[Sting]

Dear All

I had recently got my tickets booked to travel from Delhi to Kanpur via train. With many options available and convenient timings this seemed like the best way to travel.

However, the Triumph Bonneville . took offence and I have been contemplating travelling by road from Delhi to Kanpur and back.
I had the following itinerary in mind:

Day 1:
Delhi (leave 6 am)> Agra(via Taj Expressway)> Shikohabad>Etawah> Auraiya>Kanpur(arrive 2pm?)

Day 2:
Kanpur (leave 4 30pm) > same route> Delhi (1230am?)

A few questions:

1. How is the road between Agra and Kanpur and should I keep anything in particular in mind on this route?
2. Are my expectations around travel time rightly built in correctly?
3. I have work primarily around Kalpi Road in Kanpur. What are the recommendations for stay in a place nearby?
4. Lastly- any safety concerns on this route? UP has quite a reputation.

Thanks for your suggestions in advance!

Cheers,Sting

[roy_libran]

Originally Posted by Sting

A few questions:

1. How is the road between Agra and Kanpur and should I keep anything in particular in mind on this route?
2. Are my expectations around travel time rightly built in correctly?
3. I have work primarily around Kalpi Road in Kanpur. What are the recommendations for stay in a place nearby?
4. Lastly- any safety concerns on this route? UP has quite a reputation.

Cheers,Sting

1. If you follow the NH2, the roads are absolutely fantastic. Most of the route is rather less populated and elevated, so you can let her rip! However, DO WATCH OUT for village traffic coming in the opposite direction.

2. Possible, but may be a bit tight, depending on where in Kanpur you have your work. If you ONLY need to be around KALPI ROAD, you should be good, but if you need to go into the City, you WILL NOT BE ABLE to meet those timelines. Roads and Traffic inside Kanpur are absolutely horrifying.

3. You have decent hotel options on GT Road, in the vicinity of Gumti No. 5, or further away near Phool Bagh.

4. Absolutely! You are liable to be waylaid/kidnapped/shot/robbed/anything...., especially if you are travelling on an expensive machine after dark. So, take due precautions. This is especially so, for the desolate stretch between Shikohabad and Rania.

P.S. You don't get much food or refreshment options between Agra and Kanpur, barring a few dhabas near Rania, most notable being Dipu Chauhan. IIRC the Butter Chicken used to be Yum! Just remember to choose the Family Section, instead of the Trucker's section.

[TheDesertRat]

As someone who travels on this route every couple of months, my pointers are:

1. Delhi to Agra: Get on the expressway and you will be in Agra in no time

2. Agra to Shikohabad: This route is ok if you avoid morning and evening rush hour.

3. Shikohabad to Etawah: No problems here as not a lot of populated areas around

4. Etawah to Kanpur: Look out of several diversions due to 6 lane highway construction.

5. Reaching Kanpur: Your best bet will be to take the exit towards Panki. This will be the quickest way to get to Kalpi. DO NOT be sucked into the temptation of going further on the highway as you will soon hit the bottleneck.

6. Kanpur Traffic: One word - Chaotic! But hey, it is my hometown and I love it!

7. Accommodation: Stay around Phoolbagh will be best suited. Decent hotels and you will be able to soak in what Kanpur has to offer.

8. Safety: I would avoid the Etawah stretch at night (no offence to anybody here who belongs to the city).

9. Return Journey: Please avoid travelling at night!

You are looking at very optimistic timings there my friend. Your best option is to start early from Delhi (0400 hrs). Be prepared to be thoroughly exhausted.

As rightly pointed out by @roy_libran, not a lot of good dhabha options between Agra and Kanpur. There is a half decent place when you exit Shikhoabad next to a petrol station by the name Gunjan Hotel.

Dipu Chauhan is still excellent when it comes to food but you are within touching distance of Kanpur city where the famous Baba Biryani awaits.

Let me know if you need any further info.

Cheers,
Saurabh

[Sting]

Saurabh, roy_libran,

Thank you very much! These are exactly the details I was looking for. Very helpful.

My only area of work is on Kalpi Road so hopefully I will not have to experience the Kanpur chaos. I'll look for hotels in Phoolbagh.

The message on the safety issues at night is cystal clear! Though all I can say is on my way back I will be better placed to take care of it .

I rethought my plan of coming back in one go and was wondering if I should stay in Agra. However, the other way to see it is once I reach Agra the rest of the road is quite clear and safe(?). Thoughts are welcome.

Cheers,
Sting

[roy_libran]

Originally Posted by Sting

My only area of work is on Kalpi Road so hopefully I will not have to experience the Kanpur chaos. I'll look for hotels in Phoolbagh.

I'd suggest that you prefer GT Road hotels near to Gumti No. 5. It will save you a lot of headache of navigating the city traffic.

Originally Posted by Sting

Though all I can say is on my way back I will be better placed to take care of it .

Kalpi Road -> Ordinance Factories -> Small Arms Factory ?????

[Sting]

Originally Posted by roy_libran

I'd suggest that you prefer GT Road hotels near to Gumti No. 5. It will save you a lot of headache of navigating the city traffic.

Thanks Roy_libran... I will be on to tripadvisor now to book the hotels.

Originally Posted by roy_libran

Kalpi Road -> Ordinance Factories -> Small Arms Factory ?????

Yup, SAF it is

[roy_libran]

Cool. Now, that's the subject matter for another nice forum - I4G!

For Hotels, I don't think you need TripAdvisor really. Not for Kanpur!
Try Hotel Bliss. It's been around for ages and decent.

[Sting]

Originally Posted by roy_libran

Cool. Now, that's the subject matter for another nice forum - I4G!

Another IFGian .. Small world

Just spoke to Hotel Bliss- unfortunately they don't have secure parking inside the hotel. I'll have a sleepless night if the motorcycle remains parked outside!

Cheers,
Sting

[AlokSriva]

All the necessary info has already been provided to you and am chipping in only because I too used to do this route very often till about a couple of years ago every few months.
The commonality between your trip and the one I undertook this January doesn't end with the route/road; Triumph is another common factor
If you haven't already undertaken the trip, use Yamuna E-way. Even from Gurgaon, I prefer YEW as it saves the uncertainty of getting stuck in Agra's traffic. Crossing Agra can take anything from 20 minutes (if doing before 7 a.m.) to 3 hours (any other time of the day, depending on the mess called traffic at transport nagar intersection).

[Sting]

I did this trip on Sunday. 1000 kms in 36 hours and what a brilliant road to ride on. The information shared on this thread was immensely helpful and accurate.

2 things I would add:

Between Agra and Kanpur one can stop at Hotel Gunjan in Sirsaganj. Decent food and ambience and quite suitable to those travelling with family.

The travel time: On my return journey I exited Kanpur at 1 pm and was home at 8 30pm! Except for the stretch between Agra and Etawah the rest is all 6 lane and great tarmac.

The Triumph gunned down those roads and destroyed the egos of many a cars.

Alok, I can only imagine with the 1600cc Thunderbird would do on those roads. I did take the YEW and thankfully did not find any traffic even at Agra.

Roy, Dersertrat: Thank you for your inputs and all the information, it was very reassuring and helpful.

[phamilyman]

I would agree with the rest of what Desert Rat said except this part:

Originally Posted by TheDesertRat

8. Safety: I would avoid the Etawah stretch at night (no offence to anybody here who belongs to the city).

9. Return Journey: Please avoid travelling at night!

As of 2013 (when I shifted to Chennai) this was not really a concern. I did this route atleast every 2-3 months, and ALWAYS overnight - starting from either side around 9pm.

Even http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/travel...mein-hain.html did not report any untoward incident despite traveling in the same time frame.

[AlokSriva]

Originally Posted by Sting

Between Agra and Kanpur one can stop at Hotel Gunjan in Sirsaganj. Decent food and ambience and quite suitable to those travelling with family.

You are right, this hotel has come up in last 3-4 years. About a km further down the road, there's a small dhaba called Panchvati where I always stop. Serves decent food

Originally Posted by Sting

Alok, I can only imagine with the 1600cc Thunderbird would do on those roads.

Er, actually 1700 yes, you are right again, I did smoke an Innova and an unregistered Jag who were trying to play cat and mouse..

Good to know you had a Triumphant trip!

Originally Posted by phamilyman

I would agree with the rest of what Desert Rat said except this part:

Roads per se are safe, just that its way too long and isolated stretch between Shikohabad and Rania except for Auraiyya. BTW, NH2 completely bypasses Etawah city.

[phamilyman]

Originally Posted by AlokSriva

You are right, this hotel has come up in last 3-4 years. About a km further down the road, there's a small dhaba called Panchvati where I always stop. Serves decent food


Er, actually 1700 yes, you are right again, I did smoke an Innova and an unregistered Jag who were trying to play cat and mouse..

Good to know you had a Triumphant trip!


Roads per se are safe, just that its way too long and isolated stretch between Shikohabad and Rania except for Auraiyya. BTW, NH2 completely bypasses Etawah city.

Originally Posted by Sting

I did this trip on Sunday. 1000 kms in 36 hours and what a brilliant road to ride on. The information shared on this thread was immensely helpful and accurate.

2 things I would add:

Between Agra and Kanpur one can stop at Hotel Gunjan in Sirsaganj. Decent food and ambience and quite suitable to those travelling with family.

The travel time: On my return journey I exited Kanpur at 1 pm and was home at 8 30pm! Except for the stretch between Agra and Etawah the rest is all 6 lane and great tarmac.

The Triumph gunned down those roads and destroyed the egos of many a cars.

Alok, I can only imagine with the 1600cc Thunderbird would do on those roads. I did take the YEW and thankfully did not find any traffic even at Agra.

Roy, Dersertrat: Thank you for your inputs and all the information, it was very reassuring and helpful.

Originally Posted by roy_libran

Cool. Now, that's the subject matter for another nice forum - I4G!

For Hotels, I don't think you need TripAdvisor really. Not for Kanpur!
Try Hotel Bliss. It's been around for ages and decent.

Hello, we're heading to LKO tonight. We used to take GGN-Fbd-Kanpur (NH2) and then Kanpur-Lucknow in the morning. Presume NH2 chaos at Palwal with 9:00pm start from Gurgaon would not be an issue.

Since its Overnight traffic is almost never a concern.
Any choke points to be aware of?


Thanks in advance.

[AlokSriva]

Originally Posted by phamilyman

Hello, we're heading to LKO tonight. We used to take GGN-Fbd-Kanpur (NH2) and then Kanpur-Lucknow in the morning. Presume NH2 chaos at Palwal with 9:00pm start from Gurgaon would not be an issue.

Since its Overnight traffic is almost never a concern.
Any choke points to be aware of?


Thanks in advance.

You can expect following choke-points:
1) Sohna crossing where you take left towards Palwal
2) Mathura Road crossing at Palwal
3) Beyond this, depending on the state of construction, your speed/bottle-necks would be determined till Agra
4) Hopefully Transport Nagar crossing in Agra should have relatively free-flowing traffic when you hit the city around mid-night
5) Probably the last bottleneck you would encounter at Auraiya, 100 kms short of Kanpur
6) Depending on your stop-over location in Kanpur City, you would need to take/miss the elevated road after Bhauti (and before Panki).
Bear in mind, this 20-odd kms of elevated Kanpur by-pass leads one to Allahabad/LKO. Though I am not sure if lately an exit has been made for LKO road/Jajmau or one still needs to take a U-turn after the elevated road ends.

Hope this helps. Feel free to shoot more queries if needed.

Have a safe journey!

[phamilyman]

Originally Posted by AlokSriva

You can expect following choke-points:
1) Sohna crossing where you take left towards Palwal
2) Mathura Road crossing at Palwal
3) Beyond this, depending on the state of construction, your speed/bottle-necks would be determined till Agra
4) Hopefully Transport Nagar crossing in Agra should have relatively free-flowing traffic when you hit the city around mid-night
5) Probably the last bottleneck you would encounter at Auraiya, 100 kms short of Kanpur
6) Depending on your stop-over location in Kanpur City, you would need to take/miss the elevated road after Bhauti (and before Panki).
Bear in mind, this 20-odd kms of elevated Kanpur by-pass leads one to Allahabad/LKO. Though I am not sure if lately an exit has been made for LKO road/Jajmau or one still needs to take a U-turn after the elevated road ends.

Hope this helps. Feel free to shoot more queries if needed.

Have a safe journey!

Thanks. Our plans are basically a bit different. We normally sleep for 2-3 hours at Mathura or Agra depending on progress. I prefer Mathura since we normally sleep in the car at the BPCL petrol pump premises which is a fairly busy area. Agra is a bit dicey since there are no sure shot safe areas there but its been good thus far. I am thinking to park outside a police station this time. Any suggestions?

After starting from Agra at 2 am, we never faced a jam anywhere in our many drives in 2008-13. Should we do Gurgaon-Sohna-Palwal (but I find the route bit more deserted/less safe) instead to avoid the rush? Thanks.

6. We don't take the elevated route since the return back is painful. We go on the service lane and take the Unnao route. Again, that is typically at 630-7am and we ALWAYS breeze through.

Thx for all the help.