Driving down the marine drive I could recall the old odia poem by Pandit Godavarish Mishra on "Ramachandi re Sandhya” which depicts the serene, calm and quiet evening at the beach describing the weather merging with the scenic beauty of the river and sea confluence. Where the birds fly on the tune of waves, the red turtles play on the silver sands, the waves slowly vanish on the lap of the river and sun sets leaving the evening lights for us to cherish.
On a lazy day followed by some pouring, we started to drive towards the scenic side of Orissa’s coastline and the favorite is obviously the Puri Beach. But the inquisitiveness for exploring more wanted us to go beyond Puri and made us land on one of the most scenic routes of India. Its the Puri-Konark Marine Drive road that mesmerises every single heart passing through.
The 35 kilometres drive makes one of the best marine drives of India, transcending you completely in the lap of nature and offering some pristine views of the gushing sea. This marine drive road is adorned with casuarinas, making it more blissful and idyllic. It is calm, soothing and not at all crowded. The road is also quite smooth and well built, making the journey easy and swift. The charismatic beach line of Chandrabhaga Beach running parallel to the coastal forests is one of the best attractions near Puri.
Stop! Stop!! Stop !! Whats there, a small island ? And we stopped the car to enquire the place called Ramcahandi. We drove through the bank of river and could see the waves behind the small island without any crowd. To quench the thirst of our eagerness we took a steamer boat to the island and I can’t describe the experience. The cool waves leaving some rain droplets on our faces left us speechless, mesmerizing view of the clean river slowly running down to meet the mother sea gave us a picturesque view of the panorama.
Stopped at the island we walked around 10-15 steps to find the sea waves touching our feet and slowly moving back. The silvery sands and the serene atmosphere has made the place one of the most beautiful beaches of Orissa. On the east side of the beach there was a view of two liquid states when the river meets the sea on a single line. Its the Ramachandi beach, located just 7 Km from Konark,named after the presiding deity of Konark, Goddess Ramchandi.
Scenically located on the confluence of the Kusabhadra River and the Bay of Bengal this is a place that will set the perfect stage to unwind and be yourself. What makes this location unique is the pristine beach and sand where one can witness the most incredible sunrise and sunsets. Unlike most beaches in Orissa, the Ramchandi beach is one of the most scenic, very isolated, unspoilt, and the water is not turbulent like the other spots. The beach has a gradual slope due to which the high waves are not formed, and makes this beach ideal to simply laze, swim, and boating.
We ran, roamed, played and came back bidding adieu to the waves promising to visit again.