Jawhar Trip

I was travelling in Dwarka( You can click here to read about Dwarka trip) when I received a message from my friend Ajay as to whether I would be interested in joining him for the road trip to Jawhar, though I was travelling and knew that there would be hardly a gap of 2-3 days between my 5 days trip of Gujarat and this trip I was still not deterred away and I said I'll be joining him. Dil toh pagal hai...🎼🎼

Dil toh Pagal hai

Talking of Jawhar, you will be surprised to know that it is actually a hill station at around 440 metres above sea level. More than its hill station exploits its more visited for the the palace and   Waterfall ! 

The best time to visit Jawhar is in monsoon , but as we are incorrigible wanderers so seasons are not a constraint for us. Ab jo dil kiya, toh  nikal pade hum. 

Team all set to go

Our Journey:

We are early birds🌞 hence I started from my house at around 5:30 am and reached Mira Road Railway station where one of our friend was getting a car. One car and 4 of us singing Suhana safar aur yeh mausam hasin  🎼🎼 we were off to our Weekend Wandering. 

We took to the Mumbai Ahmedabad Highway, the morning was still dark, sun was just trying to come out of the blankets of clouds and apni toh bas... Manu bhai ghadi chali pum pum...🎼🎼🎼

When we were planning this trip I remembered that there is a Lake by the name of Vandri.

Sunrise at Vandri Lake

 So I requested Ajay that we will make a diversion of 5-6 kms and visit Vandri which we did. Morning sunrise near the lake is always an enchanting experience and we were the lucky one to be present there. Enjoyed the place and moved on to the highway again

Wont you like to spend sometime here ?

Amazing place with even more amazing friends

We took our breakfast halt at Datta Snacks, grabbed few hot Wada Pav and Misal and soon was on our way. If you are going from Mumbai to Jawhar, one needs to take a right after crossing Mastan Naka flyover. (Landmark is Manor Telephone exchange.) But as we all wanted to have Darshan of Mahalaxmi so we all decided that we will first go to Dahanu Mahalaxmi temple and later from there we will go to Jawhar. Thus we skipped this right and went till Charoti Naka  and with hardly a kilometre away we came across the Mahalaxmi Temple.

Shops in front of the Mahalaxmi Temple 

Mahalaxmi Temple of Dahanu

Luckily as we were early so there was not much of a crowd. We had a quick Darshan, clicked few pictures of some interesting artifacts and were again on our way. 

Veergad or Victory stone

Interesting artefacts

We came out of the temple and took the highway but turned left to go to Charoti naka again and took left on Jawhar-Dahanu road or Kasa village side to be more precise.

Dry trees dotted the Jawhar road

This serpentine road went about through villages, forest which in the month of February was not at all looking attractive but I can promise you that in monsoon this same route will take your breath away.

Dont get fooled by these dry trees,
In monsoon they spell magic !

We took our photo break at Kasatwadi, where they have built a watch tower kind of thing. (One can have a good look of valley from here) 

We all dashed and climbed the tower in no time but the structure was too shaky for my liking , the wooden planks at the top platform was in a very bad state, Pata chal photo ke chaker me upar se crash land  but then Men will be men  Jeeye gaya marega , Saala photo ke liye kuch bhi karega.😀

Photo ke liye kuch bhi karega

We all had a good photo session here for sometime and boarded our car once again.

Our next stop was Jai Vilas Palace.

Jai Vilas Palace

It is a small but very nice palace built by Raje Yeshwant Rao Maukne at Jawhar.

 This place could have offered much more grandiose than what it is offering today. Such beautiful palace lying in utter neglect. Itna neglected ki ek sign board bhi nahi lagaya for direction from the road. 

Its owner Maukne Family I was told is currently staying in Pune. The Palace is taken care by the caretaker who resides just next to it. One can see the interior by requesting the caretaker.The door to the Palace was locked. so we took the opportunity to do a photo shoot.

Locked Door and Photo Shoot

The place is built in the syenite stone, brought from an quarry at Sakhara, which is 12 km from its location. It is said that when the work of the palace was completed, the quarry from, which the stones were extracted was broken down and covered; the exact location of the quarry is lost in time. The Geological Department, of Government of India has now taken up a task to locate the lost quarry. Due to its unique architecture style and location, the palace has featured in several films in Marathi and Hindi.viz Great Grand Masti (Source:Wikipedia)

Starcast of Great Great Grand Masti 😄😄

Just next to Jai Vilas Palace is Hanuman Point. Its basically a temple and also a kind of viewing gallery from where you can see valley on three sides.

The valley is 500 feet deep and one can see Mahuli fort from here during the day time and at night one can see the lights of train passing through Kasara Ghat. Hanuman Point is also called Devkobacha Kada.

Hanuman Point

We moved out from here to check out our next stop which was  Jawhar Fort but was hugely disappointed to see that there was no such fort only a huge gate. 

The only remains of Jawhar Fort

We left from here to go to Jai Sagar Dam and on the way came across a Clock tower san the clock

Clock Tower

Clock ke naam per sirf hollow hole. Anyways photo le liya socha sayad koi blog pad kar Clock lagane ki soch le 😄 


We diverted from the main road and took a left from the clock tower. The road to Jai Sagar dam was quite narrow but thank fully good in condition, in few minutes we were at the Jai Sagar Dam.

Jai Sagar Dam

Jai Sagar Dam is a small reservoir with beautiful trees across. As per the placard on the Dam, This dam was inaugurated by Yeshwant Rao Maukne on 14 th Sept, 1961 and Rs 12,27,158=00 was spent on its construction.

As usual Our WE WERE HERE MOMENT 😜

 we spent some time enjoying the beauty of the place  feeling the cool breeze and the shade.Apna mandatory photo shoot suru ho gaya , lekin kya kare yatri ko araam kahan... usse toh mazile pukarti hai.

We now started to move towards Khad Khad Dam.As we drove the road was getting bad to worse hence driving was becoming a task kyo ki puri ghadi hi khad khad karne ne lagi thi.😉 

Khad Khad Dam

Ab samjha is dam ka naam khad khad kyo pada Anyway jokes apart, we saw this dam from far and took the pictures. The climate was very hot so no one dared to climb the wall of the dam to have a closer look. Zoom kar ke camera se view dekh liya 😜

Close look of Khad Khad Dam

The road from this place to go to Dabhosha water fall was getting worse. At one point laga ki Tractor me aana chaiye. We were infact planing to take a you turn and go via the main road, but then we saw a villager driving his wife on motorcycle, coming from opposite side, he encouraged us to risk it and go further.

Just imagine driving thru this barren land.

Thankfully we joined the main road again and were on course to Dabhosha Waterfall.It was 2:45 by the time we reached Dabhosha Waterfall. The road was very very bad , pata nahi barish me log kaise aate hai. Would you believe that even in the month of Feb we were able to see the water falling in a waterfall.

Just watching the waterfall all the tiredness of the journey evaporated and we were so happy to be here.

Dabhosha Waterfall

The heat was full on, the stomach was screaming with hunger and worse there was nothing available to eat , but trekkers that we are we do keep little bit with us. Ab joh bhi tha hum sab ne mil bantkar kha liye pyar se. We decided against going to the waterfall as we had to descend atleast 150 feet in the valley and later come up too ! we were hard pressed for time so we skipped taking a dip in the water and kept it for the rainy day (Literally) 😀.

We quickly drove back but not before hogging on a watermelon sold by the villager and later gulping chilled sweet lassi and Paneer Pakodas at Bhajanlal Dairy.

It was 8 pm when we reached Mira Road. A Sunday well spent should I must say.

I want to thank Dr Ajay, Jatin Shah and Ajinkya for allowing me to share their pictures, and Pritesh for driving his car and bringing us safely back.

Shirgaon Fort, Palghar

Another weekend was round the corner and nothing was planned for the weekend wanderer within me so I thought let me try out something nearby, hence Sunday Morning I took 7;40 am shuttle train from Virar Station  to Palghar because this weekend my destination will be Shirgaon Fort in Palghar,

Shirgaon Fort, I was given to understand is some 13 kms away from the Palghar Station. I took ST bus from Palghar Station to go to Shirgoan fort. The bus frequency I was told is quite good.One needs to catch buses going to Satpati to reach this fort.

ST bus to Satpati all set to go

A bus journey of half an hour and I was dropped at a coastal village,The Bus Conducter said "Aap Masjid ke stop per utar jana " actually this stop is before Satpati. I got down before Sarpati as I saw this huge Masjid along the road.

Masjid is the landmark to get down from ST bus

 After getting down the bus I took direction from the locals and  started walking for few minutes through the coastal village towards the Shirgaon Fort.

Sleepy coastal village

In few minutes I reached the main entrance of the Shirgaon Fort.

Shirgoan Fort Main Entrance

Before setting my foot on the fort let me brush up some history about the fort.

HISTORY:
Historical name of Shirgaon during Portuguese ruling was Sirgão. Locals told me that this fort was built by the Portuguese though I could not find much history about this fort except that this fort was later won by the Marathas in 1738 along with the Dahanu Fort, Tarapur, Kelve and Asherigad Fort under the able leadership of Chimaji Appa. However in 1818 the Britisher captured this Fort.

Fort in Ruins

This been a land fort hence no trekking is required, one can simply walk in from the road to reach the entrance of the fort. Standing in front of the fort we see Minar or tower on the right side and a gate next to that. Minar construction some how gives the impression of Mughal architecture Just at the entrance on the right side are inscriptions dating the origin of this fort to 1714 A.D.

 Frontal view of Fort from outside

As soon as we enter the fort from the door we immediately come across a big entrance door on the left side which leads into central courtyard of the fort.

Interesting architecture 

 The structure near the entrance lies in a ruined state today, tall walls and small windows atop them spells the historic tale unknown to us in today's time. I am sharing few pictures of lost glory .

Tall walls with windows

Tales of lost glory

Door leading to central courtyard

 The moment I entered through the door to central courtyard I saw a large ground with some ruined structure on the right side which looked like rooms probably for soldiers or for holding their rations.

Stairs leading to the rampart of the fort

Inside View of Large halls

I explored the inside, actually not much to see. I came out and as there was stairs which were leading to the top walls of the fort.This fort so reminded me of Arnala Fort ( You can click the link to read about Arnala fort here) near Virar.

These stone stairs going up ends on the ramparts of the fort which one can easily circumvent.I started to walk on the top. There are 5 Bastions on this fort.

View from the ramparts of the quarters,Rooms of soldiers

Walking on the ramparts of the fort just across from where I was standing I could see a white structure perched on the bastion so naturally started to move toward it to explore.

But before reaching this bastion I came across one more bastion. which has the usual windows and circular construction.

Moving forward from here I made my way to the white structure perched on the northern bastion.
The spiral stairs take you to the top.Its quite sad to see lots of graffiti on the walls, How I wish people start respecting their heritage.

Upon reaching the top of this bastion I could see the whole fort and the most prominent thing was the multi branch Palm tree...wow must be one of its kind.

Unique multi branch Palm tree

Bird's eye view from the Bastion.

After spending some time here I went on to explore the other bastion which we saw at the entrance door.

Bastion on the other end, waiting to be explored

Bastion from ground level

Exploration of these ancient forts is always an adventure because we often come across secret tunnels, caves etc. Shirgoan fort too has its quota of such historical mysteries.

Doors to unknown

The sun was hitting me hard and I think I have seen all that I can see so felt it was time to move on now back home. Shirgoan Fort is a small fort which you can explore in two hours. Do visit it if you are at Palghar.

Watch the video here for the Shirgoan Trek

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