Have been spending weekends at home for about 3-4 weeks now and was getting seriously bored. I had put in full tank of diesel at about the same time and there was enough pending in the tank for about 700kms. What started out as a plan to do about 600km of round trip, ended up in becoming a 877km round trip. Well, man proposes, God disposes.
Last year, at around the same time, my better half and I had gone to a temple at Manjeshwar (mid-way between Mangalore and Kasargod), and there started this idea of doing a repeat trip. Plan was to leave Bangalore at about 0300hrs on Saturday, via Mysore and Coorg to Kasargod, and return by Sunday eve. Plans have this bad habit of change. Friday evening, which usually is a less-work day at office turned out to be like any other day with the usual work load and I had a dinner meet (HV Kumar was in Bangalore) to attend. Rushed through work and went for the dinner meet (had a fun time at the dinner meet). By the time I got home, it was close to 0000hrs. To leave by 0300hrs, I need to get up by atleast 0200hrs cause I need to go pick my friend up as well. So, that’s just 2hrs of sleep. And with the excitement of drive, sleep will be elusive. What to do? What to do?!! Simple, took a bath and drove off by about 0100hrs!!!
Roads all the way from Bangalore to Kushal Nagar were good. But after that, it was real bad till the end of Sampaje Ghats, a distance of about 65kms. Real 2nd and 3rd gear territory and if you are not careful, you can manage to ground your sedan. We reached Kasargod by 0910hrs and settled in to a nice hotel. The best memories I’ve of Kasargod is of the well behaved people and the awesome food. Very tasty and very cost effective, the food I mean (Shaju will be quick to ask if I'm referring to the people!!!). Visited two temples, the Anatheshwara Temple at Manjeswhar and Ananthpura Temple. I had written a travelogue of my last trip here:
http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/travel...ple-visit.html
The drive back was through Mangalore, purely because I didn’t want to do another 2nd gear/3rd gear circus. And, that route turned out to be worse. NH17 connecting Kasargod to Mangalore is in a bad shape, and from Mangalore till almost Shakleshpur, the roads are real bad. It was akin to, from the kadai to the fire! It took me 6hrs (of which 1hr is break) to cover 180kms in that route. People who have traveled with me will confirm that by habit I take very less breaks.
After all this, I can very safely comment that my car was in 2nd gear for extended periods of time, through the worse roads I’ve ever driven through (till date) and still she holds good. Ford has made a very sturdy car in the Fiesta.
And today when I came down to the garage… the car had this smile on her grille, asking, where to next??
