Tag Archives: Fort Aguada

Exploring Goa – XIX – Tiracol Fort

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Kartik Kannan, continues taking you on his Goa trail, and the next destination in the series as we go further north, is the magnificent fort-hotel by the Arabian Sea- Tiracol Fort.

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Once you have boarded at the Tiracol Side of the land, you need to find a way to get to Tiracol fort. There are 2 places that the boat can leave you, depending on whether it’s a public boat or a private boat. The private boat leaves you in a slippery part of the land, from which the fort is about 400 metres by walk, and it costs anywhere between 200-300 for 3 people in a boat. The public ferry is free if you’ve come vehicle-less. My suggestion is to bring your 2 wheeler on the ferry, and drive your way back to the fort. This is the best option to commute, else you can take a private taxi/auto and pay 200 Rs for a round trip. 2 kilometres and 10 minutes later a wonderful fort opens up.

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The Orange all over welcomes you, and the slender chairs in black against the Orange walls, subtly lets you know the classiness of the place.

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As you walk out of the entrance, you see the kitchen on your right and…

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….The rooms on your left. The rooms are curiously named after every day of the week. You can book your rooms if you like the place, through Stayzilla.com.

7The Fort has this area for a foyer where guests can meet up. It looks very Portuguese in its architecture.

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Exploring Goa – XVI – Kerim

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By Kartik Kannan

-4Kerim opens out to a wonderful vista, that leaves you spell bound!

-3Try getting into the sea to visualize the view the sea has of the land, and you’l realize what a charmed life the Arabian sea has!

-9Try to find your spot in the sun/shade, in getting a shack for resting. The whole agenda at Kerim is best suited for Sussegadoing! Sleep, Eat, Walk in the sand in an infinite loop.

-8Nothing better than welcoming a sun rise or sunset from your beach bed!

-7If you’ve rested enough, climb up the mountain again to jump off it from with your paragliding equipment. It feels sublime to float over the Arabian sea!

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Exploring Goa – XII – Candolim (Coco Beach)

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Kartik Kannan continues exploring the scenic beauty of Candolim.

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The creek is about 5 minutes drive from Fort Aguada on a motored vehicle and about half hour by walk from the fort. This tourist attraction also helps you plan boat trips around the Mandovi.

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A map of the location of the Coco Beach is shown below.

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The next point of call is the lovely little beach that opens out, behind the Kingfisher Villa on Condolim Beach. Take the trouble of spotting on the main road, the Kingfisher Villa, and you will find a small path, a kilometer long to the beach. The beach opens out to great vistas, with palm trees in the background, and lovely breeze hitting you as sit back on the sand to enjoy the Arabian sea.

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On the beach(at least till 2012), you will comes across the deserted ship, that’s rusting and lying in the Arabian sea since 2000. The ‘M V River Princess’ was a huge oil tanker ship, that came here to rest once in troubled weather, and has stayed since then, much to the curious onlooker. There was a plan being made to break the ship, as 12 years of the ship, lying on the sea resulted in huge sand erosion on the beautiful Condolim Beach. A few locals feel that taking the ship off the sea, could create a false current in the sea with a depression, that may lead to drowning. It’s better to check with the authorities on the beach, if ever you to plan to head out for swimming at Condolim beach.

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The Arabian that looks calm behind the ship, also roars when the monsoon hits Goa between June and September. It can be a quite a sight to do just have sea gazing in your Goan agenda.

Exploring Goa – XI – Candolim (Fort Aguada)

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Kartik Kannan, moves on to the next place-Condolim in this Goa series. Condolim is an area north of Panjim, across of the Mandovi, which is the beginning of a series of beautiful and popular beaches stretching from Condolim to Baga(with Sinquerim, Calangute being the other beaches on this stretch). Condolim is home to a lovely coastline that plays host to Sunburn- a music festival in Decemeber, a lovely river creek(Coco Beach), an idyllic deserted ship and Fort Aguada. Join Kartik in taking yet another vicarious trip down North Goa’s sunny coastline!

Candolim Map

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Wherever you go in Condolim, you are greeted with advertisements for ‘Titos’s,  which is a famous nightclub in Goa, that has become a permanent fixture for tourists in Goa. What’s visibly seen in Condolim are road signs that read Calangute, Titos and Baga. Titos, though is close to Baga beach, enjoys a cult status of a being called a place by the local administration, as its so much in demand. You are never far away from these signs that throng Condolim.

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As you snake through a bend on a hill from the Taj Fort Aguada hotel, you come across the state jail, and Fort Aguada. Read more about Fort Aguada here-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Aguada.

Wikipedia says that a freshwater spring within the fort provided water supply to the ships that used to stop by. This is how the fort got its name: Aguada, meaning Water. Crews of passing ships would often visit to replenish their fresh water stores. A freshwater spring within the fort provided water supply to the ships that used to stop by. This is how the fort got its name: Aguada, meaning Water. Crews of passing ships would often visit to replenish their fresh water stores.

Fort Aguada was repurposed for use as a prison primarily, some claim. Many of its inmates are Western tourists serving time for drug-related crimes

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Fort Aguada is a popular place for shooting movies. One of the more famous scenes shot against the backdrop of the fort Aguada, was the film ‘The Monsoon’ by Jag Mundhra. It had a young couple, filmed in the rains, with love and lust in their eyes, against the backdrop of the fort. A preview of the scene shot is shown below, and a link to the complete movie is shown here.

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Fort Aguada was the most prized and crucial fort of Portuguese. The fort is so large that it envelops the entire peninsula at the south western tip of Bardez. Built on the mouth of river Mandovi, it was strategically located and was the chief defence of Portuguese against the Dutch and Marathas.

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As you head on your way down, you’d pass a silent creak that feeds into the Mandovi. It’s lovely to put some music on, and sit by the creek, and hope that the monsoon finds its way to make it more pleasant.

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Exploring Goa-VIII- Moving From Aswem To Morjim

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Kartik Kannan continues his photoblog exploration of Goa. This certainly is one of the most detailed description of the dream destination. More to come soon. 

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One could ride a vehicle on Aswem beach during the low tides. Suprising that this is the same beach that has surfs coming, in the deeper confines of the sea. This place has a surfing school called ‘Banana School of Surfing’, in case you are interested and land up at Aswem Beach.

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On a Hot day, local kulfi ice creams are your default dessert options!

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From Awem, you pass a beach called Morjim, which is also home to a turtle hatchery farm. Half a kilometer aling the coast, and about 10 miles by road is a scenic village called Chapora. From the village is an interesting mountain trek up Chapora Fort. In the image you see wonderful view of the Chapora river being intersected by the Mountains over Vagator, and stretches of Morjim Beach in the distance.

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Lots of ‘friends’s come along in groups, sit at the fort and renew their vows ‘Dil Chahta Hain’ style. ‘Hum Dost They, Hain Aur Rahenge’ was shot here. A lot of people mistake this scene to be shot at Fort Aguada, which is not true.

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-View of the side of the fort, where you park your vehicles and climb up.

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Exploring Goa-VII- The Aswem Beach Cure

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Kartik Kannan offers some interesting glimpses of a beach thats extremely quiet, personal and just the getaway you needed to cut yourself off from work. Aswem is a fishing village that has some very scenic palm trees swaying to a little lake(formed during the tides), across a beach that is flat for quite some distance, before the surfs lap up all the latent energy in the sea. Its also home to Goa’s only surfing school along the coast. Kartik’s discovered his little patch of sand, and has made vows to the sea, that he will be back.

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Observing the Ocean Waves against the rocks on a long camera exposure!

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A little Tree House like hut, right next to our hotel. We ate our lunch and ‘Sussegadoed’ our afternoon here! One had to climb the steps to get upstairs on the lounge.

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A little Tree House like hut, right next to our hotel. We ate our lunch and ‘Sussegadoed’ our afternoon here! One had to climb the steps to get upstairs on the lounge.

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View from the lunch-house!

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No one these days, can be at a beach without their mobiles or cameras! Can They? It’s a lot of fun and less tension when there are no gadgets around!

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