[ranjitp1]

Originally Posted by RoadTiger

Cant thank you enough, ranjitp1

If I make the trip, will start around 430 or so and hope to reach Palm Beach road in Navi Mumbai by 6-ish.

Is doing Sasvad-NH4-Pune bypass a better option than going through Pune city (via swargate) ??

I have done Hyd-Mohol-Pandharpur earlier. Am familiar with the Solapur route - but seems the worst part of the trip from Indapur to Pune.

Yes going via baramati-Saswad is a better option at the moment.Yes 4am start should be good enought to reach Palm Beach by 6-7pm.Problem is we all end up reaching Pune & Mumbai around the peak hour traffic time and that is what creates all the problems!Have a safe drive

[Ravveendrra]

Originally Posted by ASHISHPALLOD

I recommend,
if anyone travelling from solapur to pune via NH9 is not comfortable with heavy traffic between this stretch, can take solapur-nh9-indapur-left turn-12mati-morgaon-jejuri-saswad-hadpsar-pune route.
Though this route is 2lane road with some potholes here and there, the route is safe as far as heavy traffic is concerned.
the stretch between jejuri and saswad is repaired, the stretch between indapur and 12mati is repaired.
Anyone can cruise with speed of 80 from indapur to pune on this route.

Hi Ashish,

If I have to get to the Mumbai Pune Expressway from Hyderabad - would you recommend:

Indapur - 12mati - Morgaon - Jejuri - Sasvad - 'Khed Shivapur to Sasvad link road' - Khad Shivapur - NH4. Or some other route?

Thanks in advance

[ranjitp1]

Originally Posted by Ravveendrra

Hi Ashish,

If I have to get to the Mumbai Pune Expressway from Hyderabad - would you recommend:

Indapur - 12mati - Morgaon - Jejuri - Sasvad - 'Khed Shivapur to Sasvad link road' - Khad Shivapur - NH4. Or some other route?

Thanks in advance

Ravveendra,at the moment,the baramati route is your best option.I travelled the road last week and it is as bad as it can get.Ofcourse I was told that night time is slightly better off with traffic being less,but the diversions are still in place making it quite a bad scene as the road shoulders are virtually non-existent.

Hyd-Zaheerabad is excellent.Zaheerabad till Umerga is just about ok with rough patches here and there.Overall Hyd-Solapur should take you around 5-5.5 hours.There is a new food court(if you could call it that)just before zaheerabad called mahindra paradise.its clean and good.its onto your left.

On the NH9,take a left after Indapur bus stand(in case you get lost ask anybody for the road to Baramati via Junction),from thereon the roads are pretty much good.Enroute you can see quite a bit of temples(the jejuri temple,the venkateshwara hatcheries' tirupati balaji temple just before nh4,then the saswad temple and the moregaon temple).Once you are on the NH4,after paying the 1st toll,go via the new katraj tunnel.However I heard that the tunnel is undergoing some repairs currently hence only two lanes are operations,so please drive carefully.Also the tolls on the MPEW have been revised upwards making it all the more costly!Is this drive part of your Ladakh drive?

[Ravveendrra]

Thanks Ranjit.

I was a bit worried about the state of the Khed-Sivapur to Sasvad link road. That would totally bye-pass Pune and gets me directly to Katraj. If possible this might be the best route. If it is in a bad state then it might be better to head to Wanowrie via Sasvad.

Thanks again

P.S. Actually this query is relevant to both: My trip to Karjat / Lonavala for AKC & EXAMM and my trip to Ladakh.

[ranjitp1]

Originally Posted by Ravveendrra

Thanks Ranjit.

I was a bit worried about the state of the Khed-Sivapur to Sasvad link road. That would totally bye-pass Pune and gets me directly to Katraj. If possible this might be the best route. If it is in a bad state then it might be better to head to Wanowrie via Sasvad.

Thanks again

P.S. Actually this query is relevant to both: My trip to Karjat / Lonavala for AKC & EXAMM and my trip to Ladakh.

All the best for the OTRs!

Why would you want to head to Wanowrie to reach MPEW?Isnt that thats going to be a long way to reach MPEW plus driving through Pune traffic?

IMO,take the NH4 route,its pretty good and lands you straight on the Mumbai bypass road and onto the MPEW.I guess the only downside from what I see is that you would have to pay two tolls.

Just in case you need the exact route this is the one,I am referring to :

http://maps.google.co.in/maps?saddr=...via=1,2,3&z=11

[Ravveendrra]

Originally Posted by ranjitp1

All the best for the OTRs!

Why would you want to head to Wanowrie to reach MPEW?Isnt that thats going to be a long way to reach MPEW plus driving through Pune traffic?

IMO,take the NH4 route,its pretty good and lands you straight on the Mumbai bypass road and onto the MPEW.I guess the only downside from what I see is that you would have to pay two tolls.

Just in case you need the exact route this is the one,I am referring to :

Indapur, Maharashtra to Kapurhol, Maharashtra - Google Maps

Thanks Ranjit, Any views/info on the road going from Sasvad to Khed via Garade? It is just a little north of the road marked by you in the map. It is called the Khad Sivapur to Sasvad link road.

[ranjitp1]

Originally Posted by Ravveendrra

Thanks Ranjit, Any views/info on the road going from Sasvad to Khed via Garade? It is just a little north of the road marked by you in the map. It is called the Khad Sivapur to Sasvad link road.

Sorry I dont have any info on that,generally all the roads around Saswad tend to break up during the monsoons.Last August there was hardly any road between Jejuri & Saswad(but it has been relaid now).I have driven the Kapurhole route several times and found it to be good,but dont know about the other roads.

[spadix]

Originally Posted by ranjitp1

Ravveendra,at the moment,the baramati route is your best option.I travelled the road last week and it is as bad as it can get.Ofcourse I was told that night time is slightly better off with traffic being less,but the diversions are still in place making it quite a bad scene as the road shoulders are virtually non-existent.

Ranjit, are you referring to the NH9 or the Baramati road w.r.t. the points in bold above?

Originally Posted by ranjitp1

Just in case you need the exact route this is the one,I am referring to :

Indapur, Maharashtra to Kapurhol, Maharashtra - Google Maps

Between Morgaon and Jejuri you've indicated the slightly longer southern route. How critical is it to avoid the northern fork? Sorry for nitpicking but monsoon + a car packed to the gills means I'm more than a little worried about potholes.

I've decided to completely avoid Pune and toss whatever plans we had of meeting friends there. I want to make the most of Aug. 15 and bypass Pune and Mumbai "smoothly", so I'll be taking this route too.

Thanks for all the super info, as always.

Regards,
spadix

[ranjitp1]

Originally Posted by spadix

Ranjit, are you referring to the NH9 or the Baramati road w.r.t. the points in bold above?

Prashant,it is the NH9 which is bad(or rather being made good!!).Baramati is ok at the moment.

Originally Posted by spadix

Between Morgaon and Jejuri you've indicated the slightly longer southern route. How critical is it to avoid the northern fork?

the route i have indicated is the pilgrim circuit used by the people who do the ashtavinayak route and morgaon is a part of the AV.I found the roads to be excellent on this stretch,especially Baramati-Moregaon would put any highway to shame

Originally Posted by spadix

I've decided to completely avoid Pune and toss whatever plans we had of meeting friends there. I want to make the most of Aug. 15 and bypass Pune and Mumbai "smoothly", so I'll be taking this route too.

It definitely is not worth venturing into Pune if its part of a longer drive(I suspect this is part of your drive to Gurgaon?)Driving through Pune from entry at Hadapsar till entry onto MPEW would take you around 2-2.5hours plus stress on the legs!Not worth it IMHO.

[ASHISHPALLOD]

Originally Posted by Ravveendrra

Indapur - 12mati - Morgaon - Jejuri - Sasvad - 'Khed Shivapur to Sasvad link road' - Khad Shivapur - NH4. Or some other route?

hi ravveendrra,
sorry for late reply.

don't take saswad-khed shivapur via garade, its really bad road, even locals do not take it.

best option is saswad-narayanpur-kapurhol-nh4-khed shivapur,
its longer but better road.

[RoadTiger]

Originally Posted by ASHISHPALLOD

best option is saswad-narayanpur-kapurhol-nh4-khed shivapur,
its longer but better road.

As per Google Maps, there is another road for Sasvad to MPEW

Sasvad - Bopdev Ghat Road - Kondhwa - Sambhaji Nagar - then left towards Swami Samartha Nagar - cross NH4 near Katraj (south of Rajiv Gandhi Zoo Park) - connect to Katraj Road that further connects to MPEW.

Any thoughts - is this worth trying vs. the Sasvad-Kapurhol-MPEW route?

[gajadonga]

Originally Posted by RoadTiger

As per Google Maps, there is another road for Sasvad to MPEW

Sasvad - Bopdev Ghat Road - Kondhwa - Sambhaji Nagar - then left towards Swami Samartha Nagar - cross NH4 near Katraj (south of Rajiv Gandhi Zoo Park) - connect to Katraj Road that further connects to MPEW.

Any thoughts - is this worth trying vs. the Sasvad-Kapurhol-MPEW route?

I had traveled from Mumbai-Hyderabad last year September in the route Khed-Garade-Saswad-Jejuri-12mathi-Indapur route.
The route from Khed-Saswad was single road and the road was average but devoid of traffic upto Saswad.
Saswad-Baramathi was good road.
Baramathi-Indapur was average but could manage 70-80kms speed.
Coming by this route I avoided the Pune traffic completely.
Latest road conditions Ashish bhai can give us some idea.

[ASHISHPALLOD]

Originally Posted by RoadTiger

As per Google Maps, there is another road for Sasvad to MPEW
Sasvad - Bopdev Ghat Road - Kondhwa - Sambhaji Nagar - then left towards Swami Samartha Nagar - cross NH4 near Katraj (south of Rajiv Gandhi Zoo Park) - connect to Katraj Road that further connects to MPEW.

You are very correct,
there is the road which you mentioned and thats the route i usually take to enter in pune while going from 12mati.

I do not recommend this route to the people who are going to mumbai from saswad side because---
1] At the bopdev ghat, the road was very narrow with steep incline with three very dangerous curves,
[ the ghat road is widened two months back but still it is dangerous for newcomers],
2] the road from undri to katraj is potholed with heavy slow moving traffic,
3] the junction at katraj while coming from undri is very chaotic with steep incline at the cross.

It is safe and fast to use saswad-kapurhole road rather than bopdev ghat road.
you can try this bopdev ghat,
if you feel it ok, then use it next time otherwise continue with kapurhol road.

[Ravveendrra]

Last Sunday (or was it Monday morning) we travelled from Lonavala to Hyderabad. Getting to Kapurhol is a breeze with Pune whizzing past in a jiffy. The problem is that Kapurhol is so small and non-descript that if you blink you will miss it.

Once you take the left at Kapurhol the roads are ranging from average to excellent with little traffic (we did travel at night) and we reach Indapur without any problems. The turns however are not marked well and it is easy to take the wrong turnoff at one or two traffic islands.

I strongly recommend this route.

Thanks Ashish for the heads-up.

Cheers.

[F150]

Team,
How is the road condition between Pune and hyderabad ? If we start at 5 AM from Pune, can we reach by 2 PM ?