Kelva Fort

Saturday, September 24, 2011

I decided to visit the forts of Palghar on a Saturday as Palghar is very close to Mumbai. Palghar district houses more than eight forts.

Palghar is located at a distance of 112 km from Mumbai. It is located near the Maharashtra–Gujarat border and can be approached by rail and road. Palghar is a quiet place with plenty of greenery. The roads are very narrow yet very scenic. Small and lovely houses dot both sides of the road.

I visited this sea fort along with my friend Nimish, who had earlier accompanied me to Kanheri Caves. We took the Virar Dahanu shuttle from Virar station. It took us approximately 45 minutes to reach Virar from Andheri. The shuttles are never on time. Ours was delayed by 15 minutes. In the end, it took us 40 minutes to reach Palghar station from Virar.

Kelva Fort

From Palghar, you can take ST (Stat Transport) buses and tum tum's to go to Kelva beach. We boarded the ST bus so that we could have a chat with locals regarding what we could look forward to seeing in Kelva as we were quite new to the place and there was not much information available online.

The driver of our bus turned out to be a very environmentally conscious guy. At one of the stops on the way, there were many people who wanted to alight. The driver actually shut down the engine. I was duly impressed. There aren’t many people who would remember to do that.

It took us around 30 minutes to reach Kelva beach. The beach houses a Sitladevi temple. This temple is a must-see on the itinerary of Hindus.

Fishing boats at Kelva Fort

To reach the fort we need to walk across the beach for at least an hour. The beach is covered by sur trees. We started walking towards the fort. However, as the sea was rough, it being the time of the high tide, we could not get close to the fort but were forced to see it from a distance. The fort was well fortified with the walls intact. This was indeed surprising, considering that it was built in the 16th century.

Disappointed at not being able to explore the interiors of the fort, we walked back to Kelva beach. On the way back, we saw that the fisherfolk had laid out their dried fish on thin bamboo sticks. The dry fish business in Kelva is a very lucrative one.

We had some snacks at a dhaba on Kelva beach. We asked the locals about the history of the fort. They told us that it was built by the Portuguese in the 16th century and that it was later conquered by Shivaji. The fort is rectangular in shape and it can be visited only by climbing the walls. They also informed us that there is nothing much to see in the fort.

Kelva Fort

Maybe they had read our disappointment on our faces and were trying to console us.

After having our snacks we decided to head for Shirgaon Fort located in Palghar.