We are spending January and half of February in our beloved Patnem, Goa in order to escape the cold and grey British weather. It’s a shorter visit than normal this year so that we can go home and spend some time with our daughter and new grand daughter during Lucy’s maternity leave. A special time that we will treasure.

We are having other changes this year. For the past 8 or so years we have stayed at Eve Resort, which we love, but that didn’t work for us this year sadly, so we have booked a one bedroom apartment at Tubki Park resort adjacent to the Tubki resort. The apartments are all individually owned and we found ours on Airbnb. It looks fine, has over 30 excellent reviews and costs a princely £18 per night…. we shall see!

We are flying with Oman Air which gives a change of planes in Muscat. Flight times are quite nice. We leave Heathrow at 810pm and arrive into Goa at 1330 the next day. 2 hours on the ground in Muscat. The nice thing about it is that they make it very easy for you to book a stopover and so we are having a couple of nights in Muscat on the way home. It was going to be 3 nights but Oman Air changed flight days on us. No matter we will make the most of it. Love Oman. It will be a lovely end to the trip.

When we land on Tuesday we will get an airport taxi and get straight to Patnem but on the way back our flight to Muscat is at 0810am. That’s a bit early to have to get there (3 hour trip) so we are going up the night before. I have found a fabulous colonial era airbnb just 4 miles from the airport and we will stay there.

Anyway, them’s the plans and I will pause now and finish off the journey report when we get to Patnem.

We rocked up to LHR terminal 4 at 5pm on Monday. We’d booked meet and greet parking with Express Parking and it worked well . £140 for nearly 6 weeks. That was less that one taxi to Heathrow, not a return. Check in was pretty smooth and we soon met up with Joseph and Janet airside. Our flight took off about 15 minutes late but landed very early – only 6 hours 35 mins.

The flight itself was smooth and the service was good – very nice choice from 3 mains. Salad, bread and a dessert. Unfortunately the flight was rammed full and Bob and I had someone sitting between us in a row of 3. And the young lady was really unwell with some sort of flu/chest infection and she coughed richly and continuously for the entire flight. I’m not exaggerating. She also frequently slumped over her tray table and also spat phlegm regularly into her sick bag. Horrendous. I twisted myself towards the window in an effort to escape the contagion. Only time will tell. It certainly made my back ache.

We had 2 hours in Muscat airport which allowed for coffee, security and walking between gates. The second flight was much less crowded and we were served another full meal with drinks (2 hours 45 minutes) which is something most European airlines have stopped doing on shorthaul.

Through immigration really fast in Goa and Bob’s case came off early. Then dread set in as my case was nowhere to be seen. When we checked the Apple Airtag, it just shoed the case had been in Muscat abut 3 hours ago. Bob went off to speak to the baggage desk and then baggage carrousel began to splutter to a halt and the crowds thin. I was full of dread as it would mean I had literally the clothes i stood up in. clothes bought for January London, not 32C Goa. Then… just as all hope was extinguished and despair set in….. up it popped. God knows where it had been… but I had it.

We got an airport taxi – a big estate car – 5500 INR to Patnem. Things got a bit confused when the taxi guy chased after us because it turned out we’d given him 3000 of the money in Sri Lankan rupees…… We sorted it out and set off on the 2.5 hour journey. We were so glad to reach the Tubki Resort in Patnem. It was the first place we ever stayed here back in 2010. We have a ground floor 1 bed apt for tonight and they have given us the one we always name Joe and Janet’s room after our friends, the lovely Dunlops, who always stayed in it.

We didn’t unpack, just got a few necessities out, had massive showers, and then went down to Eve’s Resort to say hello to Marylyn and to drop off some stuff for Heather and Chris. Lovely to see them all again.

Then we went down to the beach for dinner and met Joseph and Janet. It was lovely walking down the lane with all the traders and tuk tuk drivers coming out to greet us and say hello. We had dinner at Tantra under the stars. I had palak Paneer washed down by 2 gins and 1 tonic. Bob had prawn masala, rice, an onion paratha, a gin and tonic and a beer. It was £17 for the lot. Lovely lovely to be there again. Cant wait to explore properly over the next weeks.