream which flows through the farm. At the end of our spice farm tour, we had one of tastiest spicy meal in Goa!
I would highly recommend a visit to this spice farm, it’s educational and fun. Their trained staff tell us a lot of interesting facts about spices. You can get up close with these fresh spices and learn so much. Otherwise, you won’t even recognize them on a tree.
Goa, Sun, Sand & Much More
Rest of our days we relaxed on beaches, played in the sand, collected lots of shells and soaked in waters. Saw lots of interesting insects, fishes, starfishes and what not. When you don’t have to worry about time, it’s so much fun to observe small insects with your kids and go behind them.
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| Sun, Sand and much more… |
To add some thrill, one day we decided to walk to the end of Baga beach and explore the other side of the small stream meeting sea water.
As we came near the stream, we saw a lot of fishes were lying dead on the beach. Obviously, they were sweet water fish from the stream. As soon as they enter salt water of the sea, they don’t know how to survive and once they are dead they are washed on shore. We also saw tiny fish in stream swimming in the opposite direction of the water at the mouth of a stream. They were struggling hard to save their life but were not moving much. We crossed the stream through knee-high water, there was little force of water. It was fun and bit of thrill, we felt great when we reached another side of the stream. We walked the hill till we reach a point where we did not find it safe to walk with our son in arms. So we returned back. But seeing the busy beach from this peaceful and secluded side was interesting.
Don’t Miss When in Goa
- Beautiful churches in Goa
- Massage on Beach Shacks
- Buy fresh fruits from hackers on the beach and have them, a great way to rehydrate
- Best and freshest Pina Colada on Goa beaches
- Fresh seafood on beach shacks
- Buy local produce to take home cashews, spices, cashew Feni
- Handcrafts and wooden carvings
- Take walks and explore on foot
Goa is definitely a fun place, but there are so many interesting things there which are still to be explored. So this time, we are going to stay on a farm, not exactly in Goa but very close to it. I promise this time I won’t take a year to write about it ;-).
