Reliving the past experiences - Purnagad Fort.
I was looking at some old photos and I came across a photo of a signboard which spelt, in Hindi, "Purnagad 2Km / Rajapur 41Km" Since taking that photo that day I had tried, on a few earlier occasions, to find this Fort on the internet, to find more info, but since the signboard was in Hindi I did not have an exact spelling to work on. And failing to find any good leads after putting in half-hearted efforts I had given up as there usually was something more important or pressing to do. This time around though I had nothing much on my mind and I was curious to find a piece of memory of my past so I tried a few variants and voila! I found the name of the Fort and once I got that name I was able to find other pages giving me map coordinates a few photos and some odd details but nothing exhaustive.
I was travelling, alone, on my motorcycle - off on a road trip with no particular time schedule or destination. Each morning I would open up Google Maps and try to find the next big town on my route within reachable distance - usually 200-300 km and then zoom in to find the local villages. This is one of the things I found out and learned early on, when I started traveling alone, that if you are going to ask local people for directions, then you best know the name of the next village or town as they would know the route to that but would not necessarily know the route to the big city - this little nugget is especially useful when your route does not involve taking Highways but local roads.
So back to the story - I was traveling alone, was in Maharashtra and heading, via the coastal route, towards Goa. That morning I left from Ratnagiri towards Vengurle which is just on the border of Goa - just about 50 Kms from Goa.. So I was travelling down the road and I come across this sign-board saying that there is this fort about 2km off my route. I had been travelling for five days on my motorcycle, this was the sixth day and although I was in no hurry I was getting a bit tired from all the riding but luckily decided to just have a peek. I spent my childhood in Gwalior and there is this big fort in Gwalior and I guess because of that I am a bit partial towards forts. So, I turned my motorcycle in the said direction and it turned out to be a village road. There was hardly any traffic, in-fact I remember thinking where are all the people. Ofcourse it was about noon in a humid place so everyone must have been indoor. There was this government building and some officer's room's window was open and so I stood next to the window and asked the officer siting by the window about the fort. Thinking back I feel it was a bit rude to barge this way in his privacy but I can't do much about it now. Anyway, he gave me directions to the fort. I could take the road a bit further on my motorcycle but from there I had to walk. The fort was located atop a not so high hillock. And so I walked - through the village houses and cobbled pathways where scarcely any stranger was wont to wander now. It again appeared to me that I was out of place here - a stranger intruding into the private land and lives of the people who must be inside the small houses. It was hot and humid, yes, and I was a bit travel weary but the experience was novel. All the houses had open courtyards and the whole area was filled with Jackfruit trees with many fruits hanging low on the trunk and most of the area being covered by the shade of these huge trees. After a short walk I reached the 'fort' but it turned out to be just a small bastion. I had hoped for something larger than this. The entrance was through an archway where some door must have been present once.. The whole place reeked of neglect. It was overgrown with wild growth. In my guess it could not have housed more than 50 soldiers. Climbing to its crenelations one could take in the splendid view of the vast, unhindered ocean. One strange thing that I found out here was that the gust coming through the crenelation was very cold but take the face away from the gap and it was hot and humid once again. I spend some time taking a few photos and then climbed my way back to my motorcycle. It has been almost an year since that trip but I could still remember so much about the place and the trip itself. I wonder how many times could we see a signboard and just head off-course with no concern for time or destination. This is the beauty and the difference between travelling and commuting. We may cover large distances in both but hardly do we discover new places while commuting. I did reach Vengurle that day, just a bit later than I had planned.
