Oct 03, 2008 08:55 PM
20579 Views
I decided to visit Kashid this weekend, we booked a Tavera and this
trip was along with office friends, we set off from Pune at around
6:00 am in the morning taking the route from Mulshi and Tamhini ghats,
we decided first to visit Janjira fort and from there move towards
Kashid, early morning was chilly in Pune and by the time we reached
Mulshi, we halted at a restaurant to have morning breakfast, the view
across Mulshi river was great, early morning breeze, mountains engulfed
in cloud cover, sunlight illuminating river water, we stopped some
distance ahead of the restaurant to take some pictures.
As we started heading towards Tamhini ghats, we were driving through
clouds and the whole journey across ghats offered breathtaking views,
waterfalls, cloud view just looked like a heaven pave way in the valley
below, we halted again in the ghats at a waterfall and took some
pictures again, saw some monkeys jumping around high on trees, the road
from Mulshi towards Murud Janjira fort is bumpy and in bad condition,
we reached Murud at around 11:30 am, it’s a sleepy town with small
lanes and relies fishery and tourism business, after booking a boat
ride towards the fort, we boarded a sailboat at 12:00 pm.
The boat owner narrated the history of the fort during the course of
the journey, they also offer a guide to you who would be on the boat,
buying things like mineral water, cold drinks, snacks and food is
costly here, when we reached fort it was high tide, sea waves were
lashing hard on fort walls as we jumped on to the fort entrance stairs
from the boat and decided to first go without guide since he was
charging 150 bucks for 7 of us, you need to bargain with them and we
settled for 100 bucks, There is not much to see in the fort, since this
was my second visit to the fort, and anyways you can scan through the
history of this fort on Wikipedia, there are cannons placed on the top
of the fort, a sweet water pond in the fort, remains of settlement
within the fort, the darbar which was 7 storey’s tall now crumbled to 3
and half floors, ammunition chambers, market area in the fort, a mosque
and a temple, there is also a underground tunnel below sea which was
build to nearest hatii palace on the shore, this tunnel is now sealed,
the guide claimed people used to stay in this fort up to 1972, after
the government took control of the fort and evacuated people, this is
the lone fort from pre-independence India which was never won by
anyone, archeological department seems to be least interested to
maintain the fort and I could see the overgrowth of plants on fort
walls in comparison to my last visit.
We initially decided to have food at the restaurant near the fort at
shore, however they were going to take more time to deliver food so we
decided to head towards the beach and once we reached Kashid beach at
around 3:00 pm, we had snacks on the beach and hit the waters, the
beach is not shabby and was less crowded in comparison to crowd one
gets to see on weekends at other beach spots, I have captured beach
images and uploaded few pictures here and uploaded more pictures on my
flickr album -
https://flickr.com/photos/bhautikjoshi/sets/72157607699583113/
(would be uploading more pics keep checking).
Cart rides on mules are available on the beach, however I would suggest
do not go for them since I felt bad for the mules who were panting
looked very weak as one of the cart stopped behind me on the beach to
carry a fare, I could see the child driving the cart whipping away
those mules, as they were finding it difficult to move fast, a whole
family was on the cart with kids and parents, it was a very painful
view, just take care you dont hurt your feet with small rocks on shore
which are not noticeable during high tide.
Once we were out of the waters we decided to dry ourselves and change
clothes, for girls there is a tin made enclosure on the beach, however
we guys had to head to a bushy area opposite beach which had a small
water stream of clear water running down the hills up to the beach, we
washed ourselves clean with a bath and were set to go back home.
We drove towards Alibaug to have dinner for evening at Hotel Sanman
which has good sea food to offer, since I am a veggie I had a Veg thali
which was okay in taste, not spicy or sweet, do not miss to have
“Solkadi” similar to butter milk made out of coconut milk if you happen
to visit any tourist spot on the Konkan belt, there are resorts to stay
nearby Kashid beach, we were not going to have an overnight stay so we
did rent any place, we took the route towards expressway from Khopoli
exit and reached Pune by 11:30 in the night it did not take much time
since the road was very good in condition, it was a great trip over
all, nice place to visit for weekend.
