I recently went on a trip to Ganpatipule with my family. I obviously took my travel diary with me and jotted down all my memories from the trip. So here they are: Pages from my travel journal: Trip to Ganpatipule.

Day 1:

I was so not ready to wake up at 4 in the morning. After I finished splashing cold water on my face to wake myself up, brushed my teeth, got my bag; we headed out the door and got a cab to Dadar railway station. Off to Ganpatipule! Our train arrived on the station and I was like ‘whoa!’ it was a really nice train; it was a chaircar train with big comfy seats and small screens with movies and songs to entertain the passengers. Papa watched Mughal-e-Azam in the on the screen, I watched the starting of the movie with him but then I got bored. I slept for most of the journey.

After we reached Ratnagiri railway station, we took an auto to our resort: Greenleaf; which is an associate of our beloved Club Mahindra. After checking in, we relaxed for some time and then went off to explore the resort. After that, we went to Ganpatipule beach for a brisk walk. We spent some time there and then had dinner. I could see loads of stars in the night sky and was so thrilled.

Day 2

We just chilled out at the resort today. I borrowed some books from the fun zone, we played carrom and foosball at the fun zone and mamma and I sang songs on the karaoke. I clicked some pictures of flowers. We splashed around in the pool and at night while mamma papa played with cards, I read the books I had borrowed. I also had a crazy tickle fight with bhaiya (my brother). I had a lot of fun.

Day 3

Today was one of those rare days when I kept my hair open. I kept it open the whole day long except when I was in the swimming pool. Can you believe it?  Anyway, today we went to the Malgund beach. There were only a few people there. The sea water was really clear and there were loads of shells on the beach, so of course, I collected them. I picked up a small shell and saw something moving inside it. It was a tiny crab! I quickly put the shell down and ran away, startled. After that I made sure to check each and every shell that I picked to make sure there weren’t any crabs in it.

Mamma spotted this jellyfish on the shore ☝

 

Seashells!

After spending some time on the beach, we headed off to find lunch. We stopped at this place called Mehendley’s and ordered thalis. I ate some aamras and amrakhand (mango shrikhand) it was amazing. After eating we went back to our room. While the others rested, I read the books that I had borrowed from the fun zone library. At four we all headed to the swimming pool to have some fun. We were the only ones at the swimming pool so it was really quiet. Bhaiya kept coming to pull my leg from behind, trying to drag me underwater ? and then we also played catch with a ball in the water. It was pretty fun.

 

Day 4

Today was our last day in Ganpatipule. We took a tour package to visit all the tourist places today. First, we headed off to Ganpatipule mandir and beach.

Saw this mermaid at the beach ?‍♀️

After that we went to the Prachin Konkan museum, it was all about the lives of people of konkan from medieval times. There were many life sized statues of the people. Here are a few:

Then we visited Aarey Waarey beach. It is a very beautiful beach, the water is a beautiful sea green color and there are pine trees besides the beach.

Look at that sand! ☝

We visited some more places:

The childhood home of Bal Gangadhar Tilak:

The temple build by Veer Savarkar:

Thibaw palace, home of king Thibaw:

After the tour ended, it was time for us to go catch our train. So we headed to Ratnagiri railway station to get on our train. The train was off schedule so we had to wait there for some time. The train arrived and we quickly boarded it. Off to Mumbai. Goodbye Ganpatipule!