January 4, 2011
Gokarna to Honey Beach
a beach hut
Last night there was temple music until I fell asleep at gone midnight. It was right next door.
My appetite is back to a certain extent and after last night's dinner, which I didn't eat, it's about time as the last proper meal was December 31st.
After loading up the Brodie, it gets wheeled out of the lodge, then I mount and freewheel down to the town area and notice many foreign tourists in ethnic garb.
This seems like a southern part of Goa; a temple town/village where Hindu worshipers congregate on a daily basis.
I reach the beach, then turn back up the unpaved lane and stop at a cafe and sit at a table outside and have watermelon juice and decide to have honey on toast and also order a banana puree, which I use as a spread.
My appetite must be back.
People walk by with tourists looking more and more ethnic. Gokarna seems a nice town to stay and looking for a place to sleep comes back to mind. It won't be a problem.
There a large pool where villagers wash themselves and their clothes and women are hard at it.
There's a resort on the edge of the village and the road there goes up steeply. It's a struggle for nothing as the place is fully booked, but I stop to have their buffet lunch which is a bit of a letdown as there's no fish, just the usual curry and rice dishes and the two juices I order are extra to the 300 rupees and cost me 50 each.
There are a hoard of Russians here. It's not something that I expected.
There's a place in the guide book recommended that overlooks the beach, but that's full too except for one dank room and owner says that Honey Beach near Ankola is a nice place so that's where I head for - north.
It's already three o'clock.
Honey Beach is not in the guide book, but the resort's guard said it was nice, but his English lacked conjunctions and it's hard to understand without these and although he said 'small boat' and gestured with his hand - moving his fingers up and down like he's playing piano - to let me know it's a basic road. That's okay.... my tyres are decent.
I pedal back the 9 km I rode in last night towards the Gokarna Road train station turnoff and now the hilly countryside is clear to see and it's nice and open with a blue sky to cap it off. It feels good to be moving again.
I get to the winding 17 and swing north and after a few kilometres see a sign on my left pointing to Honey Beach Cottages and ask a nearby man for clarification, but he can't speak English.
The sign says 8.5 km and I know if the place is full or whatever it'll be 17 km wasted and it's already late in the afternoon now. Sod it... I feel lucky.
The narrow road is basic and goes up and down and my little ring gets used as I sweat and breathe hard. It seems longer than 8.5 km, but after a while I reach a river - or is it the sea - and guess this's where the cycle boat sails to Honey Beach. I'm wrong.
This is only clear after waiting a few minutes and drinking a couple of Sprites -as when I mention Honey Beach the man manning the kiosk points left and says that the boat goes to Gokarna and now I understand the guard's simple English because he was telling me to follow the beach road from Gokarna to get here, which would have been flat and much quicker. Never mind.
A few hilly kilometres later there's a fork in the dirt track where there's a small Hindu temple and a painted sign indicates right to Honey Beach Cottages are, but a guy appears and points past the temple, which seems a bit odd as all I can see there is a rocky landscape.
He then shows me a name card for accommodation and says there are beach huts for 400 or 500 rupees and this seems good, so I agree to follow him down the route which is very rocky. In fact we carry the bike in places as it's steep and some rocks are the size of sofas and can't be dodged. I have regrets as there are thorn bushes to contend with. My sweating increases.
It's about 1 km of hard work to the simple resort, where there's just a long straw-roofed hut without walls that's a cafe and I ask the man in charge there about a room and he says 250, which is welcome news. I look at the huts and generally like the place - not that I was ever going anywhere else now.
The sun is low and I take a snap of the sea with a boat on it that's visible from the chairs inside the long straw hut and later order dinner and sit alone in the tranquil place except for a young man from Bangalore who converses to the manager in English and explains he wants to have a beach party with music and asks about paying off the police and the manager mentions 5,000 rupees.
It occurs to me to have a cold beer, but my stomach tells me not to.
Later, while wheeling the bike to the nearby huts, I notice that my rear LED has fallen off -no doubt the man helping me dislodged it from the bracket. It was only a reflector anyway.
Today's ride: 30 km (19 miles)
Total: 2,745 km (1,705 miles)
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