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Hi folks,

Today , returned to Bangalore after a 4 day trip to Angamaly. this is my tour in a capsule

Left Bangalore , Bannerghatta road on 2nd Oct 5:00 am took the NICE road, intercepted the Hosur road, said bye to all halted at the electronic city toll gate :) and continued. I have never seen such a traffic at that toll gate after the electronic city flyover.
Route taken - Hosur>Salem>Coimbatore>Palakkad>Trichur>Angamaly (Bypass through out)
Bad roads after Coimbatore near around walayar continues almost till trichur. From trichur onwards, its smooth and safe.
Halted for breakfast at Sree Saravana Bhavan after Salem at 8:30 am, one hour halt and next stop was at Angamaly at 2:30 pm.
Drive was peaceful and didn't see any signs of any political protests.

Returned today to Bangalore; same route; left Angamaly at 5:30 am, reached Saravana Bhavan (the same one near Salem) at 10:30 am, one hour break and the next halt was at Bangalore, at home at 2:40 pm.

This morning did the same route, but in reverse direction. We crossed Chandra Nagar at 0430Hours. A few words of caution:-
1. Interstate buses - VOLVOs etc. have now started operating on this route and the impact can be seen. They come in at high speeds, generally not bothered about smaller vehicles. Today I had to nearly jump off the road when one such vehicle came. At places the roads here do not have any white line marking at the edges. The roof (and top left side) scrapped against some bushes. The left side mirror got folded up - but no further damage on that.
2. Some where near Mangalam Railway Over bridge there are two speed breakers which are not indicated very clearly. Had to put a very sudden brake to stop going over one of them. Then mellowed down to go over the next one. These speed breakers are two big for the TN road standard. It was more like the one you find in Mysore-Bangalore state highway.

Suggest you to skip going through Palakkad and opt for Vadakkencherry Pollachi route. This has very less traffic and roads are in good condition.

Just heard that it the traffic on NH7 Selam-Bangalore stretch was so bad yesterday evening that it took 8 hours from Selam to Bangalore. (3:30PM at Selam and 11PM at Bangalore) I just can't imagine spending 45mins at each toll booth with people fighting for space around.

agree: Had a few folks who returned to Bangalore yesterday, but they did not mentioned such a big mess. They left Kerala at 1000Hrs and landed at Bangalore suburbs at 2030Hrs.

If what you mentioned is indeed true, then my assumptions were correct. My original plan was to return on Sunday. I had convinced my family folks that I would be taking the Palakkode->Rayakottai route. Because the Krishnagiri and Attibele toll booths would be in a mess. The only question I have now; was the Toll booth just before Thoppur ghats (when coming from Bangalore) also in a mess?

PS: My plans changed on Sunday morning, and I decided to return only on early hours of Monday. Traffic was very much okay this morning. When I went to Kerala last week, I had checked with at least two of my friends if they faced issues in the Attibele and Krishnagiri toll booths. They said it was all okay on Oct 2nd morning (when the long week end started).

This is an usual occurrence especially during long weekends when people get back home. The waiting time at toll booths is further complicated by some very intelligent drivers who create their own queues thereby making the other drivers waiting at designated queue lanes foolish.

It seems that all toll booths from Selam were in a mess. When I passed selam at 1PM, the toll booths were swelling. Again, the Thoppur ghat section had a huge jam due to a closed lane and struggling trucks. The Thoppur toll (before Dharmapuri) was also getting piled up (around 15 cars in each gate). Usually this time of the day on Sunday, even after a long weekend, will not be that much crowded. This was enough of warning for me and I decided to take the Rayakkotai route.

And the (toll-booth bypassing) NH209 route was not all roses either.

Last night returned through that way; all good till Kollegal. But i was expecting delays when i saw the lightning flashes increasing as i am approaching Kollegal and nearing the cauvery crossing, drops the size of a closed fist(thank god, no hailstorm) started pounding the windshield. Even the dual barrel lights and the full speed wipers didn't help.

It was water everywhere and don't know whether to continue or not; but just managed to drive at 40-50 kmph till Halaguru, aided by the reflectors and the white median line. Took about 4 hours from CH nagara to Silk board.

And, some of the hairpin bends have developed craters(for low slung sedans) in the Dhimbam section.

Yes. The stretch had huge pile up but was manageable. Only Thoppur had pile up close to 1.5 km long and the traffic jam at ghat section due to road strengthening work. What a day they had chosen to do the work! And coupled with that, it was raining cats and dogs after Thoppur till Krishnagiri. And more than usual crowd at A2B - Thoppur and Sree Saravanan Bhavan - Krishnagiri. Could find dejected souls carrying take aways from A2B due to over crowding. Surprisingly, almost all the vehicles were KN registered!

Is road repair in Thoppur ghats being done on both sides ? Or only traffic towards Bangalore side is affected due to Road work.

Is Palakkode-Rayakottai-Attibele route is safe to travel post midnight? Or that route doesn't make sense to avoid NH-7 during night travel.

Its not about being unsafe. Just that you should not miss the correct deviations. Thats all.

I was travelling on that stretch around the same time on my way from Calicut to Bangalore. You must have been a little bit behind me I suspect - The storm caught me about 2-3 kms after I had passed the Cauvery bridge - must have been around 9:15 or 9:30 PM. Was bad till about 5-10 kms past Malavalli after which it eased up.

I managed to keep the car going at around 50-60 kmph during the storm - Gundlupet to NICE road intersection took me around 3 hrs 15 minutes as against my normal driving time of 3 hours, so I lost only about 15 minutes to the storm. So obviously you must have been in the storm longer. Traffic was quite sparse otherwise and managed to pass all towns faster than usual. Even Kanakapura - Bangalore traffic density wasn't too bad which was a surprise !

Okay. On my journey towards Kerala (2nd Oct) I had noticed that even the Thoppur Toll gate had more vehicles than what I usually see. Just when we were in the queue, they hastly opened another toll booth which was closed. This was at around 0700Hrs. The next thought which struck me was how can I avoid this Thoppur toll as well *. After Palacode, I think there is a way to reach Mecheri (which lies between Thoppur and Mettur Dam).

So my take on this would be after long week ends any Toll Booth which has vehicles coming from multiple directions, should be avoided.
1. Salem & Thoppur: Vehicles from Kerala, Madurai and southern districts of TN and Kerala.
2. Krishnagiri: Salem, Thoppur plus Chennai based vehicles
3. Attibele: The "mother of toll booths"; pretty much the main check point at the border for vehicles coming from all Southern India!!!

* At this rate by identifying byepasses for each toll booth, I may finally start using a route which does not have any tolls at all . Perhaps using the Tamil Nadu state highways only.

I find the service at A2B Thoppur is abysmally poor, and it is worse when there is crowding. So much so that for us now the food point is the Saravana Bhavan at Vaikuntam. This happened nearly three years back, when returning from Yercaud. A2B folks at the counter did not have the courtesy to inform first hand what food items they had for a sale. So right there in front of the counter, we take 15 seconds to decide what we would have, and then the joker of a clerk there would say they did not have it. Another 15 seconds, another food item chosen the same reply given. With this we decided to skip this outlet. Saravana Bhavan folks have a much more positive attitude than these folks.

Another way to beat this, is be ready to splurge and head to Park Plaza or Grand Estancia at Salem. A very good experience and also since its a buffet, you can be done faster too. I do understand many may not opt for it, but it sure is an option. (Esp, for those who head out once in a while).

I too am interested in this route. I think coolclouds or suresh_gs had mentioned about this route.

Can't be more aptly put about A2B than this by ranjitp1.

We all call this refugee camp ever since I read this :) Stopped going there ever since we were treated like scums.