Gokarna -A world of its own.
The time span between my visit to Gokarna and my wish to visit the place was nothing less than six years, but it was worth the wait.
Gokarna is located in the Western Ghat, in Uttar Kannada district of Karnataka .It takes 9 hours (485.1 KM) for one to drive from Bangalore and 3 hours (144.3 KM) from Goa.
What I expected out of Gokarna was ,
1.)Generously cluttered and unclean beach with a beauty which once was and now all that is left is lots of packets of food items , empty semi rotten tender coconut shells and empty bottles of beer and soft drinks.
2.)Hawkers selling food items , fake Mercury bangles (apparently My boyfriend loves them ) , Soap bubble (I like them ) and a lot of other unnecessary items which would absolutely crowd the sea beach with a little patch almost into the sea to walk on the beach.
3.)An average hotel room (given the price we were paying ) with basic facilities like a clean washroom , Airconditioning and safe .
I was not being a pessimist but my expectations were on the basis of my previous experiences I had at all the beaches I have visited in India.
But here I am writing a blog on this place which absolutely awed me by its everything that makes it the most beautiful beach I have ever visited.
Below is the list of 10 reasons why Gokarna is a must visit,
1.) Gokarna is a white sand paradise, spectacularly clean and unimaginably unpopulated.Surrounded by trek friendly hillsides, all the beaches of Gokarna is like private paradise in the cocoon of mountains.The beaches and the water was clean enough for me to spend an entire morning and part of the afternoon on the beach playing frisbee.Number of local hawkers almost none,number of tourists were also very less, hence no one to bug you or ogle at you unnecessarily .
2.) Hotel we stayed in was hotel extremely reasonable, clean and amidst the nature.Most of the hotels around provide great facilities and is not as commercialised as more popular places like Goa.Most of the hotels have an option to attend Yoga classes too.There are few cafes at the beach.We discovered an awesome drink ,known as “Lemon Anna” concoction of mint-lemon-ice-water-sugar,this one is a must try.
3.)On the second day of our trek we went trekking from OM beach to Paradise beach, one of the most memorable hike.We two were the only one on the hike and the trail was sometime dissolved in the forest,hence you make a trail of your own,the whole idea of being absolutely alone and exploring an unexplored path left me exhilarated and a bit scared too.The view of the sea from the hill top is breathlessly beautiful.
4.)I got to see dolphins for the first time in my life at Gokarna, on our way back from the hike ,we hired a speed boat and the boatman also promised us to take us to a point where we can view Dolphins.The scene of the dolphins shooting out of the water as they played under the beautiful morning sun was priceless.
5.)Other than all of the above points, what felt like a differentiating factor is that,inspite of the less crowd, the place seemed safe and can be very well be traveled by a solo traveler.We visited the local markets, temples,shops and surroundings and it seemed to be pretty much conducive.
I try not to visit a place twice, at least not intentionally,because I feel there are too many places to visit,and the days we have are few :)However, given a choice to visit a place with an extra day to live ,I will certainly visit Gokarna and do everything all over again!
