[anantu2001]

Hi Guys,

We would be travelling to Goa (Calangute) on 17th of this month for 4 days. We a group of 3 families travelling in 3 cars - Taigun, Harrier and Creta.

Which would be the best route to Calangute?

Google Maps is showing the Belgaum-Patne-Dodamarg-Mapusa route. It says its the fastest route.


Maps is not even considering the Dharward-Ramnagar-Ponda route. Is this route doable?

Need inputs from people who have travelled recently.

Regards,
Anant

[SVMBLR]

Bangalore to GOA- 2nd October update:

Bangalore -Chitradurga-Davengere-Hubbali-Dhwarwad-Alnavar-Ramnagar-Mollem-Cavelossim

Note: Please carry your Vehicle Valid Documents including PUC and Speed Test after Mollem checkpost. Roadwork is underway as there are potholes and irregularities in the leveling of roads and ground clearance is manageable.

[kramerican]

We're traveling from Bangalore to Candolim on October 11th with a low-GC car (Toyota Glanza). Is the Hubbali-Dhwarwad-Alnavar-Ramnagar-Mollem route still the best? Google Maps shows options other than the above. Tinai Ghat is closed, according to maps.

Our return journey is from South Goa (Palolem). Hence, we are planning to take the Karwar-Ankola-Yellapur-Hubbali route. Since this is our first long road trip, we plan to take a break mid-way (Haveri or Hubbali) in both directions.

[rohittk]

Goa - Karwar - Ankola- Hubbali - Bangalore route is lovely and scenic. I got back yesterday via this route. Actually I had taken this route enroute to North Goa as well. I have a Jeep so i knew i could take the Ghat's easily and save much time. This was my 12th trip to Goa.

Here are the Pro's of this route:

1. The most scenic route. There are stretches where you see the sea on one side and the ghats on the other. How lovely is this?
2. The ghat section have wide roads and not really steep. They are much easier to drive compared to the Tinai Ghat or the Chorla Ghat. Route.
3. Decent eating options.

and the cons:

1. Depending on the time of the day, you can be stuck behind a bunch of Lorries/Trucks at the Ghat's where the climb is a bit steep. These are the sections (couple of them) where the trucks queue up. I did not have an issue at all in my Jeep as i could bulldoze my way through. the Torque really helped in leap frogging few trucks with one push on the accelerator and the ground clearance + shock absorbers allow me to sprint through the bad patches.

Overall I Love this route!

Originally Posted by anantu2001

We would be travelling to Goa (Calangute) on 17th of this month for 4 days. We a group of 3 families travelling in 3 cars - Taigun, Harrier and Creta.

Though I did not take this route, I know it is doable. I returned from Goa yesterday. The rains in Goa have tapered down considerably. Due to heavy rains couple of week back a small stretch of the Tinai Ghat route (Ramanagar to Mollem) was muddy and slushy affecting road grip. Not that is not much of an issue. Additionally, you can take a left just before Hotel Simla in Tinai Ghat and take the small bypass to join back to Anmod enroute to Goa. I took the South Goa route (Bangalore - Hubli bypass - Yellapur - Ankola- Karware - South Goa - North Goa) and i can tell you the route is lovely and scenic. Loved every bit of it. I will post my experience shortly.

[anantu2001]

Originally Posted by rohittk

Though I did not take this route, I know it is doable. I returned from Goa yesterday. The rains in Goa have tapered down considerably. Due to heavy rains couple of week back a small stretch of the Tinai Ghat route (Ramanagar to Mollem) was muddy and slushy affecting road grip. Not that is not much of an issue. Additionally, you can take a left just before Hotel Simla in Tinai Ghat and take the small bypass to join back to Anmod enroute to Goa. I took the South Goa route (Bangalore - Hubli bypass - Yellapur - Ankola- Karware - South Goa - North Goa) and i can tell you the route is lovely and scenic. Loved every bit of it. I will post my experience shortly.

Thanks for the update. Yes, Tinai ghat is closed and we have to take the bypass via Castlerock.

Has anybody done the Khanapur-Kankumbi-Chorla Ghat route as this Gmaps picture?



Regards,
Anant

[Thinking_Slow]

Did Goa to Dharwad via Ponda, Anmod, Tinai ghat and Ramnagar on Oct 7th. Can confirm that the tinai ghat section is open. There are few bad stretches but were easily negotiated. A vehicle with decent ground clearance should not have any issue.

Had also done Ramnagar to Anmod via castlerock on Oct 3rd. I would not recommend this route. It was full of big potholes throughout.

[aditbelw]

Hello People. I am heading towards Agonda on 12th of October , will be driving a low slung sedan and solo . Going through all the posts here is a bit overwhelming since there are varied views on the best route to take.

Input much appreciated!

[sampat.sahoo]

I drove to Cavelossim from Bangalore on 5th October and returned on 10th October.

Here is the route that I took -

5th October: Bangalore - Bankapur Toll Gate - Mundgod - Yellapur - Ankola - Karwar - Cavelossim

Distance - Around 600 kms

Duration - I started at 4:45 AM and reached Cavelossim at 5:30 PM. This includes 2 stops for breakfast and lunch of around 1 hour each.

Observations -

1. Road till Bankapur Toll Gate is awesome
2. The road from Bankapur Toll Gate to Yellapur (via Mundgod) was bad but scenic
3. The road opens up after Yellapur

10th October: Cavelossim - Karwar - Ankola - Yellapur - Kalaghatgi - Hubli Outer Ring Road Cloverleaf Interchange - Bankapur Toll Gate - Bangalore

Distance - Around 650 kms

Duration - I started at 9:30 AM and reached home at 11:45 PM. This includes 2 stops for Lunch and late evening snacks/dinner of around 1 hour each.

Observations -

While returning I avoided the Yellapur - Mundgod - Bankapur Toll Gate patch because of bad roads. I took a longer route via Hubli.

I prefer sticking to 80-90 kmph all the while. So that explains my longer travel time on both the ways. Here is a pic of my trip meter after this beautiful drive of 1443 KMs.

[redcruiser]

The better route to Goa as of today is Hubli-Kalaghatgi-Yellapur-Karwar-South Goa.
Roads are not great in the ghats but manageable.
https://maps.app.goo.gl/w3kzKw6RYeWNrPTx8

[ashkamath]

Originally Posted by aditbelw

Hello People. I am heading towards Agonda on 12th of October , will be driving a low slung sedan and solo . Going through all the posts here is a bit overwhelming since there are varied views on the best route to take.

Input much appreciated!

As BHPian @redcruiser mentioned below and in his own words,

The better route to Goa as of today is Hubli-Kalaghatgi-Yellapur-Karwar-South Goa.
Roads are not great in the ghats but manageable.
https://maps.app.goo.gl/w3kzKw6RYeWNrPTx8

For a low GC car to South Goa, this is the best route as of today.

So, after by passing Canacona town via the 6 lane new highway, at the beginning of the ghat road ( a couple of kms after town), you get a small turn towards Agonda. There's a proper board mentioning Agonda. You leave the highway and take this road and from that point, Agonda is less than 10 kms or thereabouts..

(The diversion road comes after "Mallikarjun Sports, Gulem, Canacona" on Google maps on Canacona to Madgao highway, just after Canacona town). The road is known as Agonda Beach Road. It's clearly mentioned in Google maps.

Or once you reach Karwar, simply type Karwar to Mallikarjun sports Gulem Goa on Google map and follow the route. Take the next immediate left and just follow the route to reach Agonda. It's the easiest, stress free route to Agonda

[slowtoss]

I travelled from Bangalore to South Goa on 11th October.

I took the satellite ring road to reach Bangalore Pune express way, was quite impressive drive on it for around 100kms.

After Tumkur stopped at Shell Sira for filling up the tank and then A2B. Due to long weekend there was lot of rush and took almost one hour there.

After starting from Sira did speed up and reached Hubali in 2:45 mins. Then I had decision to make if travel through dharwad ramnagar anmod or take the usual south Goa route via yellapur Karwar.

I chose the dharwad route as haven’t travelled on it since 2018. Had took the Karwar route in 2020 so was confident that if the dharwad route is not good enough then will take Karwar route in return.

Stopped at woods restaurant as suggested by someone earlier, decent place to have lunch as there are no good options after that.

The road after dharwad is quite bad to be honest, although did not have any trouble in driving through the potholes as such but it was a pain after driving on the excellent expressway.

After reaching Ramnagar again the decision was to take Tinai ghat or via castle rock. As I was getting late, I stopped at the turn for castle rock and asked few shopkeepers about the road conditions of Tinai Ghat. All of them mentioned it’s open and ok to use so I opted for the Tinai ghat route. And the roads are almost non existent in that section. There are some muddy patches and if it rains it becomes a hell lot of difficult to traverse through it but fortunately it was a sunny day.

After reaching anmod the roads were quite good and as soon as we entered Goa the roads were excellent. Did not have any issues travelling to Mollem Ponda and then south Goa.

Overall it took me 13 hours with around 3 hours of break as I was travelling with a 1 year old.

Returning back tomorrow via Karwar. I have another route in mind, that is Karwar sirsi Haveri Bangalore. Can someone please suggest if this route is good or should I stick to Karwar Hubali route?

[rajivtelang]

Originally Posted by slowtoss

Returning back tomorrow via Karwar. I have another route in mind, that is Karwar sirsi Haveri Bangalore. Can someone please suggest if this route is good or should I stick to Karwar Hubali route?

Not sure about current condition but it is a long and slow route via Sirsi town. I have taken it multiple times and the ghat is called "devimane ghat". I would still recommend Ankola Hubli route, although a little longer it is fine. To be honest the sirsi route roads are narrow and you will be spending a long time on SH or village roads.

You have two choices to reach Sirsi. Reach upto Kumta and take devimane ghat to reach Sirsi or reach Yellapur via Ankola and then take smaller state roads to reach Sirsi.

[vsathyap]

Originally Posted by vsathyap

BHPians,



Trip will be done on 2 low GC sedans.

Thanks to BHPians for recommending this route. We did the trip on the 2 sedans quite easily but road conditions seem to have deteriorated overall.

BLR->Hubli: Encountered heavy egress traffic and a long wait at toll booths with cars zig-zagging and merging across lanes to try and squeeze through . The road conditions are OKAY and we encountered extremely heavy rains after crossing Haveri, all the way to Hubli. Visibility was down to few feet and cars with blinkers on made it even more confusing to comprehend a stopped vehicle v/s a slow moving one with hazards on

Hubli to South Goa (Palolem) was a clean calm drive the next morning. The stretch till Yellapura is awesome with some randomly scattered pot holes and unmarked speed bumps near small villages. The stretch from Yellapura to Arebailu is mostly Ghat road descent (towards Goa) and is quite horrible at sharp turns with deep ruts created by heavy trucks. If you get stuck behind a long chassis lorry, it will eat up your time here. The stretch after Arebailu all the way till Goa is very good, but there are 100s of deep potholes that come up suddenly that may take you by surprise. Go easy on the the A pedal on this stretch as its quite possible to crack a rim or even lose a front wheel if you get into one of these deep potholes at speed. The tarmac after crossing into Goa border becomes butter smooth.

Overall - this route is good. I was also surprised by the sheer amount of massive potholes we saw on the Hubli Bangalore NH4 (AH47 as per GMaps). Watch out for these and drive carefully - most of them are on the middle lane. If these arent fixed in time, I feel driving on this entire highway will become a stressful experience in the future.

[BG96]

Quick update on Bangalore Goa roads. I travelled on 15th October and sharing an update right away.

The best route is Little longer, has some flaws.

Bangalore - Hubli- Yellapur - Ankola- Goa: There are some bad patches but mostly doable. But for 95% of the route is nicely laid and scenic.

Also tried the Anmod- Tinai ghat, the roads are very bad for 25 kms and if a bus/ truck gets stuck you'll loose close to an hour in standstill traffic. Unless you are going to beyond Vagator I'd not choose this route and will go via longer Hubli- Yellapur - Goa route.

[diogo]

Any Members did Anmod to Ramnagar in the last couple of days, how is the road?
Planning trip towards Bangalore tomorrow checking if there was rain that side which has deteriorated the bad sections.