Last week, I attended my friend’s marriage at Kozhikode which is about 400 kilometers away from my place. I took this as an opportunity to explore the Malabar region (Malabar region comprises of 6 districts of Kerala – Kasaragod, Kannur, Kozhikode, Malappuram, Palakkad and Wayanad & Mahé which is part of Union Territory of Puducherry). A lot have been talked about the Malabar specialties – the cuisine, friendly people, trustful auto rickshaw drivers, unique Malayalam dialect and the rich history. Vasco da Gama landed here in 1498 AD thereby discovering the first sea route to India from Europe. Portuguese were the first to arrive, then came the Dutch, the French, and finally the British. Although unintentionally, my exploration of Malabar region started from a monument which has witnessed all this history – St. Angelo’s Fort
Friday, 24th October 2014: I arrived at Kannur early in the morning. The overnight bus journey from Thiruvananthapuram was smooth. They played Mohanlal starrer Mr. Fraud in the bus last night and I considered it as a good omen for my journey ;-). Kannur was slowly waking up from sleep. I decided to check-in to a hotel as I will be spending a night here. Unfortunately the room I took was miserable. Bed was not clean, the fan made cranky voice, no TV but thank God the toilets were clean. Next morning after a quick fresh up, I caught an auto to St. Angelo’s fort. The fort is triangular in shape with 2 sides surrounded by sea. A water moat separates the 3rd side from mainland thereby completely isolating it. Clicking on the pics will take you to my Flickr blog 🙂
Water moat
Entrance to the Fort
The fort seems to be a popular spot for wedding photo shoot
Cannon
Army barracks
Army barracks
Graffiti work by man and nature – A closer look at walls (left section of previous pic)
More Graffiti
Inside the Fort
Inside the Fort
Fire Power
🙂
Click on the picture to view complete set
Please note that you have to pass through Kannur Cantonment to reach the Fort. This is a very high security zone and you are not supposed to take photographs of this area. The fort timing is 8am-6pm and It takes about 2 hours to explore the fort at a leisurely pace. I had planned to visit the remnants of Kadalayi Fort at Moppila Bay which is very near to St. Angelo’s but the day was turning out to be hot and humid; visiting a beach during this time of the day would be tiring; hence I skipped it and walked towards Arakkal Palace, palace of Kerala’s only Muslim ruling dynasty.
