[Samurai]

The 3 day plan is too aggressive. If it done on a long weekend, expect massive crowd in all the temples. We went to Kollur last saturday, the temple was practically empty, we just had 5-6 people in front of us as we joined the line for the darshan. We left home at 3:50PM and back home at 7:50PM. BTW, I was visiting Kollur after 32 years despite being so close.

Be flexible to change plans based on delays, don't underestimate holiday crowd.

[zoomingbhat]

I just did a 4 day trip along with my friends.
@chandras,First day is absolutely fine.Leave early morning to beat the traffic and reach subramanya by atleast 12:30.There is a lot of bad patches in shiradi ghat.Be prepared for a heavy rush at dharmasthala,I had to stand atleast 1.5 hrs on monday but i used some contacts to get in early.

You have to do night drive on day 3 if you want to come to bangalore.If advice you to go to Jog falls on day 4 and spend half a day there You wont regret your stay there.

[lohithrao]

Originally Posted by Samurai

The 3 day plan is too aggressive. If it done on a long weekend, expect massive crowd in all the temples. We went to Kollur last saturday, the temple was practically empty, we just had 5-6 people in front of us as we joined the line for the darshan. We left home at 3:50PM and back home at 7:50PM. BTW, I was visiting Kollur after 32 years despite being so close.

Be flexible to change plans based on delays, don't underestimate holiday crowd.

As samurai mentioned be prepared for the crowd, couple of weeks back had been to Dharmasthala and Subramanya on a weekday and i their was hardly any people according to me weekend is a bad idea!

[Jay]

Had been to Dharmasthala and Kukke this weekend, Left on Friday and got back on Saturday. Road upto Sakleshpur is pretty good, the road in Shiradi ghats is pretty damaged but motorable nonetheless. Smooth roads and suddenly bad patches, the road after taking right towards Dharmasthala is Amazing. Thought there would be huge crowd at the temple but to my surprise, it was pretty empty. It took us around 20 mins each at Dharmasthala and Kukke temples.

We Left Bangalore ( Banaswadi ) at 5:30pm and reached Dharmasthala at 11pm, ofcourse with some Spirited Driving as our rooms were booked and i had to meet the concerned person by 10:30pm. Otherwise i would say 6-7 hours from Bangalore again depending on the conditions such as Rain, Fog and Truck traffic. We had to travel 5 kms behind a truck thanks to fog and rain as we couldnt see anything, took us half hour.

Took some pics of the roads, shall put them up by evening for others' reference.

[Jay]

The road condition on Shiradi ghats.

[lohithrao]

Jay, yes its messy. when i had been there dint even feel like stopping and clicking some pics...had overtaken many trucks and dint want them to overtake me

how was the truck traffic??

[Jay]

@ lohithrao : Well, i too didnt want to stop to take pics, these pics were taken from the car where i just slowed down completely, clicked and started off again.
There were trucks but not too many.

[chandras]

My thanks to Ravi, Sushrutha, gowda, lohith, Samurai, Jay and Bhat. Now i get a better picture on the trip and will work out on the alternate plans.

The pics shows me that I need to exercise extra caution in the ghat.

- Chandra

[SureshS]

Need advice on a trip that I am planning end Aug and 1st few days of Sept. Coinciding with the Ganesha festival. Alternate suggestions are welcome.

Day 1: Bangalore to Horanadu via Aldur, Balehannur. Stay at Horanadu
Day 2: Horanadu - Sringer (via Kudremukh) - Kundapura (Stay at Kundapura)
Day 3: Kundapura - Kollur - Marvante - Udupi (Stay at Udupi)
Day 4: Udupi - Dharmasthala - Kukke Subramanya (Stay at Kukke)
Day 5: Kukke to Bangalore

Is it possible to do Udupi - Dharmasthala - Kukke - Bangalore in a day? If I am in Dharmasthala a day before the Ganesha festival, how crowded will it be?

The other option is to do the reverse:
Day 1: Bangalore - Kukke - Dharmasthala - Karkala or Udupi (for night stay)
Day 2: Udupi - Kollur, Marvante, Kundapura (Night at Kundapura)
Day 3: Kundapura - Sringeri - Hornadu
Day 4: Hornadu to Bangalore

Which one is the better plan? How is the stay at the Temple guest house in Horanadu?

Regards,

S.Suresh

[pjay_in]

I will be driving to Kukke from Mangalore this weekend. Can anyone update me on the road condition from Uppinangadi to Kukke via Kadaba? Or is it better to continue on NH48 till Gundya and then take a right for Kukke? I know the second option will be a longer route.

[lohithrao]

pjay i think the kadaba road is not in a good shape, gondya till kukke is very nice but till gondya you need to go through lots of bad stretches...

[SureshS]

Hi,

I am planning a trip this weekend to Horanadu. I wanted to know which of these roads is better now? To go via Chikmagalur and Balehannur or to go via Mudigere, Kottigehara? Any suggestion will be highly appreciated.

S.Suresh

[sushrutha]

Originally Posted by SureshS

Hi,

I am planning a trip this weekend to Horanadu. I wanted to know which of these roads is better now? To go via Chikmagalur and Balehannur or to go via Mudigere, Kottigehara? Any suggestion will be highly appreciated.

S.Suresh

Via Chikmagalur will be quite longer. I would suggest you to take BLR-HASSN-BELUR-MUDIGERE-KOTTIGEHARA-JAVALI-KALASA-HORANADU.

[SureshS]

Thanks Sushrutha. I had earlier been via Kotigehara and was planning to go that way. A person whom I know in Chikmagalur said that the road from Kotigehara may not be all that great and that the Chikmagalur - Aldur road is better now. I wanted to know if this was the case and if the road via Kotigehara is OK now.

Regards,

S.Suresh

[ravi@64bhp]

Originally Posted by SureshS

Thanks Sushrutha. I had earlier been via Kotigehara and was planning to go that way. A person whom I know in Chikmagalur said that the road from Kotigehara may not be all that great and that the Chikmagalur - Aldur road is better now. I wanted to know if this was the case and if the road via Kotigehara is OK now.

Regards,

S.Suresh

Last week we did this route on bikes from Hyderabad. We visited Kodachandri and on return trip we rode to Hornadu and then took the following route to Banglore.

Hornadu - kalasa - kottegere - belur - hasan - Banglore.

Road from Hornadu to kattegere is very narrow and through forest. Some stretches are very good and some are okay. Need to be very careful. Some stretch between kettegere and Belur is very bad with big potholes in some patches. Belur to Hasan is a dream road, excellent.