[PGNarain]

Originally Posted by Maverick79

Doing this route again today .

Route planned is Pune - Indapur - Sholapur - Basavakalyan - Zaheerabad - Hyd. The regular NH9.

Hi Maverick,

Thanks for the updates!! I am keenly following your route updates for this sector. I think I mentioned once before to you that I am planning to drive down to Vizag from Bombay during the month of January next year, and planning to take the NH9 all the way to Vijaywada and the NH5 from thereon.

Please do keep us posted.

Thanks.

[vnabhi]

Originally Posted by PGNarain

On the way to Vizag from Bombay, I do not plan to stop over at Hyderabad and wanted to know if I can skip Hyderabad completely by driving through the ORR. .

Yes you can. This advantage did not exist till 3 months back. Consider yourself lucky!

Originally Posted by PGNarain

I will be approaching on the NH9 from Solapur, and as per Google Maps, I can completely circumvent Hyderabad by getting onto the ORR at Gachibowli and re-joining the ORR near Abdullapurmet.

Please keep in mind that I have absolutely NIL knowledge about roads in Hyderabad.

Thanks.

Google maps has not been completely updated in that case. You need not drive all they way till Gachibowli to take the ORR (which comprises around 10 kms of city traffic).

Instead, you can take the right turn to the ORR at Patancheru itself, which comes on the outskirts of Hyderabad. This wing of the ORR was completed only a month ago. It joins the ORR stretch that used to earlier start from Gachibowli at a place called Narsingi.

So consider yourself twice blessed !

[PGNarain]

Originally Posted by vnabhi

Yes you can. This advantage did not exist till 3 months back. Consider yourself lucky!

So consider yourself twice blessed !

Wow, vnabhi, that is indeed fantastic news. Thanks for the prompt update and route info, it really puts my mind at ease and will help immensly in planning out the trip.

[Maverick79]

Well, here goes my recent experience on this route.

Started from home( Pimle saudagar) by 3.15pm to fill up the tank at Autolines University road and then to pick my better half in Kalyani Nagar.
It was 4.15pm finally to start for Hyd from there.

Took the below route,

Pune - Kurkhumb - Sholapur - Basavakalyan - Zaheerabad - Hyd.

Reached home by 1.15am.
Total time including 20 mins dinner and two ten mins breaks is 9.00 hrs.

Now coming to the road conditions.

The 27 kms paid road after crossing Hadapsar is a breeze.
Touched 120kmph many times here. Paid 20bucks for this toll.

Once this stretch ends, the widening work starts immediately.
Sugarcane carrying bullock carts and tractors were vey much evident in the entire stretch, as mentioned by AshishPallod in this thread earlier.
Unfortunately, the are more slow moving, on the narrow and un widend road patches of roughly 6-8kms each.

Truck traffic was very much present too, which led to an additional hour for reaching Sholapur.
It took 5 hours this time unlike my last drive which took only 4 hours with the similar truck traffic, excluding the sugar cane carts

Pot holes too, were present all over the un worked and un-widend roads.
Average speeds hence reduced to 50-60kmph.

Be very Cautious with these ill illuminated, slow moving bullock carts and tractors.

It takes time to realise their presence. Better to drive slowly and flicker your head lamps continuosly to gauge their distance and speed.

The road widening is approximately for 170 kms after leaving Pune. Rest is the same old single road with plenty of trucks and car carriers filled with regular reworked patches of old road.

Leg two, from Sholapur to Umarga, was also a similar story, but with almost no sugarcane carts. I don't remember crossing them after Sholapur.

The two narrow bridges slowed down the speeds.

Leg three, from Umarga to Basavakalyan was really good this time. Suprisingly, all the stretch was completely re done with fresh Bitumen. Infact the entire stretch of KA is improved and is now at par or even better than the present MH and AP road conditions. Hence,the 100kms KA stretch was just a breeze.

Next 100 kms stretch in AP till BHEL, Leg four, was alright with ocassional pot holes. I was lucky to miss all of them this time

Reached BHEL by 12.40. Again refilled and took 5 mins break.

It was like a dream to cover the BHEL - KP - Ameerpet - Koti - DSNR- Chaitanyapuri road in flat 25 mins. I always take the other route BHEL - Mehdipatnam- ABIDS - Koti - DSNR. Then too, I used to face two hours of traffic to reach my home on the other end in the day.

@vnabhi. Will try ORR for sure next time. Came to know the stretch from my place till Gachibowli is finished and is being used by my IT friends for regular commuting.
Thank you for confirming about the completion of the other stretch between Gachibowli and Patancheruvu.

Will upload the pics of the road soon.

@PGNarain.
I would recommend you to take the HYD- Suryapet - Vijayawada - Rajamundry- Vizag route. I enjoyed this route even in the night. The road condition was really good when I went on Oct 7 -10th.

I would suggest you not to take the HYD- Khammam - Rajamundry - Vizag route as this is full of pot holes and also took longer time. I also had a big bend on my LH frnt wheel rim when slipped into one of those huge potholes near Sathupalli.

Pls ping me for any kind of assistance you may need, in this route.

[anilisanil]

Originally Posted by Maverick79

Total time including 20 mins dinner and two ten mins breaks is 9.00 hrs.

9 hrs????

Man! Did you fly?

That same stretch for me took about 14.5 hours.

From Hinjewadi to A.S Rao Nagar. Started at 3:45 PM and reached by 6 AM

[Maverick79]

Originally Posted by anilisanil

9 hrs????

Man! Did you fly?

That same stretch for me took about 14.5 hours.

From Hinjewadi to A.S Rao Nagar. Started at 3:45 PM and reached by 6 AM

The KA stretch used to take the longes time. But, it was just butter smoot this time. Hardly took an hour and half to cover this 100kms. It other wise used to take more than 2.5 hours or even more and then another two to reach HYD.

The same road was equally worse when I went back to Pune on 31st. But found some rework activity in the starting point after crossing the 'Welcome to Karnataka' Arch.

If the road widening between Pune and Sholapur is completed, I am pretty sure we can do this 565kms till BHEL in 8 odd hours.
Pune to Sholapur - 3.5 to 4 hours and Shloapur to BHEL in another 4 hours.

Just checked the fuel bills to find the timings.
Pune Auto lines - 15:37 on 8.11.11.
Mallikarjuna Service, Ramachandra puram - 00:56 on 09.11.11.

I have a bad habbit of saving all the bills till the get converted into the Payback points.

[ASHISHPALLOD]

Originally Posted by Maverick79

Reached home by 1.15am.
Total time including 20 mins dinner and two ten mins breaks is 9.00 hrs.

oye maverick,
you reached hyd in nine hours but gaddi thickthak hai na?

Thats pretty fast.

[Maverick79]

Originally Posted by ASHISHPALLOD

oye maverick,
you reached hyd in nine hours but gaddi thickthak hai na?

Thats pretty fast.

Gaddi eekdam ttaatt hain jee!

This time filled nitrogen in all the wheels. Had a very smoother and less bouncy ride.

Luckily, didn't face any jams/ blockages while going, unlike the return journey.

Started at 10.15am from Hitech city. Though stated early from home in Hyd, camped in Barista on the way to Gachibowli for almost an hour to send an urgent report. Could re start only by 10.15am. on 10th.
Later took a break of 30 mins after 25kms from Sholapur for Lunch, at a very pathetic restaurant.
Another 40 mins were gone while waiting at a railway crossing ( don't remember the name of the place) to finish a double crossing of two trains.

Could reach home in Pune only by 9.15pm.

[PGNarain]

Originally Posted by Maverick79

Took the below route,

Pune - Kurkhumb - Sholapur - Basavakalyan - Zaheerabad - Hyd.


@PGNarain.
I would recommend you to take the HYD- Suryapet - Vijayawada - Rajamundry- Vizag route. I enjoyed this route even in the night. The road condition was really good when I went on Oct 7 -10th.

I would suggest you not to take the HYD- Khammam - Rajamundry - Vizag route as this is full of pot holes and also took longer time. I also had a big bend on my LH frnt wheel rim when slipped into one of those huge potholes near Sathupalli.

Pls ping me for any kind of assistance you may need, in this route.

Fantastic and accurate info Maverick. Thanks a ton.

It good to hear that the KA stretch has been recarpeted. As you mentioned above, barring any last minute changes to, I plan to take the very route you have recommended above all the way to Vizag.

Once again thanks for the update and may I ask if you will be doing this stretch sometime again the coming months?? Just my selfish motive for getting road updates all the way till Januray, when i intend to start on my trip.

[himavanth_m]

Originally Posted by Maverick79

Gaddi eekdam ttaatt hain jee!


Later took a break of 30 mins after 25kms from Sholapur for Lunch, at a very pathetic restaurant.
Another 40 mins were gone while waiting at a railway crossing ( don't remember the name of the place) to finish a double crossing of two trains.

Could reach home in Pune only by 9.15pm.

There were no good places to eat in the highway between Pune and Hyderabad when I used to travel in the route upto about 8 months back and I dont think it will change. One would not even get even good Tea enroute as per my opinion. The best solution is to either carry food from home or make do with chips and miscellaneous stuff and have a good dinner at Pune. Save time for lunch and dinner and use the saved time to have a sumptuous meal at Pune

Thankfully I dont need to do this route very often like earlier.

And yes, the railway crossings (If i remember correctly there are 2 or 3) are terrible especially if trains cross. The roads are not good and the trucks queue up when the trains come and one looses a lot of time.

Hope that the 4 laning is complete as soon as possible and it would save enormous amount of time between Pune and Hyderabad journeys.

[ASHISHPALLOD]

Originally Posted by himavanth_m

1]There were no good places to eat in the highway between Pune and Hyderabad when I used to travel in the route upto about 8 months back and I dont think it will change.
2]And yes, the railway crossings (If i remember correctly there are 2 or 3) are terrible especially if trains cross.

1] There are very good restaurants/hotels near solapur.
These are located between chincholi and solapur. One of very good restaurant is ''The only place''.

2] There are two railway crossings between pune and solapur.
One is at Malad, between kurkumbh and bhigwan, @ 80 km from pune, the track goes from daund to 12mati. Another is at shetfal, between tembhurni and mohol, @ 70km from solapur, the track goes from kurduwadi to pandharpur.

[himavanth_m]

Originally Posted by ASHISHPALLOD

1] There are very good restaurants/hotels near solapur.
These are located between chincholi and solapur. One of very good restaurant is ''The only place''.

I meant good dhabas on the highway. Near Sholapur The only place is a good one but somehow did not like it too much but its the best on the route. I have been there only once. But the rest of the times, my lunch and dinner timings on the highway were never near Sholapur unfortunately.

[kpbhatt]

Thought long and hard about driving from Pune to Hyderabad during Christmas vacations of the kids -- then gave priority to my poor back and booked tickets with the Shatabdi for the to and fro journey. Peace of mind and will really try to enjoy the vacation instead of being bogged down by bad roads .....

[NoRules]

Originally Posted by kpbhatt

Thought long and hard about driving from Pune to Hyderabad during Christmas vacations of the kids -- then gave priority to my poor back and booked tickets with the Shatabdi for the to and fro journey. Peace of mind and will really try to enjoy the vacation instead of being bogged down by bad roads .....

Excellent decision. You will travel in the comfort of AC, reasonably good catering in Shatabdi (you can carry food of your choice if you want), can read a book / watch a movie on your laptop and remain fresh when you reach your destination.

Please let us know about the Shatabdi journey on this new route.

[Maverick79]

Originally Posted by ASHISHPALLOD

1] There are very good restaurants/hotels near solapur.
These are located between chincholi and solapur. One of very good restaurant is ''The only place''.
.

Originally Posted by himavanth_m

I meant good dhabas on the highway. Near Sholapur The only place is a good one but somehow did not like it too much but its the best on the route. I have been there only once. But the rest of the times, my lunch and dinner timings on the highway were never near Sholapur unfortunately.

While driving back to Pune on 30th Oct, I found one restaurant called 'Junglee', just on the left, when the road widening starts after leaving Sholapur bridge. Food Was good and ambience was more than average. They also serve Thali along with Chinese, Punjabi and Maharashtrian food.
Has good parking space too.
Missed this on 10th Nov due to heavy traffic and hence had a bitter experience latter.
Will try 'The only place' next time AP bahu.