[ampere]

Originally Posted by vdiatech

Google map suggests, NH77 after Krishangiri through Chengam, Thiruvanamali, Gingee. Is the stretch really in a bad shape ? I will do more reading now.

Please check the link I provided in post # 540.
That should provide a good of the two options.

[vdiatech]

ampere, many thanks for the link. Iwill follow the Harur/TVM route.
Also, how is the road from TVM to Tindivanam through Gingee? Thanks once again

[ampere]

Originally Posted by vdiatech

ampere, many thanks for the link. Iwill follow the Harur/TVM route.
Also, how is the road from TVM to Tindivanam through Gingee? Thanks once again

Its actually very decent with those odd potholes. You can easily cruise at 70-80kmph.
Also as Ajit mentioned, at the Karimangalam exit, as for (or look for) Morappur and not Harur. At Morappur ask for Harur. Else you would be diverted back to Chengam,

Also note this being a SH, it will go through villages and at these places would slow you down a bit. But roads are very decent and sure not like the Krishnagiri/Chengam route.

[vdiatech]

thanks a lot ampere. sent this thread link to my wife and she is worried lol.
she suggests going to chennai, spending the night there in our house and then leaving for vanur/pondy .
I will convince her, otherwise now. Asking her to read this updated thread

[vdiatech]

Hi, we had a a very nice weekend in Pondichery. We took the Morappur, Harur, Thiruvanamalai, Gingee ( senji ) , Tindivanam route as I had some work in Tindivanam and Vanur , before heading to my Aunt's place in Auroville.
Past 30 years we have doing Pondy trips from Chennai only..This was the first time from Bangalore

I just wanted to add a point or two to the advises given below.

1. As you approach Harur (Arur), please do go into the town by taking a right for about a km or two. After you pass the bus stand, town street, on your left you will see a small bridge. Take that and it will lead you straight to Thiruvanamalai.
If you dont take that left, and keep straight , you would head to Salem !!

2. Dont do the mistake of stopping by at the entrance of Harur town , the spot where yo have to take a left or right and ask for directions. They will direct you to take a left instead of right ( into town ) as the left also leads to NH66 (Thiruvanamalai). So please take right, into town as mentioned in the above point.

3. While coming from Tindivanam , after gingee you enter thiruvanamali (Btw, that stretch of road is not too bad. Can be taken ). After you cross the Thiruvanamali by pass towards the town, just after the railway crossing, take a left and keep down until you hit a 'T'. Take a right there ( thirokovilur road ) and then a left. Ask the auto guys or any shop keeper for Harur (arur) salem route. just a few turns here and there, and you will be bang on the SH , all way down Harur.

4. When you hit Harur, you cross over a small bridge and hit a 'T'. Take a right there into town. If you take a left, its towards salem.

5. If in doubt, please do ask 2-3 people for directions.

I dont know how bad the NH66 is from Krishnagiri towards Bangalore. If it is really bad as mentioned here then the Harur route is worth taking. Narrow roads, through many a villages. Drive with care.

Driving through Tindivanam town , esp on a Sunday could be a real pain. A small guy threw a stone on my wind shield in the market area. I got down, caught hold of him and gave him a piece of my mind in Tamil. When the locals surrounded me, my wife got worried. I explained what the lad had done and the locals thrashed him and I moved on. No crack or chip. So I didn't worry much

Finally, I cant than enough tbhp and the members here for the advise.

Icing on the cake, was filling up petrol at the ashram pump while heading towards bangalore. 69/litre ! 10rs lesser than Bangalore ! Weekend really ended with a smile on my face while filling up lol.

Here are us !
In the back ground is my wife's brand new i10 1.2 Sportz.

[ampere]

Originally Posted by vdiatech

Hi, we had a a very nice weekend in Pondichery. We took the Morappur, Harur,
Thiruvanamalai, Gingee ( senji ) , Tindivanam route as I had some work in Tindivanam and Vanur , before heading to my
Aunt's place in Auroville.
Past 30 years we have doing Pondy trips from Chennai only..This was the first time from Bangalore

Good update there. So how much was there average tine you took to reach Tiruvannamalai from Bangalore?
Because I guess Tiruvannamalai-Tindivanam-Pondy is more predictable (not counting the traffic delays at Tindivanam).

[vdiatech]

Originally Posted by ampere

Good update there. So how much was there average tine you took to reach Tiruvannamalai from Bangalore?
Because I guess Tiruvannamalai-Tindivanam-Pondy is more predictable (not counting the traffic delays at Tindivanam).

I live in Rajarajeshwari Nagar. So, my route was from nice road, adjacent to PESIT. With a stopver lasting 40 minutes at A2B (Shoolagiri) for breakfast and another stop as my daughter was getting a bit uncomfortable at Thiruvanamalai for 15 minutes, my total journey time was 7 hours (incl the breaks) . From RR Nagar to Auroville, via Tindivanam etc. I am sorry, I dont have a break up of kms or time taken .

[rawdeal]

Originally Posted by ampere

Folks never take Krishnagiri-Chengam-TV Malai. If for any reason you want to go via Tiruvannamalai,
you can continue from Krishnagiri in the Salem direction for about 20km. At Karimangalam get out the highway
and take the road to Tiruvannamalai via Morappur/Harur. Its a much better road. The distances are almost the same.

This are the options I was referring about:

Via Harur/Tiruvannamalai

Via Arcot/Cheyyar

Left to Pondy at 4am on Sunday. Five and Half hours later I was there. Took the route as described by Ampere (via Harur) and it was great all the way.

Hosur -> Krishnagiri -> Karimangalam -> Harur -> Thiruvannamalai -> Konalur -> Vettavalam -> Kedar -> Villupuram -> Pondy

I made sure to continuosly ask the locals about these places just to make sure I was on the right path. I must have stopped at least 10 times during the journey to reconfirm and it still only took me five and half hours.

There was a small strech between Thiruvannamalai and Konalur that was undergoing some road work (less than 5 km) and surprisingly enough it was almost completely re-tarred on my way back 36 hours later!

All in all, a great route except that you don't find any good places to stop to eat given that it's not the regular route to Pondy. That's just a heads-up for anyone that leaves on a hungry stomach.

Thanks a lot Ampere. Everyone I spoke to at Pondy couldn't believe I didn't run into any potholes and that I reached in less than 6 hours.

I'd recommend that anyone taking this route should have Google maps on hand. It was very accurate and got us all the way including helping us find the best ways out of small towns.

I thought of doing the Gingee route to Thiruvanamalai instead of via Villuparam, but since the Villupuram route had no issues whatsoever I decided to do it both ways.

BTW, this was my second time to Pondy after many years. Aside from the ashram what else is there to do? I was staying at a hotel called Atithi. Nice little 4-star. Great staff, good rooms and decent pricing. Aside from visitng the old French neighbourhood we didn't really do much else. Are there any beaches that are not cordoned off with stones?

Any activites like Scuba diving, Jet skiing etc?

[ampere]

Originally Posted by rawdeal

I thought of doing the Gingee route to Thiruvanamalai instead of via Villuparam, but since the Villupuram route had no issues whatsoever I decided to do it both ways.

Thanks a lot for this. I always preferred the Gingee option, because of the fact that
Tindivanam to Pondicherry is 4-Lane. Not sure if you were aware of it !

How is the traffic from Villupuram to Pondicherry?

[rawdeal]

Originally Posted by ampere

Thanks a lot for this. I always preferred the Gingee option, because of the fact that
Tindivanam to Pondicherry is 4-Lane. Not sure if you were aware of it !

How is the traffic from Villupuram to Pondicherry?

Somebody told me about it but since the Gingee strech apparently had some potholes, I decided not to risk it and go with Villupuram. Besides, I think the Gingee strech is a little longer.

The route I took was roughly about 350km.

Villupuram was a bit crowded and I was surpised it was that way at 9am in the morning on a Sunday but nonetheless nothing crazy.

[vsbabu]

Drove to Pondycherry over weekend via Arcot, Vandavasi. Nothing much to report - decent roads as usual, except that Krishnagiri-Arcot has too many deviations due to six laning. Came back via Gingee, Harur, Morappur. It is my first time on this route. Spent some 20 minutes in Tiruvannamalai figuring out the road (google maps helped finally) and another 15 minutes in Harur. Overall time taken was from 1:15pm start at Auroville and 7:00pm at Koramangala. Very quiet and peaceful drive. Though this route has almost 210km of state highways, really liked it. Only part I found missing was lack of any decent hotel once you go past Chinnar A2B.

Thanks guys for suggesting this route.

[ampere]

Originally Posted by vsbabu

Though this route has almost 210km of state highways, really liked it. Only part I found missing was lack of any decent hotel once you go past Chinnar A2B.

The best bet are hotels in Thiruvannamalai. Thats the only where you can get some decent place to break. But even there most of them are residential hotels.

[rajshenoy]

I have been following this thread for a while and after going through the same i saw that the following route is in good condition

Hosur -> Krishnagiri -> Karimangalam -> Harur -> Thiruvannamalai -> Konalur -> Vettavalam -> Kedar -> Villupuram -> Pondy

Krishnagiri-Thiruvanamalai is about 50Km and via Karimangalam-harur adds another 50 kms( as shown by Google maps)

How bad is this Krishnagiri-Thiruvanamalai ? Is it no road, rough road(like we see about 20km on the mulabagil-palemanur stretch) or occasional potholes ? I heard that traffic density is low on that road and it is no doubt shortest route to Puducherry

[nfsfreak]

Originally Posted by rajshenoy

How bad is this Krishnagiri-Thiruvanamalai ? Is it no road, rough road(like we see about 20km on the mulabagil-palemanur stretch) or occasional potholes ? I heard that traffic density is low on that road and it is no doubt shortest route to Puducherry

Please refer post #527 for the road condition. It remains the same now is what I heard. Krishnagiri-Chengam-T.V.Malai is not good and would definitely slow you down considerably if you are travelling in a sedan or hatchback. If you love off-roading, then this is the route for you.

Though Krishnagiri-Harur-T.V.Malai adds 50 Kms to your drive, the travel time would be almost the same in both routes (or may be shorter in harur route, depends on your driving style) + a really stress free ride in Krishnagiri-Harur-T.V.Malai with good roads all the way.

[ampere]

Originally Posted by rajshenoy

Krishnagiri-Thiruvanamalai is about 50Km and via Karimangalam-harur adds another 50 kms( as shown by Google maps)

How bad is this Krishnagiri-Thiruvanamalai ? Is it no road, rough road(like we see about 20km on the mulabagil-palemanur stretch)
or occasional potholes ? I heard that traffic density is low on that road and it is no doubt shortest route to Puducherry

Originally Posted by nfsfreak

Though Krishnagiri-Harur-T.V.Malai adds 50 Kms to your drive, the travel time would be almost the same in both routes (or may be shorter
in harur route, depends on your driving style) + a really stress free ride in Krishnagiri-Harur-T.V.Malai with good roads all the way.

Krishnagiri-TV Malai is about 120 and not 50. Also the route difference is about 30-35 and not more. Here is the google route link:

Via Chengam


Via Morappur/Harur