Bangalore-Goa Road Trip Day 3 – Vagator, Chapora, Baga Beach
This post is about day 3 of our 5-day Bangalore-Goa road trip.
You can read about day 1 in Bangalore Goa Road Trip and day 2 in Bangalore Goa Road Trip Day 2 – Murudeshwar and Gokarna
The third day of our trip was planned to be a relatively relaxed one after the first two days full of driving. The plan was to try and wake up early for a walk on the beach and then hike up to the Chapora Fort on foot as it was very near to our resort.
We woke up at 7.20 AM and by the time we got done with the morning routine, it was already 8 AM. Now, it was too late for an “early morning” walk on the beach and still too early for the breakfast buffet in the resort. So, we decided to head straight to the Chapora Fort while our breakfast was getting ready.
It was a small hike to the fort from our resort and the morning breeze made it that much more enjoyable. Chapora Fort overlooks the Arabian Sea and dates back to 1617 AD. When we reached the fort, the entrance was not open yet, but we could see people on the inside. Since the fort is actually a ruin now and the outer boundary wall has collapsed in a number of places, people were using these gaps to climb inside. We used one such entrance and got inside.
The fort changed hands several times in its 400 years of history but was eventually abandoned by its final occupant, the Portuguese. There isn’t much to see here in the fort itself; just some ruins of the escape tunnels built by the Portuguese. But the view from up there is amazing. We spent some time clicking pictures and just taking in the cool morning sea breeze.
After spending about an hour at the fort, we decided it was time to head back as it was getting hotter by the minute in the open sun and we were very hungry after the hike up the hill. After returning to our resort, we quickly got ready and then had a lovely sumptuous breakfast of Idly-Sambhar and Poha.
Next on our itinerary was Baga Beach. The plan was to spend a few hours at the beach and then head to Palolem in South Goa, which was our stay for the night. Baga Beach was barely 2 kilometers from our resort. We packed everything back in the car and started for Baga.
A search for “Baga beach parking” on Google Maps led us to a parking spot that was over half a kilometer away from the beach. There was a lot of vehicular and foot traffic on the roads, so we decided not to try and take our car further towards the beach in search of a better parking spot.
As we started walking towards the beach after parking our car, we realized we would have been better off bringing our car closer to the beach. Not only did the roads become wider, but we also saw a large parking place very close to the beach. There are multiple parking places near the beach, I’d suggest just searching for “parking” on GMaps while zoomed-in on the Baga area.
Because we had parked so far away and also planned to go into the water, we had left all our electronics in the car. So no cameras or phones to take pictures.
By the time we reached the beach, it was afternoon, but the beach was still jam-packed. We also spent a good 2 hours just enjoying the sea. The cold seawater was a much-needed relief from the hot & humid weather. Nobody cared about sun tan. 🙂
After a good few hours just enjoying the cold waves, it was time to clean up and tank up. Breakfast energy was running low. Now we really regretted parking the car so far away. With no other option, I decided to walk back and bring the car to a parking lot much closer to the beach, while the missus waited.
This new parking lot was much bigger and also had a Sulabh Complex by the entrance. This Sulabh was one of the dirtiest public restrooms I had ever seen. Broken fittings, unclean, unhygienic everything, no hooks to hang clothes, little to no water pressure – it had everything. To top it all off, it was extremely overcrowded. Somehow managed to take a bath in there and came out trying to avoid touching anything.
After all that, finally, it was time to gorge on some delicious food at one of the beach shacks. I don’t remember exactly which shack we went to but the food was tasty. After all that time in the sea, we were very tired and hungry too. We had a good lunch.
Because I avoid driving at night, we had earlier planned to start from Baga by 4.30 PM. The distance to Palolem, which was our destination for the night, in South Goa is about 70 km from Baga Beach. But seeing the evening sun, we couldn’t resist waiting for the sunset at the beach.
After watching the beautiful sunset at Baga, we started towards Palolem at 7 PM. The traffic en route wasn’t as bad as we had faced two days earlier. We did face a small unfortunate incident when a cab rear-ended us at a traffic signal. Thankfully, nobody got hurt and the damage to the car was also minimal. This happened just as the light turned green, so it was difficult to track the car & we just let it go and decided to proceed with our journey.
It took us another 2.5 hours to reach Palolem driving through the ghat roads connecting North Goa with South. Finally, we reached our destination for the day, Palolem Beach Resort, at 9.30 PM. The resort was pretty basic, but the best part was that we had booked a beach-facing room.
Today was a busy day with lots of activities and driving. We put our bags, freshened up, and went straight to the in-house restaurant by the sea for a nice dinner.
