Alibag-Kashid-Murud

I visited Alibag-Kashid-Murud during this diwali holidays. It is a very nice place to spend a weekend provided you get good booking.

Timings and Route: I started from Pune on 15th at 7:15 AM. I took the route shown here i.e. Pune-Pune Expressway towards Mumbai-Khopoli-Pen-Poinad-Alibag-Kashid-Murud. We reached Alibag at around 11 AM and spent around an hour on the beach. We had our breakfast at Sun Glow Resorts. The food was pretty good but a bit pricey. We left Alibag at around 12:30 PM and reached Murud at 2:30 PM. During our visit, it was bhau bij-tij-chauth so the high tide timing was around 11:30 AM to 1:30 PM. So we reached Alibag at the right time but by the time we reached Murud, it was low tide and we couldn't spend much time on the beach.

Tariffs: The list of tariffs is long and here it goes:

• I had hired a Tata Indigo with a driver for three days. Generally it costs around INR 9 per km with a minimum of 300 KM per day for an Indigo but I bargained that it will not be 900 KM for three days for us (and it really turned out to be just 550 KM trip) so I was able to get for INR 7650 plus INR 100 per night halt for a driver.
• There are a lot of toll collection booths between Pune and Murud. 
  • Mumbai Pune Expressway - INR 126 till lonavla. If you take old mumbai-pune highway, you can reduce this to INR 62. There was no traffic on old mumbai-pune highway in the morning when I went on 15th but the expressway was having a lot of traffic when I returned in the evening on 17th.
  • Alibag - INR 20
  • Poinad - INR 20
  • Murud - INR 15
• I stayed at Sand Piper Resorts. The resort offers three different kinds of rooms, 100% sea view, 70% sea-view and no sea-view. The tariff chart gives you the expenses the hotel charges during normal season but because of Diwali, the rates were hiked by 15%. The rooms were average but were lacking a lot of facilities such as
  • Hot water
  • Intercom
  • One room didn't have working hand-shower in the toilet.
  • The swimming pool wasn't clean. There weren't any transat kept near the pool. There were no air-bed provided to just relax in the pool while reading a book or listening to music.
  The food was average. The staff was quite co-operative and gave us hot water buckets delivered to our bathroom whenever we asked for. I would give a 3 out of 5 to the hotel since it wasn't value for money.

Activities: There were a lot of places to visit. Here is the list:

• There are places along the route to stop and take snaps.
• Murud Beach: The beach is not a white sand beach stretching around 1.75 KM. The local janta calls it a chowpatty. It has boat-ride, horse-ride, and some other activities.
• Janjira Fort: This is a very old fort built around the year 1140 on an island. 
• Kashid Beach: This is a white sand beach stretching around 3 KM. There are some water sports as well as horse ride.
• Birla Temple: This is situated just near Revdanda bridge. The aarti takes place at around 7:15 PM in the evening. Mobile and cameras are not allowed in the temple but women are spared so one can carry cameras in her bag/purse.
• Phansad Wildlife Sanctuary: It is situated between Murud and Kashid and remains open till 6 PM. It requires around 2 hours of walk so plan it either in the morning or just after lunch. We reached there at around 5 PM and no desire to walk for two hours, we skipped the visit.

All in all, it was a trip worth visiting.

Kaas Plateau Bamnoli Sajjangadh

I visited Kaas Plateau, Bamnoli backwaters and Sajjangadh fort yesterday with my family. If you have not visited it even after you are staying in Pune for quite some time with your family and kids, then I would say it is sad.

Timings: I had decided to visit the place with four other families from our housing society but unfortunately nobody showed up so I just hired a cab and went solo. The cab was booked to come at 6:30 in the morning but it reached at 7:15 and then instead of me it picked up somebody else from some other housing society. When I called the driver at 7:45, he dropped the other customer wherever he was and came back to pick me up so finally we left at 8:15. I would suggest you start early so that you can visit Thoseghar waterfall too.

How to reach: I took the route shown here. From chandani chowk, take the highway towards Bangalore and continue till Satara. When you are just leaving Satara, there is a flyover which you have to go underneath and take the right turn towards Kaas. You will actually go through Satara city. Make sure you take proper turn towards Bogda (Tunnel). When you reach Bogda, take right before tunnel towards Kaas and if you want to go to Sajjangadh, go beyond tunnel and then take right.

Parking: The Kaas Pathar is a no-parking zone so you better drop your family there and then go ahead 1-1.5 KM where you are allowed to park your car and then come back.

Tariffs: Satara Forest Department charges INR 10 per person when you enter Kaas. You also have to shell out INR 50 if you carry a camera. The cab I took charged me INR 8 per KM. From my home to Kaas, it is around 150 KM. To go to Sajjangadh, you have to come back to tunnel and then it is 15-20 KM more. So the total trip came to around 400 KM which costed me around INR 3200. The boat-ride in Bamnoli backwaters charge INR 450 for a boat of 6 people.

Food: I had searched for some restaurants/hotels in Satara and found 'Radhika Palace Hotel', 'Rajtara', 'Sagar Deluxe' all of them near Powai naka on the same road. I chose 'Radhika Palace Hotel' and ordered 'Poha', 'Dosa' and tea when we reached Satara at around 10:45. The food was average but the environment wasn't. The hotel stinked a lot and I decided not to come there again for food. In the afternoon at around 3:30 after visiting Kaas, when I came back to Satara, my wife found 'ShivSagar' and she thought most of the restaurants with that name generally offer good food. So we visited it and to our pleasant surprise, it was offering above average quality food. We ordered Hakka Noodles for my daughter and Naan+Roti and Veg Kadhai for ourselves. We finished our part but my daughter didn't take a single bite. So we took the noodles in parcel which my daughter did eat when we reached home at night.

Activities: Once you cross the toll collection booth on NH-4, both sides of the road is filled with bed-sheets of flowers. There were clouds in the sky and some of them were touching and playing with the mountain ranges of Sahyadri in front of our eyes. I had decided to take a nap along the way in the cab but the beauty of nature didn't allow me to blink my eyes.

• Kaas Pathar: When you reach Kaas, the beauty of the nature just astonishes you. The Satara-Kaas road is surrounded by two dams on two sides so when you travel in your car, you will just want to wait at several places and keep taking snaps. Once you reach Kaas, you will see nothing but bed-sheets of flowers on both sides and you will just feel sleeping on them. I felt like I am God Indra who is taking a stroll in the gardens of Heaven with my wife and daughter. The only problem was that it had rained a lot in the morning so most of the ground was wet and I didn't take the risk of spoiling my clothes by taking a nap on the bed-sheets of flowers.
• Bamnoli Backwaters: If you go beyond Kaas, you will reach Bamnoli backwaters where there is Shivajisagar lake and you can take boat-rides.
• Sajjangadh: This is a fort. We reached there at around 5:30 in the evening and it was getting very late and dark so we just reached its entrance and came back.

All in all, it was an amazing experience. Have fun visiting these places.

Company Offsite to Fort Jadhavgadh Hotel

I visited Fort Jadhavgadh Hotel today as part of company engineering offsite. It is a nice place to spend quality time with your friends/family if you just want to relax.

Timings: We started from our company office on Senapati Bapat Road in a Volvo bus at 8 in the morning and reached Fort Jadhavgadh Hotel at 9:30. The fort is obviously on a hill so there were lots of scenery along the way to capture. There were no clouds or rain otherwise it would have been much better.

How to reach: We took the route shown here. I don't know the exact route since I wasn't driving, but I did see the koregaon park-fatima nagar-saswad road combination.

Tariffs: The hotel website mentions charges of around INR 5000 for a night's stay in tent with complimentary breakfast. If you want to go for AP (breakfast + lunch + dinner), it costs INR 7000. Add INR 2000 if you go for a suite. We weren't going to stay overnight and the company only booked a conference room. I don't know the exact charges that the company paid.
Food:  We were served breakfast at 9:30 at the time of arrival, lunch at 2 and snacks at 4:30. All of them were delicious except for a few issues. The tea didn't have much milk, the poha was not cooked properly and in the lunch, the items were either very sweet or very spicy.

Activities: From arrival at 9:30 till 3:30, we were busy discussing the current and future of our company's software products but then we were set free to explore and play in the big ground the hotel has. People divided them among teams playing football, volleyball and cricket and I too tried my hands on cricket after a very long time. The hotel also has a swimming pool at the top but it was close at the time of our visit.
All in all, it is a nice place to visit and spend some quality time.

Tamhini Ghat

I visited Tamhini Ghat last Sunday with my family. It is a very nice place to spend some time with a group of friends and enjoy the waterfalls and the scenery on the way.

Timings: I started from my home in Aundh at 3:15 PM. The road I took was from Abhimanshri-Bawdhan-Pirangut-Paud-Mulshi-Tamhini shown here. There were lots of places to stop and take snaps but since we started late, I couldn't risk reaching late to the destination so I didn't stop at a lot of place. The road is pretty straight after chandani chowk and there are no turns anywhere to confuse you in reaching Tamhini. We reached there at around 5:15 PM.

Tariffs: There is a toll plaza along the way to Paud which charges INR 30 for two way and INR 20 for one way.

Activities: There are a lot of activities along the way. There is a turn just after you enter Paud where there is a nice place to rest and enjoy cool breeze.


There is a big waterfall when you reach Tamhini but while reaching there my wife's shoe-sole tore down and she lost her balance and got hurt badly. My daughter started crying and so I had to then put-off my plan to enjoy bathing in the waterfall. I also couldn't take any photos of the place and it was getting late and started raining so we decided to leave immediately. I would suggest to start a bit early latest by 1PM so that you reach the place before 4 and enjoy one - one and a half hours there. All in all, you can easily spend an evening with your friends there.

Company outing at Empower Activity Camp, Kolad

I visited Empower Activity Camp, Kolad last Friday as part of company outing. It is a very nice place to spend some time with a group of friends and enjoy rafting, trekking, shooting and several other activities.

Timings: We started from our company office at Senapati Bapat Road in a Mercedez Benz bus at 15:45 in the afternoon and reached at the Empower Activity Camp at around 18:30. There were lots of panoramic scenes along the way to capture but unfortunately we didn't take any stoppages except for emptying our bladders where I coudn't snap any photos.


How to reach: We took the route shown here. The route is only till Kolad but as per my understanding, I saw 'Roha' network being displayed on my phone so you might need to move a bit farther than that. Till halfway, the route is similar to reaching Tamhini Ghat. Since the bus was driven by somebody else, I don't know the exact route. I had just noticed pirangut and tamhini along the way and that's how I have provided the route. I got the following route from another website: Pune - Chandani Chowk - Pirangut - Paud - Mulshi - Tamhini Ghat - Vile Phata - Kolad.

Tariffs: The company website mentions charges of around 1800-2000 per person per day. The company had made bookings of around 50 people so we were allotted 2 dormitories for 18 people each and 4 tents for 4 people each. The dormitories had two ACs with three separate toilets and three bathrooms. The tents were air-cooled with one toilet and bathroom. We were provided with soaps, towels and blankets. I was told that the company paid around INR 3000 per person which I think is what is mentioned on the company website (1800 per person + 200 for Burma Bridge + 1300 for white water rafting on weekend).


Activities: There were a lot of activities that can be performed but some are included in the basic package while some are add-ons and separately need to be booked with extra charges. The company I am working in had arranged for:

• Target Shooting: After reaching the place, we had our evening snacks of tea with onion-pakoda and started with the first activity planned for us. There were some targets like human body, animals and water bottles set up for shooting. Everybody was provided five rounds of air-gun and I scored just two out of five. There were two bonus round if you shoot five out of five. Unlucky me.
• Night Trekking: We went on a night trek after the target shooting. The trek was full of jungle but there were no wild animals so everybody came back one-piece.
• Campfire: We had a nice campfire and a round of antakshari just before the dinner.
• Burma Bridge: We were woken up early at 5:30 in the morning just like military life. The activity was quite difficult for people with more weight and I too felt a bit of nervousness when I reached in the middle but it was still not too much of a hassle for me.
• Trust Track: In this, there was was one route of pits, roofs, fences, obstacles etc... The team of 8 was divided in 4 pairs. In each pair, one person would be blind-folded and the other person has to guide him/her in finishing the route. The blindfolded person can talk but the other person can only provide guidance by tapping head, leg or back or by any other gesture to the other person. One group leader is chosen first and shown the terrain and the he is supposed to provide all this information to the rest of the group in five minutes. The pits should be jumped upon, roofs should be cleared bending on knees and fences and obstacles should be cleared without touch.
• White-water rafting: We left the camp in a tempo to reach the Kundalika riverside. There is a dam built on the river which releases water everyday at around 10:30 AM that makes rafting possible in the river. We enjoyed some time before the water was released. When the water got released, we got training about the commands and what action to take for a command. The whole route was almost 14 KM and it took around two hours and thirty minutes to complete it.

All in all it was a trip worth remembering for the rest of my life.

Phoenix Market City, Viman Nagar

I visited Phoenix Market City, Viman Nagar last Thursday. It is a nice place to spend an evening with your family.

Timings: The mall remains open from 11AM to midnight. We reached the mall at around 8 PM and left at around 10:15 PM.

How to reach: The mall is around 15 KM from Aundh. It is on Samrat Ashok Road in Viman Nagar and is easily reachable.

Parking: The mall has ample parking facilities and charges Rs 20 for car. Do make sure you remember the pillar number where you park your car since there are four sections A, B, C and D and each section has 16 parking areas. If you forget to remember the pillar and come back at a time when it is full, God help you in finding your car!!!

Fees: There were no entry fees to the mall. There were a group of guys playing guitars but there were no charges for it.

Attractions: There are a lot of attractions including

• Branded apparel and footwear stores including Bata, Raymond, Allen Solly, and many more.
• A lot of eateries including SubWay, McDonald's, etc... and we had a nice dinner at Rajdhani. The two empty katories had aam-ras and custard poured later.

• There is a gaming area at the top floor of the mall where you can find a lot of rides and games including dodgem cars, a toy train, etc...

All in all, it is a nice place to spend an evening with your family.