Trip to Dive Agar

Hi,
We had been to Dive Agar and Hari Hareshwar on the weekend of 16th Feb 07. Here is the travel related information.

We followed the Pune - Paud - Mushi - Tamhini - Mangao - Mhasala - Dive Agar - Shrivardhan - Hari Hareshwar route. A total of 165kms till Dive Agar and another 40 odd kms till Hari Hareshwar.
One note though. There is mobile coverage only upto Tamhini ghat. Thereafter the coverage/range comes and goes (if that is the right way to describe it!) . However BSNL has good coverage in Dive Agar. Also pack in a few candles and torches as there is daily load shedding upto 8.30pm in Dive Agar.

The intention of this blog is to help others understand directions as well as the distance. The distance readings are in the sequence of Odometer reading followed by name of the place.

Odometer reading .... Places
8869 ............................Started from Aundh at 6.30 am
8922 ............................Stopped at Quick Bite, Mulshi for tea. The roads is pretty good till this point.

















First stop at Quick Bite near Mulshi

8925 ............................Chachavli (pronounced as Chaachuvli)
8929 ............................Tamhini
8932 ............................Sarole (pronounced as Saarole) 8936 We reached a T junction. The road to the right goes to Lonavla while the one straight ahead goes to Kolaad. This is the road to be taken to go to Dive Agar or Konkan in general.

Pictures of Tamhini Ghat









8941 ............................Dongarwadi The bad road starts.
8945 ............................Adarwadi ((pronounced as Aadarwaadi) ... bad road
8949 ............................here you reach an arch that has distances displayed to a lot of places in Konkan. You can also have some snacks (Vada Paav, Misal, tea etc.) over here. The road continues to be bad

8961 ............................Reached Vile phata. Take a left turn over here. Incase you go straight ahead (towards Kolad) you can ask the locals for direction to Nizampur.
8965 ............................Bhagad .. still more bad road
8970 ............................Kandalgaon (pronounced as Kaandalgaaon) .. we were getting used to the bad road.
8975 ............................Nizampur All the locals seem to know this place. ... bad road continues.

8982 ............................Chavanwadi
8985 ............................Mangao (pronounced as Maangaon).

We reach Mangao on the Mumbai - Goa highway. Take a left turn. (There are 2 petrol pumps at a distance of about a km on either sides from this point thats towards Mumbai and towards Goa) About 100 meters after turning left you can see the Mangao ST stand on the right side. Continue going ahead for about 500 meters and then there is a nondescript turn (phata) on the road. Turn right here. There is a small board saying State highway 97.

Incase you miss the right turn just ask for directions for Mhasala. The road is bad and good in patches. Maybe they are trying to build a new road.

8994 ............................Naitane
8998 ............................Dongroli
9005 ............................Chandore
9007 ............................Nivachi wadi
9011 ............................Saibaba Mandir. This mandir is on the right side of the road besides a small river and the road turns left towards a bridge.

9015 ............................Mhasala. Take a right turn from the signboard. The good road starts
9020 ............................Mendadi
9031 ............................Shiste
9032 ............................Borli. You will reach Maruti naka. Take a right turn
9043 ............................Dive Agar. There is an arch while entering Dive Agar and a board of Mauli resorts.

Hotel Woodland
We stayed at Hotel Woodland. The rates were on the higher side @ Rs.500 per room without breakfast or food. (The average rates for rooms in Dive Agar are Rs.300 per room) The only good thing was that the hotel had an inverter, fan and so we did not have to face power shortage in the evenings. Dive Agar has a daily load shedding of about 4 hours in the evening upto 8.30pm

Though the locals said that the beach was just about the corner it was actually almost 600meters from the hotel. There is a road right upto the beach and a car or jeep can easily go even on the beach.
We had lunch at Patil's (they offer both veg and non-veg food - veg Rs.45 non veg Rs.50) The food was very good as good as home made food and clean. The veg meal included one "Ukadicha modak".
Dinner was with Bapat's @ Rs.45. However they don't serve Ukadiche modak as part of the meal. You have to call them and place an order. They cost @ Rs.6 each. Incidentally Bapats also have their own accomodation available @ Rs.70 per person but it is on a sharing basis with common toilets.

One important thing about the meals. There aren't any restaurants in Dive Agar. All the places where food is served is a makeshift arrangement in the "Aangan" of the locals. So incase you want to have food you will first have to tell them atleast an hour before that you are going to have lunch/dinner only then they prepare the food. The food is very clean and hygienic. We had taken our own water bottles, drinking water is available.

Contact numbers for food and accomodation:
Suhas V Bapat
Near Marathi school
Dive Agar 402404
Tel : 02147 224377

Uday Bapat
Tel: 02147 24235

Ramesh Awlaskar

Tel: 02147 24707

Anand Kelkar

Tel: 02147 24242

For Hotel Woodland

Girish Kulkarni 94220 00441
Shrikant Tikhe 93701 49114

Dive Agar has a Ganapati mandir with a very old idol. It is believed that the idol is made of pure gold. Actually someone found the idol in a huge copper box buried in his backyard while digging up the place. The idol is now placed in a safe locker and the doors of the locker are opened at 8.00 AM.

We could locate petrol pumps at Chandni Chowk, Paud, Mangao and Mhasala. From Dive Agar we went to visit Hari Hareshwar.

Akshay and Amey at the beach at 2 in the afternoon!










































Route map

Comments

  1. Vinit23 February, 2007 10:39

    Nicely written & covers plenty of details.

    Regards
    Vinit (http://wandering-freak.blogspot.com/)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous23 February, 2007 11:35

    That was informative. I printed it out for future reference.

    More than the mileage and the left and right turns you efficiently took, I would have liked if you told us how you felt, what was good and what was not.

    What did you say?

    I am going to Dive agar the next time I get a chance.

    Cheers and a great 'first' attempt.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous26 February, 2007 19:43

    Hi,
    how did you travel car, bus motorcyle? What was the mileage? Any problems with the vehicle? How long did it take to reach that place?

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous18 April, 2007 10:12

    Hi,
    very nicely written. I intend to travel next week and have taken a print of the directions.
    Thanks buddy.

    Sagar

    ReplyDelete
  5. Anonymous19 December, 2008 08:16

    That is pretty neat. I plan to travel there in the Christmas weekend. Hope it is good.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Uma09 December, 2015 06:33

    lovely informative post. thanks for sharing all this useful info.

    ReplyDelete

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