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:
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.
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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.
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- 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.
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