[ampere]

Originally Posted by figo_united

Thanks a lot ampere. Will chalk out an itinerary based on the route you suggested.
Any interesting places enroute rameshwaram where I can stop for a quick break?
Planning to visit palani on the way back from madurai to mysore.
Have booked for accommodation at the udupi mutt at Rameshwaram.

Originally Posted by ravib

Nice to see u back on roads
Near Rameswaram, you can see Thirupullani temple, Devi pattanam & Sethu karai which are few kms deviations from
Madurai - Rameswaram main road. But it will take couple of hours in each place. See if you have time.
-Ravi

Sethukarai and Thiruppullani are close to each other and can be easily done.
They are just off the NH87 (old Nh49) and are on the Turicorin side of ECR (just about 10km from Ramnad).

Thiruppullani temple is also called Darbashayam. A beautiful temple to visit where you can see Lord Ram resting on grass.
After you visit this temple you continue from there to Sethukarai which is hardly 5km towards the shore.

[figo_united]

Please suggest any places to stop by in the following stretches (Not too much off the track)?

Rameshwaram - Kanyakumari
Kanyakumari - Madurai

From my logs of the bike trip, I can recall the following route we took from Rameshwaram to Tirunelveli

eravadi->sayalkudi->kokkadi->padarndapuli->NH45B->tuticorin->NH7A->Tirunelveli

Could anyone please update the current road conditions in this route?

[hvkumar]

Originally Posted by figo_united

Please suggest any places to stop by in the following stretches (Not too much off the track)?

Rameshwaram - Kanyakumari
Kanyakumari - Madurai

From my logs of the bike trip, I can recall the following route we took from Rameshwaram to Tirunelveli

eravadi->sayalkudi->kokkadi->padarndapuli->NH45B->tuticorin->NH7A->Tirunelveli

Could anyone please update the current road conditions in this route?

Rameswaram-Ramanathapuram 50 kms-Kizhakarai 20-Ervadi 9-Sikkal 9-Sayalgudi 26-Vembar 14-Kulathur 26-Tuticorin BYpass 17-Tuticorin Port 24-Shahupuram 20-Tiruchendur 17-Ovari 40-KOodankulam-Chettikulam 33-KK 12

Roads are outstanding till Tuticorin. Remember to bypass Tuticorin, by connecting to the Tuticorin-Madurai highway before continuing on ECR. From Tiruchendur onwards, roads are OK, but very twisty and may have occasional rough sections. You can do this drive in 5-6 hours

[NPV]

Originally Posted by figo_united

Please suggest any places to stop by in the following stretches (Not too much off the track)?

Rameshwaram - Kanyakumari
Kanyakumari - Madurai

Could anyone please update the current road conditions in this route?

@figo, you can find my detailed trip logs for distances, restaurants (ones we saw as well as ones where we stopped) and fuel stations here:
http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/travel...re-5-days.html
Also, road conditions were superb all the way from Bangalore to Madurai-Kanyakumari and Rameshwaram during my trip in Nov 2011, I don't expect it to be too bad now. ECR was in great condition, loved driving on that surface.
Only stretch that was bad was Tirunelveli-Tiruchendur-Tuticorin which was due to my mistake of taking the state highway. Instead, if you take NH7A for Tirunelveli-Tuticorin it will be very good.

Hope this helps.

[figo_united]

Originally Posted by hvkumar

Rameswaram-Ramanathapuram 50 kms-Kizhakarai 20-Ervadi 9-Sikkal 9-Sayalgudi 26-Vembar 14-Kulathur 26-Tuticorin BYpass 17-Tuticorin Port 24-Shahupuram 20-Tiruchendur 17-Ovari 40-KOodankulam-Chettikulam 33-KK 12

Roads are outstanding till Tuticorin. Remember to bypass Tuticorin, by connecting to the Tuticorin-Madurai highway before continuing on ECR. From Tiruchendur onwards, roads are OK, but very twisty and may have occasional rough sections. You can do this drive in 5-6 hours

Thanks hvk sir for the detailed break up.
When I took that route a couple of years ago, it was very good as well. Very picturesque too.

Originally Posted by NPV

@figo, you can find my detailed trip logs for distances, restaurants (ones we saw as well as ones where we stopped) and fuel stations here:
http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/travel...re-5-days.html
Also, road conditions were superb all the way from Bangalore to Madurai-Kanyakumari and Rameshwaram during my trip in Nov 2011, I don't expect it to be too bad now. ECR was in great condition, loved driving on that surface.
Only stretch that was bad was Tirunelveli-Tiruchendur-Tuticorin which was due to my mistake of taking the state highway. Instead, if you take NH7A for Tirunelveli-Tuticorin it will be very good.

Hope this helps.

Hello NPV,

I have already read and printed your entire thread
Will be of great help for sure!
I had to tweak the plan since I am going for only 4 days, else could have followed your log blindly!
Thanks for the update on the road conditions, and Thank you for such a detailed log

[figo_united]

600kms successfully completed on day 1:-)
At rameshwaram now. Took the route suggested by 'route guru' ampere.

[ampere]

Originally Posted by figo_united

600kms successfully completed on day 1:-)
At rameshwaram now. Took the route suggested by 'route guru' ampere.

Great to know that figo! So did you go buy Nattam or via Madurai.
Increasingly I have seen people take the Nattam option to beat the Madurai. The numbers however are slowly building.
The only reason people go via Madurai is because they want to see the temple.

[NPV]

Originally Posted by ampere

Great to know that figo! So did you go buy Nattam or via Madurai.
Increasingly I have seen people take the Nattam option to beat the Madurai. The numbers however are slowly building.
The only reason people go via Madurai is because they want to see the temple.

Instead of Nattam & Madurai town route, why not just take the Airport Ring Road towards NH49 junction for Rameshwaram ? This way, even if you want to visit the Madurai Meenakshi temple you can do it because it is not too far. I had stayed at Hotel Metropole which is near the District Court in Madurai and very close to the Ring Road. This was just about 5Km from the Meenakshi temple also. Also, Madurai town/CBD traffic is avoided.

[ampere]

Originally Posted by NPV

Instead of Nattam & Madurai town route, why not just take the Airport Ring Road towards NH49 junction for Rameshwaram ? This way, even if you want to visit the Madurai Meenakshi temple you can do it because it is not too far. I had stayed at Hotel Metropole which is near the District Court in Madurai and very close to the Ring Road. This was just about 5Km from the Meenakshi temple also. Also, Madurai town/CBD traffic is avoided.

Agreed @NPV. What I meant was if Meenakshi Temple is not on the visit agenda, one can easily by-pass these traffic prone sections.
Also its not worth going all the way going to Madurai for the sake of NH49 alone. (Maybe you comment better as you were there recently there).

Based on what Harsh had mentioned, Melur-Shivagangai-Illayangudi-Paramagudi is a better option than NH49 (but that was for folks coming from Trichy).
So I just thought it would be a better option here as well.

[figo_united]

Originally Posted by ampere

Great to know that figo! So did you go buy Nattam or via Madurai.
Increasingly I have seen people take the Nattam option to beat the Madurai. The numbers however are slowly building.
The only reason people go via Madurai is because they want to see the temple.

Took the nattam route you suggested.
But missed the deviation to palladam from avinashi and ended up passing through busy traffic in tiruppur!

I visited madurai on the way back, so this route worked well.

Here's the full route I took


Mysore - Chamarajanagar - Dimbam - Sathy - Dharapuram - Odachantram - Shivganga - nattam - Melur - IllayanguDi - paramkudi - Ramanathapuram - Rameshwaram.

[ampere]

Originally Posted by figo_united

Took the nattam route you suggested.
But missed the deviation to palladam from avinashi and ended up passing through busy traffic in tiruppur!

This is exactly what @luvuride and @ajitbr had told me about Tiruppur!
One is getting past Avinashi a task in itself, and as if we were not even out of one town yet, we are already into the second busy one!

Mysore - Chamarajanagar - Dimbam - Sathy - Dharapuram - Odachantram - Shivganga - nattam - Melur - IllayanguDi - paramkudi - Ramanathapuram - Rameshwaram.

It is very good to note that you went by Nattam. How was the overall route?
Esp. Dindigul-Nattam-Melur? Mostly people use Nattam route to go to Karaikudi.

Very few use it to go toward Melur, Hence I was asking about Nattam - Melur section?
Overall this definitely must have been faster than Dindigul-Madurai-Rameshwaram.

Also you while returning you must have seen where is the Palladam exit is at Avinashi!
Did you come back by the same route?

[figo_united]

Originally Posted by ampere

It is very good to note that you went by Nattam. How was the overall route?
Esp. Dindigul-Nattam-Melur? Mostly people use Nattam route to go to Karaikudi.

Very few use it to go toward Melur, Hence I was asking about Nattam - Melur section?
Overall this definitely must have been faster than Dindigul-Madurai-Rameshwaram.

The nattam route was not that great actually.
there were some bad patches in between, but none too big.
definitely manageable, given that its faster than the other route.

Originally Posted by ampere

Also you while returning you must have seen where is the Palladam exit is at Avinashi!
Did you come back by the same route?

Oh yes, didnt miss palladam for the second time

Took the following route back from palani

Palani -> Dharapuram -> Palladam -> Avinashi -> Sathy -> Dimbam ->Mysore

Madurai to Palani was a slight confusion too!
We were on the NH from madurai towards dindigul and saw a deviation to left mentioning 64kms to Palani. Took this route(it was quite narrow road), and we ended up again on the NH at dindigul after around 20kms of following the directions
From the deviation under the bridge there, palani was almost 60 kms.

Trying to make some time and write a detailed log, hopefully sometime this weekend.

[NPV]

Originally Posted by figo_united

Madurai to Palani was a slight confusion too!
We were on the NH from madurai towards dindigul and saw a deviation to left mentioning 64kms to Palani. Took this route(it was quite narrow road), and we ended up again on the NH at dindigul after around 20kms of following the directions
From the deviation under the bridge there, palani was almost 60 kms.

When traveling from Madurai towards Dindigul, the Road to Palani is just immediately after the Bathlagundu (NH45 towards Theni & Kodai Road) turn, both on the left side.
During my last trip to Kanyakumari, Rameshwaram while traveling from Bangalore towards Madurai I saw multiple turns on the right side marked for Theni, Palani, etc so this will be confusing when traveling in the opposite direction

[daisyb]

Originally Posted by hvkumar

The way the border conflict between TN & KL is shaping up, I would avoid all travel between TN & KL till situation becomes clear and totally safe.

Planning to do Rameswaram to Kanyakumari through ECR via Kudankulam around 19 or 20th Dec. How is the situation currently. Did anyone do this recently. Wanted to take this route to visit Tiruchendur. Any alternate routes to Tiruchendur from Rameswaram, if I have to avoid Kudankulam

[hvkumar]

Originally Posted by daisyb

Planning to do Rameswaram to Kanyakumari through ECR via Kudankulam around 19 or 20th Dec. How is the situation currently. Did anyone do this recently. Wanted to take this route to visit Tiruchendur. Any alternate routes to Tiruchendur from Rameswaram, if I have to avoid Kudankulam

No problems reported in Kudankulam area. One of my friends went that way last week too.