[aargee]

Hi Folks
14-Apr being Thamizh New Year holiday, adding 2 more CL's gives a very long weekend of 5 days, which also means, time for a short trip

We're planning a short trip with the following itinerary & have requests on your suggestions. Pls help.

13-Evening - Start from Chennai to Salem & stay at Salem
14-Morning - Start from Salem to Angadipuram Temple
14-Noon - Start from Angadipuram Temple to Udipi & stay at Udipi
15-Morning - Darshan at Udipi & darshan at Moogambigai Temple
15-Noon - Start from Moogambigai Temple to Mysore & stay at Mysore
16-Morning - Start from Mysore & reach Chamundi hills & stay near Temple
16-Noon - Start from Chamundi hills Temple & reach Chennai

Pls let me know
1. If this plan is realistic?
2. Pls provide your suggestions on accomodations & food as I've no clue on how easy or difficult or safe it is on each of the places we intend to stay. We basically need a safe comfortable locations with a budget not exceeding Rs 1000 for 12 hours stay. Regarding food, we like to have at some good vegetarian hotels.
3. Is it possible to accomodate more site seeing or anything that we miss out to enjoy more in this trip.

Travellers - myself, wifey, my cousin, my son of 2.5 & daughter of 0.4
Ride - WagonR Vxi

Thanks in advance for any help.

[ampere]

Originally Posted by aargee

Hi Folks
14-Apr being Thamizh New Year holiday, adding 2 more CL's gives a very long weekend of 5 days, which also means, time for a short trip

We're planning a short trip with the following itinerary & have requests on your suggestions. Pls help.

13-Evening - Start from Chennai to Salem & stay at Salem
14-Morning - Start from Salem to Angadipuram Temple
14-Noon - Start from Angadipuram Temple to Udipi & stay at Udipi
15-Morning - Darshan at Udipi & darshan at Moogambigai Temple
15-Noon - Start from Moogambigai Temple to Mysore & stay at Mysore
16-Morning - Start from Mysore & reach Chamundi hills & stay near Temple
16-Noon - Start from Chamundi hills Temple & reach Chennai

Pls let me know
1. If this plan is realistic?
2. Pls provide your suggestions on accomodations & food as I've no clue on how easy or difficult or safe it is on each of the places we intend to stay. We basically need a safe comfortable locations with a budget not exceeding Rs 1000 for 12 hours stay. Regarding food, we like to have at some good vegetarian hotels.
3. Is it possible to accomodate more site seeing or anything that we miss out to enjoy more in this trip.

Travellers - myself, wifey, my cousin, my son of 2.5 & daughter of 0.4
Ride - WagonR Vxi

Thanks in advance for any help.

- Salem to Perinthalmanna is about 300 Km. So not sure if you start from Salem in the morning, you would be able to reach the place in time to have darshan, since it may be closed in the noon. Plus you also need to surge foward the same day to Udupi.

(I assume you are referring to the Angadipuram temple near Perinthalmanna.)

- In Mysore you can do the temple early morning before 7/7:30 and then you can do some sight seeing till 2/3. If you start from Mysore at 3 you should be able to cross Bangalore at 5:30 through NICE road and be on your way to Chennai by 10/11.

- Options for Stay: Salem : Cenneys. Very good but costly. (3.2K for a room, but very comfortable). Mysore : Dasaprakash Paradise ~2K. Comfortable rooms with good food. Try the Mysore Masala Dosa .

[aargee]

Originally Posted by ampere

- Salem to Perinthalmanna is about 300 Km. So not sure if you start from Salem in the morning, you would be able to reach the place in time to have darshan, since it may be closed in the noon. Plus you also need to surge foward the same day to Udupi.

No worries here because we're all early birds . For all our trips, we start as early as 4 in the morning; We intend to reach Angadipuram by 10:00 AM for breakfast & plan to leave only by 2 PM after lunch.

Originally Posted by ampere

(I assume you are referring to the Angadipuram temple near Perinthalmanna.)

Spot ON

Originally Posted by ampere

- In Mysore you can do the temple early morning before 7/7:30 and then you can do some sight seeing till 2/3. If you start from Mysore at 3 you should be able to cross Bangalore at 5:30 through NICE road and be on your way to Chennai by 10/11.

Thanks for the tip; I'll search for interesting sight seeing around Mysore until 3 PM

Originally Posted by ampere

- Options for Stay: Salem : Cenneys. Very good but costly. (3.2K for a room, but very comfortable).

No sir; single night less than 12 hours, its bit expensive for 3.2K; I can afford only about little over 1K for a night.

Originally Posted by ampere

Mysore : Dasaprakash Paradise ~2K. Comfortable rooms with good food. Try the Mysore Masala Dosa .

Sure, actually, I'm looking forward to experiement with all veg foods from Udipi & KA & will look into Udipi thread for more foodies.

Places recommended for stay at Mysore:

1. Hotel Dasaprakash, Gandhi Square, Mysore 570 001. Very good restaurant, ample car parking, just similar to the one in Chennai at Poonamallee High Road. I have stayed here many number of times. Very old landmark of Mysore. Mysore Dasa Prakash Group

2. Ginger Mysore, Near Nazarabad Police Station.
Ginger hotels | Ginger Mysore | Hotel profile

[aargee]

Originally Posted by J.Ravi

1. Hotel Dasaprakash, Gandhi Square, Mysore 570 001. Very good restaurant, ample car parking, just similar to the one in Chennai at Poonamallee High Road. I have stayed here many number of times. Very old landmark of Mysore. Mysore Dasa Prakash Group

Thanks; I guess I'll choose the above as it fits to my budget; I'll go with their Non A/C rooms.
Double Room Non - A/C Rs.520-750-825* + Extra Person Non - A/C Rs.110*
Thanks for the pointer Ravi.

[MX6]

With a son of 2.5 and daughter of .4 I don't think the distances you've quoted daily are do-able. Especially the daughter of .4 would require a lot of breaks for her feed.
Especially the salem to udupi is a long way to go. Also leaving kollur after food at noon and reaching Mysore is going to be hectic be nightfall.
Don't want to discourage you, but only 13th and 16th noon seems doable with a toddler and an infant.
Let me look at how to enhance your trip and revert back.
As a small query, what's the longest you've done in a day with your .4 year old?

[ampere]

Originally Posted by aargee

Thanks; I guess I'll choose the above as it fits to my budget; I'll go with their Non A/C rooms.
Double Room Non - A/C Rs.520-750-825* + Extra Person Non - A/C Rs.110*
Thanks for the pointer Ravi.

Please note that there are two Dasaprakashs in Mysore. One is near the bus stand and the other is on the KRS road. The one in KRS road is the Dasaprakash Paradise, (which I referred to) and whose tariffs are higher.

[aargee]

Originally Posted by MX6

With a son of 2.5 and daughter of .4 I don't think the distances you've quoted daily are do-able. Especially the daughter of .4 would require a lot of breaks for her feed.
Especially the salem to udupi is a long way to go. Also leaving kollur after food at noon and reaching Mysore is going to be hectic be nightfall.
Don't want to discourage you, but only 13th and 16th noon seems doable with a toddler and an infant.
Let me look at how to enhance your trip and revert back.

Ok, are there any other altenatives? Are you saying its risky to take her along for the trip or shorten the distance with freqeuent breaks? Son, I don't have issues, with just him & me have done 690 in a single day, I'm confident on him.

Originally Posted by MX6

As a small query, what's the longest you've done in a day with your .4 year old?

This will be her maiden trip in the car.

Originally Posted by ampere

Please note that there are two Dasaprakashs in Mysore. One is near the bus stand and the other is on the KRS road. The one in KRS road is the Dasaprakash Paradise, (which I referred to) and whose tariffs are higher.

Ok, then I'll stay in the one near to the bus stand; I'm actually looking something like Bhimaas in Tirupathi (nr the Railway station) where you stay for 12 hours at Rs 800 for an A/C room & Rs 1500 a day. Since all my stays are in the night & less than 12 hours, I don't prefer spending on luxury.

[MX6]

Originally Posted by aargee

Ok, are there any other altenatives? Are you saying its risky to take her along or shorten the distance with freqeuent breaks?


This will be her maiden trip in the car.

No. It's not risky to take her along. But remember, there will be more breaks to feed her, change her nappies etc. So realistically speaking, you should target 6 hours of driving a day (excluding 3 - 4 hours of total breaks).
Do you have a car seat? Ideally, both your kids need to be on car seats, or atleast your .4 year old.

Maiden trips on cars can be tricky. Start sensitising her on the car seat. Else if she cries, you may be forced to take a u turn near poonamallee.
I shall analyse your trip and say what can be done.

No risk involved in taking her. But your trip needs to be planned to the minute details, with back up plans.

[ampere]

Car seats are must for highway driving. Once for a while you may take the baby on the lap, but not more. On a broad scale I agree with MX about the times you can drive the baby. 6 hours is a long stretch. If it increases, they may get cranky. Since they dont know how to express themselves, it becomes all the more difficult. I had done Waynad ~5 hours from Bangalore when my kid was about 4-5 months and that was all. Did not go further.

On an alternative you can think of train till Calicut and then hire a vehicle till Mysore. You then have a Mysore-Chennai (I think its weekends) train.

[MX6]

I just analysed the trip you were planning. Salem to Udupi with a halt at Angadipuram temple works up close to 700 kms.
That is too much to be done with or without kids in a day, especially considering the fact that you are driving 350 kms of that in Kerala where the roads aren't conducive for high speed driving.
Guess you will have to think of something like taking a break at Palghat on day 1. You leave at 4 in the morning from chennai, you'd be in Palghat by 6 pm with ample breaks.
Overnight stay at Palghat means, you leave at 4 am to have a pitstop at angadipuram temple at 5:30. Not sure whether the temple opens that early. Normally temples in Kerala open very early. So even if you leave angadipuram by 7 AM, you can target reaching udupi by 5 om with ample breaks again.
Visit the udupi temple in the evening itself so that you can start driving to Kollur next morning by 6 am.
You will be in Kollur by 9 am. After breakfast you can finish Darshan and come leave by 11.
Stop at Koppa for lunch. Kollur to Koppa is 2 hours.
Koppa to Mysore through Hassan is around 6 hours with breaks. So you'd reach Mysore by 8 pm.
Once again, I urge you to drive with your kids to say 100 - 150 kms from chennai and see how your little one manages on the car seat on long distances. If she's cranky, this plan needs to be changed further.

[aargee]

@MX6 & @Ampere - with both of your opinions strongly influenced by me & wifey, we decided to change the iterneary as follows...(will ask the MODS to change the thread title)
14-Chennai-Hosur-Mysore (break in Hosur for lunch)
15-Mysore-Chamundi Hills-Udipi (Stay in Udipi for 2 Nights 1 day & this is Night 1)
16-Udipi-Kollur-Udipi (Day drive to Temple in Udipi & Kollur & back for Night 2)
17-Udipi-Mysore (Day drive to Mysore & stay at Mysore)
18-Mysore-Hosur-Chennai (break in Hosur for lunch)

@MX6 - your inputs were invaluable man & forced us to rework on many things

The Angadipuram was on the agenda for one of our offerings; since we reworked, we'll plan that trip later sometimes during this year end.

[MX6]

Originally Posted by aargee

@MX6 & @Ampere - with both of your opinions strongly influenced by me & wifey, we decided to change the iterneary as follows...(will ask the MODS to change the thread title)
16-Udipi-Kollur-Udipi (Day drive to Temple in Udipi & Kollur & back for Night 2)

@MX6 - your inputs were invaluable man & forced us to rework on many things

The Angadipuram was on the agenda for one of our offerings; since we reworked, we'll plan that trip later sometimes during this year end.

You can still make it as per the earlier post of mine altering your trip. Check how your girl copes next weekend over a small trip around chennai.

You need not hit the panic button and count out Angadipuram.

Udupi - Kollur - Udupi is not of any significance. You can leave Udupi early in the morning and reach kollur. Finish Darshan there and leave from Mysore from kollur through Thirthahalli - Koppa - Hassan - Mysore. The road from Koppa to Mysore is very good.

Now they've closed the car street in Udupi from traffic. Take auto rickshaws from your hotel to the nearest gate and walk 10 mins to the temple. Ideally I'd say finish your udupi temple visit in the evening and leave early morning to kollur and proceed from there to mysore.
Tonight I'll mail across an excel sheet showing how you can plan this trip. Going out to check Morachi Chincholi now

[ampere]

Originally Posted by aargee

@MX6 & @Ampere - with both of your opinions strongly influenced by me & wifey, we decided to change the iterneary as follows...(will ask the MODS to change the thread title)
14-Chennai-Hosur-Mysore (break in Hosur for lunch)
15-Mysore-Chamundi Hills-Udipi (Stay in Udipi for 2 Nights 1 day & this is Night 1)
16-Udipi-Kollur-Udipi (Day drive to Temple in Udipi & Kollur & back for Night 2)
17-Udipi-Mysore (Day drive to Mysore & stay at Mysore)
18-Mysore-Hosur-Chennai (break in Hosur for lunch)

@MX6 - your inputs were invaluable man & forced us to rework on many things

The Angadipuram was on the agenda for one of our offerings; since we reworked, we'll plan that trip later sometimes during this year end.

This sounds much more practical to me. Though Chennai Mysore is about 500Km, but the roads do not let you down.

I guess Mysore-Udupi should be through Hassan, Belur and Mudigere (~350Km). Roads are much better now.

You can also couple the Angadipuram temple visit with Guruvayur. Its pretty close. May be in a month or two you may plan to go to Guruvayur for Annaprasanam . You can cover it then. There are good VFM hotels in Guruvayur.

MX can comment on Udupi. I dont have much of an idea of stay, as I just visited the temple.

[aargee]

Originally Posted by MX6

Tonight I'll mail across an excel sheet showing how you can plan this trip. Going out to check Morachi Chincholi now

@MX6 - you're doing what I should be doing ideally; Thanks man, you're making me feeling embarassed.