[Jaggu]

Waking up the old thread, what are my options for the trip?

I have to travel from Tamara resorts and reach Vythiri tomorrow. Issue is i would be able to start only by 4-430 pm and have to do this alone at night in my Swift. So ideally good roads with less traffic hurdles preferred.

Google maps gives Ooty as well Manjeri as options? Which one would you recommend and updates of road conditions please. I am inclined to KL route due to familiarity, but crossing Walayar is always a dicey one

[ampere]

Originally Posted by Jaggu

I have to travel from Tamara resorts and reach Vythiri tomorrow. Issue is i would be able to start only by 4-430 pm and have to do this alone at night in my Swift. So ideally good roads with less traffic hurdles preferred.

Best Route I think is :

Tamara-Virajpet-Iritty-Boystown-Mananthvady-Kalpetta-Vythri.

But no idea about the night drive part. Roads I think are decent. I dont know how is the Gonikoppal-Tholpetty-Mananthvady section.

[kala]

Originally Posted by Jaggu

Waking up the old thread, what are my options for the trip?

I have to travel from Tamara resorts and reach Vythiri tomorrow. Issue is i would be able to start only by 4-430 pm and have to do this alone at night in my Swift. So ideally good roads with less traffic hurdles preferred.

Google maps gives Ooty as well Manjeri as options? Which one would you recommend and updates of road conditions please. I am inclined to KL route due to familiarity, but crossing Walayar is always a dicey one

Originally Posted by ampere

Best Route I think is :

Tamara-Virajpet-Iritty-Boystown-Mananthvady-Kalpetta-Vythri.

But no idea about the night drive part. Roads I think are decent. I dont know how is the Gonikoppal-Tholpetty-Mananthvady section.

@Ampere : I think you mistook Tamara resorts as the Coorg one. I think the OP is referring to the one near Coimbatore.

The Kerala route is the one where you need to travel the least amount of ghat section, but the route shown by GM passes through a lot of towns and so the timing might perhaps be a bit optimistic. Also the Manjeri-Areecode-Thamarassery section wasn't in the greatest of conditions when I last travelled that way (which was quite some time ago - so someone who has more recent info please update) - and it is quite trafficky as well.

The Coimbatore-Ooty-Gudalur-Chundale-Vythiri has more of ghat section, but the road should be good all through except for a few potholes reported in the Ooty-Gudalur section. Not sure how bad the Coimbatore-Ooty traffic would be at that time of the day, but from thereon it should be pretty light.

Overall it's a hard-to-pick choice, but if I were travelling I'd be a little more inclined to take the route via Ooty since the travel through Kerala traffic in the evenings can be quite painful - and especially if it is raining.

Edit : Forgot to add my comments on the third option provided by GM (via Chamarajnagar). It has the best roads, and traffic should be light once you pass Annur. But it's tough to justify the 25% extra distance you need to travel - and there's always the risk of missing the forest closing time in case you get into some traffic block situation on the Dimbam ghats.

[mallumowgli]

As of now Walayar is ok. But you are taking the peak traffic time. From Kumaranputhur (Mannarkad)to Manjeri and little beyond, the roads are average. But from there all the way to Tamaressery was good the last time I traveled. But that was before the previous monsoon

[ranjitp1]

Originally Posted by Jaggu

Waking up the old thread, what are my options for the trip?

I have to travel from Tamara resorts and reach Vythiri tomorrow. Issue is i would be able to start only by 4-430 pm and have to do this alone at night in my Swift. So ideally good roads with less traffic hurdles preferred.

Google maps gives Ooty as well Manjeri as options? Which one would you recommend and updates of road conditions please. I am inclined to KL route due to familiarity, but crossing Walayar is always a dicey one

Originally Posted by ampere

Best Route I think is :

Tamara-Virajpet-Iritty-Boystown-Mananthvady-Kalpetta-Vythri.

But no idea about the night drive part. Roads I think are decent. I dont know how is the Gonikoppal-Tholpetty-Mananthvady section.

Ok I thought it was the Tamara at Kakkabe!Ignore the below.

From the Coimbatore Tamara at night,I would take the Ooty-Gudalur-Nadugani-Vaduvanchal-Meppadi-Chundale-Vythiri route to Vythiri as long as you are comfortable driving the forests in the night,https://goo.gl/maps/NaEGj

Tamara-Kakkabe-Virajpet-Gonikoppa-Kutta-kattikulam-Mananthavady Bypass-kappumchal-Kainatty-NH212-Vythiri

https://goo.gl/maps/GegV5

The direct route from Gonikoppa to Kutta via Ponarampet and Srimangala was in slightly bad shape,some months back,dont know of its present condition but the rest of the route is excellent.It should take you around 4-5hrs to Vythiri from Tamara.

[ampere]

Originally Posted by ranjitp1

The direct route from Gonikoppa to Kutta via Ponarampet and Srimangala was in slightly bad shape,some months back,dont know of its present condition but the rest of the route is excellent.It should take you around 4-5hrs to Vythiri from Tamara.

As @kala mentioned, looks like there is a Tamara in Coimbatore also! Thats what Jaggu had asked about.

I would suggest the Kerala option. Because via Ooty, first you drive on the traffic heavy CBE-Mettupalauam road, then the ghat and then the worst of all; crossing Ooty.

CBE-Palakkad-Perinthalmanna-Areacode-Mukkam is the best option in my opinion.

[Jaggu]

How about this to avoid Palghat. Anaiketti > Mannarcaud. Anyone tried recently?

[ampere]

Originally Posted by Jaggu

How about this to avoid Palghat. Anaiketti > Mannarcaud. Anyone tried recently?

Jaggu,

I looked at Google. From the place where you are, ideal option is if you can get to Siruvani dam and there on drive to Mannarkad. But I think they dont allow private vehicles to go past the reservoir.I think movement is restricted thanks to Siruvani reservoir which feeds to folks in Coimbatore.


The other options take the road via Anaikatti. Thats means you go back to CBE and take the Thadagam road which extends to Annaikatti and leads you to Mannarkad via Kottathara. But I am not easy on suggesting that for a night drive. Extremely high wild life activity. And you propose to do it in evening hours. I would say take the regular Palakkad or Ooty roads.

Here is a discussion which we had last year on this same topic:

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/travel...kkad-trip.html

[mallumowgli]

Originally Posted by ampere

CBE-Palakkad-Perinthalmanna-Areacode-Mukkam is the best option in my opinion.

No need to go all the way to Perintalmanna

This is the route we normally take

https://www.google.co.in/maps/dir/10...m0!1m0!1m0!3e0

Mukkam - Areacode-Tamaressery is fun!!

Originally Posted by Jaggu

How about this to avoid Palghat. Anaiketti > Mannarcaud. Anyone tried recently? Attachment 1257300

My cousin had taken this a few months back and found it to be ok. In fact I would recommend this in case getting to Tadagam road is easier from your resort's location

Originally Posted by ampere

Jaggu,

I looked at Google. From the place where you are, ideal option is if you can get to Siruvani dam and there on drive to Mannarkad. But I think they dont allow private vehicles to go past the reservoir.

Forget getting to the dam, you cant even get your vehicle to the falls in TN side itself

[Jaggu]

Originally Posted by mallumowgli

No need to go all the way to Perintalmanna

This is the route we normally take

https://www.google.co.in/maps/dir/10...m0!1m0!1m0!3e0

Mukkam - Areacode-Tamaressery is fun!!

This is what i took finally, left resort at around 4.20 pm and could avoid all block situation at walayar, with couple of breaks managed to reach Vythiri Village Resort by 9.30 pm. Road between Areacode and Tamarassery is broken up; if Snowie spoke she would have abused me.

But it was good fun the whole BLR - CBE - Wayanad - BLR trip was done without a fuzz. Need to get the service done and time for a new set of shoes for the car.

Thanks guys!

Had google maps ON throughout the CBE > Wayanad drive and trust me the 30 so MB was really worth it. a) i could see where the bends are leading to b) not even once i had to stop and check direction, esp with so many Y forks that are there.

[FuelInjector]

Originally Posted by Jaggu

How about this to avoid Palghat. Anaiketti > Mannarcaud. Anyone tried recently?

old thread, but nonetheless sharing my 2 cents. i take this route every month and the roads are 7/10. Pretty decent. The best part is no lorry traffic at all. Anaikatti to Attapadi is OK. Then is the beauty going along silent valley till Mukkali. From there proceed downward over to mannarkad. Once you reach CBE, you can proceed in thadagam road to enter the city (almost zilch traffic compared to Palakkad or Mettupalayam road).

Driver regularly to calicut and this is the road i take. Superbly bypass perinthalmana by taking the pandikkad-manjeri route from Mannarkad.

little late but hope this helps other commuters on this route

[Sujair]

I’m planning a Coimbatore-Wayanad-Allepy-Coimbatore trip in the first week of January. Will be renting a swift from Coimbatore and start at 1 pm . To get to Wayanad from Coimbatore, the 2 routes I’m considering are:

1) CBE-Palakkad-Perinthalmanna-Areacode-Mukkam-Kolagappara

2) CBE-Attapadi-Mukkali- Kolagappara

Info on the current road conditions & better route overall will be helpful. Also as I’m driving a rental car, I’ll apparently need to pay a permit fee at the RTO check post on entering Kerala . Any idea where this checkpost falls in the above routes? Thanks.

[Sujair]

Completed the trip from Coimbatore to Wayanad . Took the CBE-Palakkad-Areacode-Mukkam-Kolagappara route . Traffic was sparse till Areacode and the drive was quite good . Some accident happened in the Ghats after Thamarassery , so the traffic was moving at snails pace right till our destination in wayanad . This was really frustrating .

To answer my own question , the RTO checkpost for paying commercial taxes is at Walayar which is about 25kms from Coimbatore . The RTO office is well marked with boards .

Hope this helps someone who's travelling by a rented car like i did .

[smrtdvl]

Going to Wayanad Sterling next month for a weekend from Coimbatore so any updates on the road conditions as of now will be really helpful.

TIA

[mallumowgli]

Originally Posted by smrtdvl

Going to Wayanad Sterling next month for a weekend from Coimbatore so any updates on the road conditions as of now will be really helpful.

TIA

Which route are you planning?