Castella de Aguada or Bandra Fort, Mumbai

Stuck in busy traffic in the main street of Bandra last week, I turned on my GPS to take some narrow streets. That experience really turned up to be an adventourous one in a 4 wheeler, when my car got few scratches as well. But a heritage walk through those narrow streets is what I am looking for during my next visit. My GPS also navigated me to Bandra Fort, which was in my do visit list for quite sometime. So we headed there. The Bandra bandstand road reachs you to the Fort.

Mumbai Fort Circuit: Right from early historical period, Mumbai has been an important trade centre. Owing to its coastal location, Mumbai was constantly invaded. Numerous forts were built through coastlines to fiercely defend the city. Each fort through the Konkan coastline, originated in different periods and is of different dimension with totally different architectural features. The Directorate of Archaeology and Museums, Government of Maharastra has initiated the Mumbai Fort Circuit including Bandra, Worli, Sewri and Ghodbunder forts.

Castella de Aguada, also known as Bandra Fort is one of the biggest fort in Mumbai owing to its location and size played an important role in the struggle for supremacy over Bombay. Its said to be built my Portuguese in 1640 as a watchtower overlooking Mahim Bay, Arabian Island and southern Island of Mahim. Its name indicates its origin as a place where fresh water was available in the form of a fountain(Aguada) for Portuguese ships cruising the coasts in the initial period of Portuguese presence. The Fort lies over several levels, from sea level to an altitude of 24metres.

Adjacent to the fort wall is a well maintained park,

More than the Fort, the view of the Bandra-Worli sea link from the fort, is what attracts most of the people. Following post on Bandra-Worli Sea Link.