[suzuki san]

Hi Guys,

A friend of mine has just driven down yesterday from Bombay to Goa via Nipani, Uttur, Ajra and the Amboli Ghat. He says that the road is all repaired now and is good all the way. No more rough patches between Ajra and Amboli. Although he was driving an Isuzu pick up, he insisted that this road was good now could easily be used by small hatch backs as well.

He also mentioned that as it was Id yesterday, all the roads were deserted and he reached Mandrem in 8 hours and 10 mins from Hyatt Regency, Santa Cruz (West)

Regards,
SS

[comfortablynumb]

Saw an article about heavy vehicles being prohibited in Chorla from May 4 - 11 due to repair work. Don't know if it applies for LMVs too.

https://www.dainikgomantak.com/goa/h...air-work-avj90

[Irwin]

Heavy vehicles have been banned on all 3 major Belagavi – Goa roads

https://allaboutbelgaum.com/news/hea...avi-goa-roads/

[abhi3284]

Came back from South Goa (Benaulim) to Pune this Mon. Took the BWS-Mollem route both ways and Roads are good throughout for the most part, except for the 10 odd Kms. at BWS end, which is pretty bad and rattles your bones. Also, didn't help that i was in a Ritz with a not so great suspension setup. Was planning to return via Chorla route, but stuck to BWS due to the circulating news of Road Repair. Also, I was not aware of the 60 Km/hr Speed limit in Goa. For sure, i went past 60 quite a few times, but have not received any message for Speed breach. Any portal or App. where i need to check to be sure?

[Rajit]

Hi friends,

Have been a regular reader, but this is my first post / query as a new member.

Planning to drive to Cavelossim / South Goa from JVLR this Friday / 20th May morning. This time, with a slightly bad left knee, I will be taking my 2019 Honda Jazz V CVT, instead of my usual preferred 2016 Honda City V manual. Intend to start at 5:30 am

Haven't done a Goa drive since covid, but in the past, since my trip has largely been to North Goa, I have used Kolhapur - Nipanni - Gadhinglaj - Ajra - Amboli - Sawantwadi a few times. On the return, I have used Benaulim - Ponda - Chorla ghat - Belgavi - Kolhapur route in the past, but I did find it more pothole ridden then than Amboli.

Queries:
1. Latest condition of Chorla Ghat road?
2. Does Chorla make more sense than Amboli?
3. If there is a change in plan and I were to go to Candolim instead, would Chorla still be a preferred option?

Thanks in advance

[maverickxx2006]

Originally Posted by Rajit

Hi friends,

Have been a regular reader, but this is my first post / query as a new member.

Planning to drive to Cavelossim / South Goa from JVLR this Friday / 20th May morning. This time, with a slightly bad left knee, I will be taking my 2019 Honda Jazz V CVT, instead of my usual preferred 2016 Honda City V manual. Intend to start at 5:30 am

Haven't done a Goa drive since covid, but in the past, since my trip has largely been to North Goa, I have used Kolhapur - Nipanni - Gadhinglaj - Ajra - Amboli - Sawantwadi a few times. On the return, I have used Benaulim - Ponda - Chorla ghat - Belgavi - Kolhapur route in the past, but I did find it more pothole ridden then than Amboli.

Queries:
1. Latest condition of Chorla Ghat road?
2. Does Chorla make more sense than Amboli?
3. If there is a change in plan and I were to go to Candolim instead, would Chorla still be a preferred option?

Thanks in advance

I had travelled to South Goa last month and took Anmod ghat route instead of Chorla. Recent reports were that there are some repairs going on in Chorla, if you dont get confirmed latest reports of Chorla then I would recommend Anmod ghat route for sure.

[suzuki san]

Hi Guys,

I have just driven up from Goa to Bombay and used the Amboli Ghat.
From Siolim we used the inside roads through Pernem and joined the highway after all the diversions for road widening on the Goa side. Then through Sawantwadi and on to Amboli, Ajra, Uttur and Nipani.
The road is pretty good all the way to Amboli. Between Amboli and Ajra till the turn off to Uttur the road is just O.K. Quite a few pot holes and rough patches but nothing that cannot be handled - even by a small hatchback.
Once we joined the main highway at Nipani, the road was good all the way through till we reached SCLR where we got the usual rubbish Bombay roads.
It took us 10.5 hours from Assagao to Vashi Toll Naka (where we got stuck in a major traffic jam) and then another 1.25 hours to Andheri.
We made 4 stops along the way including "Manas" Hotel at Satara for an excellent mutton lunch. Highly recommended. Also has clean washrooms.

Regards,
SS

[Vandit]

Just did a run down from Central Mumbai to Mapusa North Goa in just under 10hrs with 3 breaks in between.. 1 30min break after crossing Lonavala for breakfast and a couple of 15min breaks there after just before Nipani and the other at Amboli.

Road condition overall: 8/10. Most surprising were the Maharashtra parts.. the roads were in excellent shape! Barring one odd diversion, almost all the overpass sections of the highway which were under construction a few years ago have been completed and are in good shape! This was my first run to Goa since the Covid outbreak, last drove down in late 2019! I was very pleasantly surprised. Even sections where the road was crappy earlier from what I remember, have been all done and kept well.

In fact this time it wasn't the roads that let me down.. it was the insane amount of truckers driving without a care in the world on the right most and middle lanes and in several places every few odd KM's they just blocked traffic behind them for a couple of Km's!! This kind of behaviour is just so infuriating. Not only do they cause a rolling roadblock but they force faster moving cars behind them into making rash and dynamic moves in order to avoid losing momentum when passing resulting in some really crazy hair raising moments. I have no idea why the authorities refuse to crackdown on these truckers. If they can adopt speed cameras.. Why not monitor entire sections of highway and penalise these idiotic truckers who refuse to yield way as well when signalled from behind

Even Nipani to Ajra has been completed and is superbly smooth!.. it's only after Ajra till the run down to Sawantwadi where there are intermediate patches of broken and eroded top layer with a few deep craters here and there. Once in Goa.. the entry roads and 4 Laning continues so not much you can do but apart from a few sections in between.. the roads are good. Concrete unfortunately.. but good. Sadly even Goan roads are being concretised instead of the lively smooth, silent and grippy tar roads! The sheer amount of hill cutting going on though.. heartbreaking!

[t3ofil4us]

I am leaving for South Goa today and Google shows the nippani uttur ajra amboli Ghar route with an estimated travel time of 10 hrs from Navi Mumbai.

Will post about my experience once I reach Majorda

[Musaafir]

Planning a Konkan trip mid-June. Does anyone have a recent update on Phondaghat route? Thank you.

[t3ofil4us]

Originally Posted by t3ofil4us

I am leaving for South Goa today and Google shows the nippani uttur ajra amboli Ghar route with an estimated travel time of 10 hrs from Navi Mumbai.

Will post about my experience once I reach Majorda

The route is perfect from Mumbai till Nipani- Uttur- Ajara, amboli has some bad stretches but manageable. Roads inside Goa after Banda are decent despite being concretised. Just pay attention to the speed limit with cops clamping down big time using speed cameras during the day.

[VWAllstar]

Originally Posted by Musaafir

Planning a Konkan trip mid-June. Does anyone have a recent update on Phondaghat route? Thank you.

Take the Gaganbawda route. It is in a decent shape now. Try to cover Kolhapur before 11 or after 17:00 hours as per your destination in Konkan.

[Musaafir]

Originally Posted by VWAllstar

Take the Gaganbawda route. It is in a decent shape now. Try to cover Kolhapur before 11 or after 17:00 hours as per your destination in Konkan.

Thank you VWAllstar. Since I have taken the GaganBawda route at times, was looking to go via the Radhanagari route if the roads were good.

[VWAllstar]

Originally Posted by Musaafir

Thank you VWAllstar. Since I have taken the GaganBawda route at times, was looking to go via the Radhanagari route if the roads were good.

You may try. Considering Gaganbawda was well laid, expect phonda ghat roads also to be in similar shape. On my way back I am considering the Amba Ghat from Lanja.

[Rajit]

Originally Posted by Rajit

Hi friends,

Have been a regular reader, but this is my first post / query as a new member.

Planning to drive to Cavelossim / South Goa from JVLR this Friday / 20th May morning. This time, with a slightly bad left knee, I will be taking my 2019 Honda Jazz V CVT, instead of my usual preferred 2016 Honda City V manual. Intend to start at 5:30 am

Haven't done a Goa drive since covid, but in the past, since my trip has largely been to North Goa, I have used Kolhapur - Nipanni - Gadhinglaj - Ajra - Amboli - Sawantwadi a few times. On the return, I have used Benaulim - Ponda - Chorla ghat - Belgavi - Kolhapur route in the past, but I did find it more pothole ridden then than Amboli.

Queries:
1. Latest condition of Chorla Ghat road?
2. Does Chorla make more sense than Amboli?
3. If there is a change in plan and I were to go to Candolim instead, would Chorla still be a preferred option?

Thanks in advance

This is a rather late post. I did Mumbai (JVLR) - SCLR - Karad (night halt) - Kolhapur (visit to Ambabai temple) - Belgavi - drive through the Bhimgad sanctuary - Anmod Ghat - Mollem - Dharbandora Road - Madgao - Cavelossim on 20th - 21st May.

The return was a single day trip on 26th May via the same road, excepting that I did not drive through the Bhimgad sanctuary and took the NH 748, with a left turn from Ramnagar and from then onto Belgavi, and from then on all the way to Mumbai JVLR via Airoli.

I am a very unhurried driver, and prefer not to exceed 80-90 kmph on the expressway, and between 70-80 kmph outside.

Started on 20th May around 2.15 pm from my JVLR residence in my Honda Jazz V CVT. At that point of time, there was some issue on JVLR EE Highway, so ended up taking SCLR as advised by Google maps. Think it may have cost me about 10 min incremental - negligible in the larger scheme of things. The drive was largely comfortable and uneventful. I had crossed Pune by 6 pm and took my first halt (about 30 min) at the Joshi Vadewale around Khed Shivapur. Tanked up, and started driving. We were tossing up for a night halt post Satara, and ended up staying at the Fern Residency at Karad. Reached there by 8:30 pm. Road conditions were great, and in fact, i thought the night drive portion was better than day time, as the number of two wheelers and autorickshaws were considerably lesser than in the day time.

On 21st May (Fri) morning, we started from Karad Fern Residency at around 9:15 am. The traffic which we faced till Kolhapur was insane. It seemed to be a big wedding day as well. We had planned to visit the Ambabai Temple in Kolhapur, and this added a clean 2 hr 30 min to our journey time. While we started driving from Kolhapur post 1 pm, we reached Belagavi by 2:30 pm or so and stopped for lunch at the McDonald's - the trusted place for clean loos. Starting post 3 pm from Belagavi, i was following the Google maps direction. The Anmod Ghat route via the Bhimgad Sanctuary was the suggested one. That route is open only till 6pm, and since we had reached by 4:15 pm, i felt comfortable with that. The road was terrible in patches, but the traffic was negligible. It is a very picturesque road though (sorry no pictures). By 5 pm, we were out of the Bhimgad Sanctuary and just them, we hit the most dense cloud that I have ever needed to drive through. While I was aware of some thundershowers in Goa, at the top of the Anmod Ghat, the visibility was barely a few meters. I stopped for about 10 minutes, when I met somebody who had just driven up. He indicated that the visbility while poor, does get better as we go down the ghat. I hd a terrible 15-20 minutes of drive in very poor visibility, but soon enough, it got better. The road from there on was fabulous; and I reach Goa / Cavelossim by 7:30 pm. Total door to door distance was about 645 km, but the time taken had materially inflated.

On the way back, we started driving at 6:45 am on Thursday 26th May, which was about 45 min behind plan. The quality of road till the Karnataka border on the Anmod Ghat was fabulous. Just that instead of taking the Bhimgad Sanctuary route, we took the NH 748 via Ramanagar. That is where i felt how the crooked contractors and politicians trouble the lay people. While the paving on the road is good, there are huge stretches of incomplete roadwork. This means that though there are no potholes, you cannot drive consistently at any good speed for a major part of the road. The diversions are also abrupt. So while this route was showing 45 minutes extra, i didnt feel i got the value for the better road. The Bhimgad sanctuary may have been better. I ended up crossing Belagavi by 10:15 am, and would have reached Kolhapur by 12:00 noon, if it werent for being caught by a posse of Mah Police cops. I had missed getting my PUC on the Jazz and paid the penalty for the same which took away a good 15-20 minutes. Next stop was at Burger King at Kolhapur (the McDonalds was shut and we had to drive back half a km). Reached there by 12:30 pm, and started driving again at 1:15 pm. With a fuel stop post Satara near the turn to Wai, we drove till the Khalapur Food Plaza. We reached there by 5:15 pm. Finally reached home at JVLR via Amboli by 8:30 pm. Total driving distance was about 660 km and drive time was 13 hrs 45 minutes with about 1 hr 30 minutes of stoppages. I really envy the people who are able to drive this in 10-11 hours.

My Jazz gave me a mileage of 16 km for the entire journey (including about 150 km of driving within Goa).