>It took me a while to get to a place where I feel completely relaxed. The first place I landed was a fairly basic group of shacks immediately behind the main beach of Palolem. 

It was the same for me. I felt like in Palolem all the shacks were kind of fucked up :D Agonda definitely offered better accommodations. But i ended up staying for a week somewhere in the north near arambol. I liked it there the most.