Greater Mumbai has crept inexorably northwards to engulf villages and swampland in a pall of chimneys, motorways and slums. These grim industrial areas hold few attractions, but possibilities for full- or half-day excursions include the quirky Victoria and Albert museum and botanical gardens in Byculla, and the beach at Juhu . All lie within reach of a suburban railway station, although you will, in most cases, have to take a rickshaw or taxi for the last few kilometres. Beyond them to the north lie the Buddhist caves chiselled out of the hillside at Kanheri , and the crumbling Portuguese fort at Bassein .