I decided to GOAll out for New Year's! ;) 

After leaving Pondy, I flew across the country to Goa to meet up with the homies from Oregon! Kyra, Kyle, and Zach have been traveling in India for the past 4 months or so and back in Eugene we decided to all meet up for NYE as soon as we figured out we would all be in India at the same time. I still can hardly believe we made it happen!

 

I almost didn't... I looked up the wrong place for us to meet and I would have ended up in a different city if it wasn't for a last minute check on my taxi driver's phone. When I pulled up to the right place and saw the three of them casually sipping beers I had to check myself because I was just about losing it with excitement! It felt so surreal for our little dream to be coming true. 

They found us a nice little guesthouse only a few minutes walk from the beach with wifi, a fridge, a sweet patio with a hammock, swing seat, tables, chairs, etc.

Our first day together we set off down the Anjuna beach to adventure down to the next big beach area.  It felt so nice to finally be on a beach where there wasn't as much pressure to wear full length clothes... I could finally wear a tshirt and shorts in the hot weather and it felt amazing.

We walked along this beautiful rocky coastline for about an hour to Baga, stopping for refreshments at a little beach we found in between.

We could see the craze that is Baga beach as we approached it, and after just an hour or so there felt pretty grateful that we were on the slightly-less-crazy Anjuna beach.

So happy to be with these goons! They gave me lots of inspiration for traveling in India as well... I was so impressed by how they had just taken up the travel process as a lifestyle and in only a few days I learned a lot from them.

Our two big nights out we went to a place called Curlie's on the far end of the beach. Basically every bar or club in Goa plays really loud trance music—all day and night. But this place was definitely the spot to be. 

New Year's Eve was crazy from the start. We popped champagne on our patio with some awesome Swedish friends we met there and somehow managed to leave before midnight.

We journeyed down the beach to Curlie's, got in without paying, took tequila shots, and booked it over to the beach for the countdown and New Year's kisses and one of the longest and closest firework shows I've ever seen! They were shot off about 20 yards away from us and exploded directly above us so our entire vision was filled with the exploding bursts. Kyra even said she got hit by some of the falling pieces... oh India. We proceded to dance for hours and meet other white people and just celebrate in this wild setting! 

The walk back put a little damper on the night for me because I sliced my foot on some broken glass, but I've kept it clean and gooped up with neosporin so it's healing up alright. After a crazy night, we took it easy the next day. Watched Bad Neighbors, ate pizza, lounged on the beach, it was a nice and laid back start to the New Year.

Kyra and Kyle packed that night for Gokarna and I almost decided to go with them for a couple days but ultimately decided to hang back. The next day they left in the morning, and Zach and I were able to keep our same room for even cheaper for the next couple nights. After breakfast we somehow ran into our Austrailian friend Ella who we met at Curlie's and we decided to go back to the little beach near Baga for the day.

It was so fun getting to know her and to hear all the insider tips on Australia!

Played in the water, drank some beers, messed with Zach... :)

Saw the start to a pretty sunset on the way back. If you could look past the trash and dogs pooping in the waves, it was a really beautiful beach to spend our mini "vanilla vacay" at!

Zach took off to Sri Lanka the next day and I did some wandering for my last day in Anjuna. Found 8 newborn puppies! 

Resisted the temptation to adopt them all. I got one final meal overlooking this sunset!

Goa treated us so well.

I shared a taxi with some nice Swedes to the airport yesterday and hopped on a plane to Delhi, where I was only going to be for a couple hours initially but my flights got changed around, so I stayed here overnight! Delhi is cold and crazy... definitely not in the south anymore. 

Well today I travel to Rishikesh, my home for the next month!