Dadar Chowpatty

Mumbai's beaches are mostly a suburban or a South Mumbai pleasure — Juhu in the north, Girgaum Chowpatty at the foot of Marine Drive — which is exactly why Dadar Chowpatty feels like a secret kept by the middle of the city.

• A long, unglamorous crescent of grey-brown sand on Mahim Bay, it runs west of Shivaji Park along Swatantryaveer Savarkar Marg, hemmed by a low sea wall and a ribbon of rain trees.
• There are no Ferris wheels here and very few touts.
• What there is, on any given morning, is Dadar itself, out walking.
• The beach works to a twice-daily rhythm.
• Before seven the sand belongs to walkers, stretching groups, kite fliers and boys drifting over from Shivaji Park's famous cricket maidan, the ground that has shaped generations of Mumbai batsmen, a few minutes inland.
• By late afternoon the light softens, the Bandra–Worli Sea Link draws its thin white line across the bay to the north, and families settle along the wall to watch the sun drop into the Arabian Sea.
• Near the shoreline stands Chaitya Bhoomi, the memorial at the site where Dr B. R.
• Ambedkar, principal architect of the Indian Constitution, was cremated in 1956; enormous numbers of visitors gather there each 6 December, and it is treated with quiet reverence the rest of the year. Come with realistic expectations.
• This is a working city shoreline, not a swimming beach — currents, silt and water quality all argue against going in, and the sand is at its cleanest in the drier months after the monsoon clean-ups.
• During Ganeshotsav the Chowpatty becomes one of central Mumbai's principal immersion points, turning for several nights into a swell of processions, drums and floodlights: remarkable to witness, but not the visit for anyone wanting a quiet walk.
• Food is where Dadar quietly outclasses the flashier beaches.
• The neighbourhood is a stronghold of Maharashtrian vegetarian cooking, and the lanes around Shivaji Park and Gokhale Road hold long-running snack houses turning out misal, thalipeeth, kothimbir vadi, sabudana vada and glasses of piyush, the saffron-and-cardamom drink Dadar swears by.
• Udupi-style counters near the station add idli, medu vada and filter coffee from dawn.
• Mumbai is a mixed-kitchen city, so read the board and ask at the counter before you order — plenty of nearby kitchens cook both vegetarian and non-vegetarian food, while the fully vegetarian places usually say so plainly on the signboard.