 |
PLACES OF INTEREST
|
 |
MIRYA
Mirya near Mirya. village (Ratnagiri T.; 17° 00' N, 73° 15' E;
p. 2936), a high headland of bare laterite rock, lighter in colour than the surrounding land and from the north and south looking like an island, lies in the Ratnagiri taluka about two and a half miles north of Ratnagiri fort. Its very steep, sea-face, covered with large late-rite boulders, ends near the water edge in cliffs of varying height. Mirya peak at its highest part, on which there is an old flag-staff, is 475 feet above the sea.
Between Miyet, the south-west point of the Mirya hill and the Ratnagiri headland, lies Mirya Bay one and a half miles long and one mile deep, with depths of from four to five fathoms to within a quarter of a mile of the beach. The shore is narrow and sandy covered with cocoa palms and fronted by a ridge of sand hills rising from twenty to thirty feet above high water. It connects the headland of Mirya with the mainland, and behind it is an extensive flat of mud and sand, in many places thickly overgrown with mangrove bushes and covered at spring tides. Through this the Shirgaon creek winds to the town of Ratnagiri. The entrance to this creek is on the north side of the Mirya. headland where it joins the Kalba-devi river, a large inlet with, at the north side of its mouth, the village and temple of Kalbadevi. Large crafts come up the Shirgaon creek at high water, and lie off a landing place near the town of Ratnagiri. Part of the new road from Ratnagiri to Mirya, which runs parallel to this creek, is also used as a wharf for craft. In the north of Mirya Bay is a sunken rock called the Muddle Shoal, which, at low water, has a depth of only five feet. On all sides, shoal water stretches for one and a half cables, but at two cables, there is a depth of six fathoms.
On the north side of Mirya headland is Kalbadevi bay in which south-east corner there is, in five fathoms mud, a sheltered anchorage from south-west winds. Here, during the stormy season of 1857,
troops were safely landed in smooth water. [Hydrographic Notice No. 17.] There is an all-weather motorable road from Ratnagiri to this landing place. The road forms part of the Mirya-Ratnagiri-Kolhapur State Highway. The nearest railway station is Kolhapur, 78 miles to the north-east.
|
