[kannan666]

As scheduled, left for Kukke Subramanya on Friday morning at 8:30am taking the Nelamangala flyover (Toll Rs.20/-) and then the left onto NH48 towards Hassan. There are two toll booths (Rs.33/- each) which we crossed and stopped for a late breakfast at Hotel Mayura in Adichunchunagiri (Bellur Cross). After breakfast, continued on till Sakleshpur which we reached at around 1:00pm. Roads upto this point are excellent. From here on, however, we started facing problems due to the numerous landslides that had occurred just then on Shiradi Ghat road. We got stuck at two places after Sakleshpur, and had to return back to Sakleshpur at the second one as we had not had lunch and were informed that the blockage would take at least 2 to 3 hours to clear. Had lunch and started back thinking that the road would have been cleared by then but were informed further down the road that there were new landslides and it would take another couple of hours to clear. By then, it was already 6:15pm and we were wondering if it was wise to take accommodation in Sakleshpur and continue the next day. However, we decided to make it to Kukke for the night and take the seldom used Bisle Ghat road from Dhonigal. We enquired the condition of the road from a tempo traveller that had just come from Kukke on that road and he informed us that the road was doable but it had taken him 2.5hrs for the 60 odd kilometres. We decided to take a chance even though we were in a much smaller vehicle and proceeded. The road was, as expected, quite poor but was motorable and we were able to maintain speeds of around 35 to 40kms per hour on the road and we thought that it was not too bad. However, as we continued the road condition got from bad to worse and so did the weather. For some 18 kms, it was more a case of trying to find a patch of road amongst the boulders. Added to that, it was raining pretty heavily and steadily, there was a thick layer of mist and visibility was down to almost just about 5 metres. The going was tough but the Omni soldiered on. At places, the road was completely washed away and rivulets of water was cascading down from the ghats and flowing across and on the so called road. The Omni broke traction a lot of times while wading through the slush, mud and gravel but we somehow made it through. It being a rear wheel drive must have helped. The 60 odd kilometres took us 2.15hrs and we reached the temple town at around 8:30pm.

There was not much rush at the temple itself due to the landslides that had closed the highway for most of the day. At Kukke, we had most of our meals at Neo Mysore Cafe as it was conveniently located just in front of the temple and adjacent to our lodge. The food was very good, service was quick and the prices were moderate. We stayed at Anugraha Lodge where the rooms were big, clean and neat and was at walking distance from the temple.

Next day, we visited Dharmastala. While going, we took the Kukke - Panja - Kadaba road. The road was pretty decent for most part but there were a lot of places where the roads were damaged and there were numerous pot holes to negotiate, rains adding to the woes. It took us an hour and fifteen minutes to get there (57kms). Decided to take the Dharmastala - Gundiya - Kukke route on the way back and this route is a breeze, superb roads all the way (63kms) and we were able to make the trip back in just under an hour.

The return journey was quite uneventful except there being a hold up in the highway traffic between Gundiya and Sakleshpur as an MP registered Canter had fallen down the gorge and two cranes which were engaged to lift it back up had blocked the road. This exercise took about an hour. We had started from Kukke at 11:15am and we were back in Bangalore at 6:00pm, having lost an hour at the traffic hold up and another hour at Hotel Mayura where we had stopped for lunch.

[Samurai]

Boy, that is quite an experience. Odd that landslides happened just before you arrived, in such cases delay can't be avoided. But you took Bisle ghat, that was a brave decision. Instead of driving in the best ghat road, you took on the worst ghat road of Karnataka. Hope you took enough photos, driving through Bisle is quite an experience.

[figo_gpb]

Back from Kukke & Dharmasthala trip. Had good darshan both at Kukke and Manjunath temples. Thanks to all who have shared their suggestions. Will post an update on the trip a little later. Shiradi ghat section like Samurai was mentioning is holding up as of now, but deteriorating fast. It did have landslips in at least 4-5 places on Friday. Could see fresh wet mud on the roads. Luckily nothing major seems to have happened on Saturday/ Sunday when we travelled. Also quite a few bull dozers on standby for quick clearnance. Quite a few potholes and expanding in size with rains in the ghat section.

[SharathScorp]

I did a weekend trip same area. Had malaya marutha guest house booked for saturday. Sunday while returning, went down in charmadi to reach d'stala and took shiradi to reach blr. More updates and photos would be posted.

[lohithrao]

Was planning to visit bisle ghats sometime soon, about 4years back i had ventured on this route on my bike and had enjoyed it, how bad is the road now?

@kannan

[kannan666]

Originally Posted by lohithrao

Was planning to visit bisle ghats sometime soon, about 4years back i had ventured on this route on my bike and had enjoyed it, how bad is the road now?

@kannan

@ Lohith Can safely assume that you have read my review above and hence the query ! Well, for a bike, it would be a really challenging course to put it mildly if you had to do it in the circumstances that I did. Problem was that I had to tackle the terrain with the fear of the unknown, in an Omni, with extended family, in the night with it raining cats and dogs, accompanied by a heavy mist and fog cover which reduced visibility.

It would be a lovely bike ride if you were to tackle it in the day time and preferable not in the rains since a few of the rivulets that I had to cross were quite deep and were very fast flowing, so much so that I did lose traction at a couple of places. At some places, the rain water was flowing along the road itself making it difficult to get a grip on the slushy and gravel ridden surface. Hope this helps.

@ Samurai The drive was too demanding and full of tension of the unknown coupled with bad weather and very poor visibility, hence unfortunately, no pics although the scene is still quite vivid in memory ! I am sure you must have traveled these roads many a time in your GV seeing it is in your own backyard !

[Samurai]

Originally Posted by kannan666

@ Samurai The drive was too demanding and full of tension of the unknown coupled with bad weather and very poor visibility, hence unfortunately, no pics although the scene is still quite vivid in memory ! I am sure you must have traveled these roads many a time in your GV seeing it is in your own backyard !

Yes, I have done it many times on both Jeep and GV, in both dry and wet weather.

Bisle ghat during wet weather: http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/4x4-ex...isle-ghat.html

Bisle park during dry weather (it is totally fogged up during monsoon):

[addyhemmige]

Originally Posted by kannan666

@ Lohith Can safely assume that you have read my review above and hence the query ! Well, for a bike, it would be a really challenging course to put it mildly if you had to do it in the circumstances that I did. Problem was that I had to tackle the terrain with the fear of the unknown, in an Omni, with extended family, in the night with it raining cats and dogs, accompanied by a heavy mist and fog cover which reduced visibility.

I see you've had an adventurous trip. I guess you were lucky not to face any elephants. Bisle at night is actually scary and while it is raining like this, it is even more scary. Apparently, there is a lot of elephant activity at night on this road.

[figo_gpb]

Originally Posted by figo_gpb

Back from Kukke & Dharmasthala trip. Had good darshan both at Kukke and Manjunath temples. Thanks to all who have shared their suggestions. Will post an update on the trip a little later. Shiradi ghat section like Samurai was mentioning is holding up as of now, but deteriorating fast. It did have landslips in at least 4-5 places on Friday. Could see fresh wet mud on the roads. Luckily nothing major seems to have happened on Saturday/ Sunday when we travelled. Also quite a few bull dozers on standby for quick clearnance. Quite a few potholes and expanding in size with rains in the ghat section.

Update on trip

Prologue: We were pretty undecided almost till Saturday morning 9 am. The previous day's landslips and forecasted heavy rains did not help matters. I called up a couple of hotels in Kukke and confirmed the weather conditions there. They said, its only raining moderately and there are no blockages on the Shiradi ghat road section as far as they are aware. Finally decided to take the risk as this was the only weekend where all five of us can make it together (my mom-in-law is expected to leave on Wednesday). By the time we started it was almost 11 am.

Route & Timings:
Day 1: As suggested by fellow bhpians, took the Blr ORR - Nelamangala - Kunigal - Channarayapattana - Hasan - Sakhleshpur - Gundya - Kukke. (11 am to 6.30 pm with about 1.5 hours of break for lunch/ coffee/ tea)

Day 2 (onwards): Kukke - Gundya - Dharmasthala (9.30 am to 11 am with 10 min break)

Day 2 (return): Dharmasthala - Gundya - Hasan - Kunigal - Nelamangala - Blr (2.30 pm to 10 pm with around 1-1.5 hour breaks for enroute shopping/ snacks/pics)


Road Conditions:
Very good road conditions all along till Shiradi ghat section. They are four laning/ at quite a few places enroute after Kunigal. So you will find a lot of it being two lane. Shiradi ghat section like i said earlier is holding up as of now. But we encountered heavy rains in patches while going and returning. There are quite a few potholes and need to keep a watch while driving. Given my doubts with ground clearance of figo and 5 adults, i was a little extra careful in the shiradi ghat section. Once you take left at Gundya, the road conditions improve drastically. Its in fact in excellent condition all the way till Kukke.

Kukke to Dharmastha route via Gundya is also in excellent condition. There are a few potholes you should watch out for after you take right onto SH37 before reaching Dharmasthala.


Temple Darshan
We had a very good darshan in Kukke temple. I guess they close by 8 pm. We were the last people to come out of the temple and they closed the doors behind us. Had part dinner inside Temple premises & Neo Mysore Cafe outside. We had breakfast the next day in the hotel opposite Neo Mysore cafe and found it to be better.

Temple darshan in Manjunath was stopped between 11 am 12 noon for Puja. We took quick darshan ticket of 200 rs. We could do the Darshan in less than half an hour after 12 noon. Had lunch in temple premises again - similar to Kukke.

Performance of Car
Figo handled very well all through - mainly the curvy roads. Roughly the fuel efficiency figures seem to be around 16 to 16.5 km/ltr. Was expecting more than this. But probably the ghat road and 5 adults with 70% AC may have negatively impacted these figures.

One peculiar thing i observed was there was some kind of smoke (looked like steam/ water vapor to me) coming from the AC vents when i switched it on. This happened at least 3-4 times during the trip. Am a little puzzled.

Was it because it was raining and some water may have seeped through and then evaporated on getting in contact with an already very hot engine? Can this be a possible explaination? I opened the bonnet at least a couple of times to check if there was any issue, but could not find anything. Any thoughts on this would be very helpful.

Thanks all for your valuable suggestions.

[lohithrao]

Thanks Kannan, am planning to go by my truck(Safari) so the terrain should not be too much of a concern, however as addy mentioned, elephants will be

Originally Posted by kannan666

@ Lohith Can safely assume that you have read my review above and hence the query ! Well, for a bike, it would be a really challenging course to put it mildly if you had to do it in the circumstances that I did. Problem was that I had to tackle the terrain with the fear of the unknown, in an Omni, with extended family, in the night with it raining cats and dogs, accompanied by a heavy mist and fog cover which reduced visibility.

It would be a lovely bike ride if you were to tackle it in the day time and preferable not in the rains since a few of the rivulets that I had to cross were quite deep and were very fast flowing, so much so that I did lose traction at a couple of places. At some places, the rain water was flowing along the road itself making it difficult to get a grip on the slushy and gravel ridden surface. Hope this helps.

@ Samurai The drive was too demanding and full of tension of the unknown coupled with bad weather and very poor visibility, hence unfortunately, no pics although the scene is still quite vivid in memory ! I am sure you must have traveled these roads many a time in your GV seeing it is in your own backyard !

[kannan666]

Originally Posted by figo_gpb

Back from Kukke & Dharmasthala trip. Had good darshan both at Kukke and Manjunath temples. Thanks to all who have shared their suggestions. Will post an update on the trip a little later. Shiradi ghat section like Samurai was mentioning is holding up as of now, but deteriorating fast. It did have landslips in at least 4-5 places on Friday. Could see fresh wet mud on the roads. Luckily nothing major seems to have happened on Saturday/ Sunday when we travelled. Also quite a few bull dozers on standby for quick clearnance. Quite a few potholes and expanding in size with rains in the ghat section.

Read about your trip, I too was in Dharmasthala on Saturday. We could have actually met up somewhere there had we known that we had crossed paths. However, I had left Bangalore on Friday itself when the actual landslides had occurred between Sakleshpur and Gundya and had an adventurous trip to say the least !

[figo_gpb]

Originally Posted by kannan666

Read about your trip, I too was in Dharmasthala on Saturday. We could have actually met up somewhere there had we known that we had crossed paths. However, I had left Bangalore on Friday itself when the actual landslides had occurred between Sakleshpur and Gundya and had an adventurous trip to say the least !

Yes, however we started only on Saturday. We reached Kukke only in the evening of Saturday and went to Dharmasthala on Sunday and returned to Bangalore on Sunday itself. So looks like i followed you with a gap of 1 day!

[shreeps]

Guys,
I will be starting on my Mysore-Kukke trip on Wednesday. Subsequently, I will be going from Kukke-Mangalore-Kundapur-Dharwad-Belgaum-Pune.
It will be really helpful if regulars and localites can update this thread with the latest road, rain and river conditions in the region.
I am specially worried about Kumaradhara river overflowing the bridge and situation on Shiradi ghat.
I would really appreciate it if people could help out. Thanks in advance.

[SharathScorp]

Originally Posted by shreeps

Guys,
I will be starting on my Mysore-Kukke trip on Wednesday. Subsequently, I will be going from Kukke-Mangalore-Kundapur-Dharwad-Belgaum-Pune.
It will be really helpful if regulars and localites can update this thread with the latest road, rain and river conditions in the region.
I am specially worried about Kumaradhara river overflowing the bridge and situation on Shiradi ghat.
I would really appreciate it if people could help out. Thanks in advance.

Kumaradhara river even if it overflows, doesn't last long (Not more than 2 to 4 hours). So, you need not worry. And if you are going from Mysore, I guess you are talking Madikeri, Sulya route. In this, you need not worry about Shiradi. Even if you go via Hassan, Shiradi was in good motorable shape till last month, and I had info that local and highway authorities were keeping close watch on this and had all arrangements to make quick fixes for large damage if it happens.

From Kukke till Kundapur it won't be any probs as it is complete highway drive except for Mangalore Udupi stretch which was under construction. I am not sure on the current condition. Kundapur onwards is blur for me.

[shreeps]

Thanks. Its just that I am a little concerned about the route after Kukke to reach kundapur. In case kumaradhara river is in flood, we may get stuck.