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Besides hill and land forts some very prominent sea forts were built in the Maratha period. Vijaydurga or Victory Fort is one of the great forts of the Konkan. Vijaydurg Fort was strengthened around the 17th century by Shivaji, to whom it owes its finest features - the triple line of walls, the numerous towers and the massive interior buildings.
The
earlier name of this fort was Girye or Gheriya because it is surrounded by
sea from three sides. The fort has an area of six hectares; there are
twenty-seven Buruj inside the fort. Some of them have three floors. "Kothi
Pirachi Sadar", "Kitta Sadar", Jails, 'Jakhinis' Canon,
huge stones used for construction purpose, the platform built in the deep
sea for guarding, etc all these things must be seen and are still puzzling
to a viewer.
The underwater explorations on the western side of the fort, about 100m
seaward revealed a stone structure at a water depth of 8 to 10m. It
measures 122m in length, 7m in width and 3m in height. Besides it a tidal
dockyard was also located around 3-km from Vijaydurg fort on the left bank
of Vaghotan River.
The dockyard is 110m long and width is 75m. It was hollowed out of a
rock. The southern and eastern side is cut out of a natural rock and rest
is dry masonry. In addition to this a number of grapnel and triangular
stone anchors were noticed in the adjoining area of dockyard.
It existed as a dilapidated fortification of the Shilahar
period before it was taken over by the Bijapur kings, and then by Shivaji
who made it a major naval base. When Shivaji failed to capture
Murud-Janjira, he decided to
create a similar stronghold and built Vijaydurg Fort, on a rocky
projection south of Ratnagiri.
He had a triple line of walls built, as well as numerous towers. In 1698
AD, the Maratha naval commander Angre, who was the terror of all traders,
made it his capital. This fort has a hollowed-out entrance to take vessels
of 500 tons.
Rail: Rajapur and Kudal are the nearest railway
stations on Konkan railway.
Road: By road Vijaydurg is 425-km from
Mumbai via the Goa
Highway.
Accommodation is available at the MTDC Resorts at Ganapatipule and Tarkali.