[dass]

Originally Posted by Gannu_1

. Collecting tolls on this stretch from the users is really sad. We wasted a lot of time on this stretch.



It has been taking too long. I really wish they complete this stretch real soon. It will be a boon for those doing Bangalore-Pune during weekends. And Parag bhai, I think it might actually make a difference if they do the 6-laning here. Average speeds of 100 kmph and we are easily touching the MH-KA border after leaving Pune in less than 3 hours. Don't you agree?

Apart from collecting tolls, the process of collecting tolls itself takes a long time. I saw a lot of Jams at the toll booths, with a lot of truck drivers arguing with the toll operator, not sure what the issue was, but I guess I saw a notice board at all the toll booths that it is not the capacity of the vehicle, but how much load you carry on the truck that the toll is based on, so if they carry higher load, they are charged at the next slab and I thought that was the issue.

Regarding adding one more lane, it may not help much, but it surely would be better than what it is now. The amount of two wheelers on this stretch was to be seen to be believed, and most of them are riding with 3 people on them, no helmets and sometimes in the opposite direction, on the fast lane.

[narayans80]

Originally Posted by mpksuhas

With an early morning start (~03.00 AM) is it possible to reach Vapi by around 06.00 PM the same day on bye-passing Mumbai?

Here are Rohit Tunga's timings for the same destination:

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/travel...ml#post2891694

[paragsachania]

Originally Posted by dass

The amount of two wheelers on this stretch was to be seen to be believed, and most of them are riding with 3 people on them, no helmets and sometimes in the opposite direction, on the fast lane.

Next Task - Drive Pune-Ahmednagar-Aurangabad or Pune-Nashik and tell us how 2 wheelers can be further painful than the Kolhapur-Pune belt.
Hence, I always say that this stretch is best done when 2 wheeler riders have just woke up and looking for dantmanjan in their closets!

5 to 7am and 9pm-12 midnight works best.

[siddutta]

Originally Posted by paragsachania

at Hubli, Clarks Inn is closest to the bypass (NH4) and many have rated the hotel positively.

2 years back I stayed at Clarks Inn at Hubli. It is a nice, decent and a mordern format hotel. We walked in and negotiated the rates @ Rs 2800 for the night plus breakfast.

[Tanmoy]

Hey everyone. I am planning to drive to Mumbai from Bangalore on 30 th October, 2014. Will be extremely happy if any of you would like to join. My ride is a Mitsubishi Cedia. Please respond if anyone is interested and has a trip to Mumbai or Pune coming up. I will leave from Whitefield in Bangalore. Thanks.

[NPV]

Yesterday while talking to a friend who is visiting from Mumbai (he is a regular on this doing Mumbai-Bangalore-Mumbai almost every month), he mentioned that there have been some recent instances of highway robberies mostly near eateries on the stretch after Pune and most of these between midnight-4am. Anyone heard of these ? And obvious targets have been small families with a child who are usually the easy ones to target.

[karts]

Hi Guys,

This is about my trip from Chennai - Mumbai in Dec '13.

Brief intro about my previous trip from Chennai to Mumbai and back to Chennai:
My previous trip from Chennai to Mumbai and back to Chennai was between 19th Dec 2012 and 2nd Jan 2013, all I could remember now is the total travel time taken which was close to 22 hrs( Chennai - Mumbai ) and 21 hrs ( Mumbai - Chennai).
That was the first long tour for me after buying 2nd car (iGen i20 CRDi) in July 2012. Previously I had a driving experience of 1 yr in my Petrol swift. I had to sell it as I had to transfer to Chennai and badly wanted a diesel car in Chennai as I would be extensively using it.

I had driven to Vellore golden temple once around September 2012. That was the first time I got the glimpse of what driving on a highway feels like and since then I had been planning for a long tour from Chennai to Mumbai. Took some time convincing my mom and after lots of negotiation got a green signal.

Now coming to the '13 trip.
Since I already had a prior experience of Chennai - Mumbai, It was easy for me to convince my mom this time around.

The plan was to start at 4:00 am of 21st Dec 2013. I had given my vehicle for 4th Service a week prior to our trip so the vehicle was in top notch condition for the journey. Filled up fuel to the brim while coming back from office on 20th Dec itself. Once again checked if all the electricals were working. Checked wiper water level. Cleaned the windshield and side glasses with trusted water and news paper method.

As planned Mom woke me up at around 3:30 am. Got up and had a bath and a cup of tea and by 4 am we got down to our parking lot and started loading the bags. water bottles etc. I once again aligned all my mirrors so that I get a comfortable view. It was 3 of us traveling, Me, My mom and sister. Finally we started from our place at Pallikaranai at 4:20 am. The first target was breakfast at Shri Krishna inn at Shoolagiri. It comes roughly around 30 kms after the right turn we take from Krishnagiri. It is located on the right side. It has a HPCL bunk, Mcd, CCD. We reached here around 8:00 am. The odometer showed 289 kms. It was very crowded and had to wait for 10 mins to get a table. Breakfast is very good here. We had idli wada, dosa, pongal and filter coffee. Wada was a bit hard though. rest were excellent. We hit the road back at 8:45 am.

Now comes the 1st worst drive of the entire trip. The road condition 15 kms before Hosur and 15 kms after Hosur is really pathetic with lots of diversion and heavy truck traffic (Not sure, if it has improved now). Filled up diesel at a IOC bunk near Hosur and reached Nice road exit at 9:50 am. Covered only 50 kms in 1 hour. So imagine the road condition.

From Nice road exit its a breeze to drive. That helped in munching miles fast. Next stop was at 1:10 pm at a Toll plaza on Davanegere - Harihar bypass. It was 642 kms on the ODO. Got down stretched my legs a bit. We had coconut water. We did not have any plans of lunch as we had a heavy breakfast. The roads were super smooth and I guessed of reaching kolhapur by 5:30 pm, So asked my mom if we can have lunch at belgaum or maybe MCD at kolhapur, She said ok. and started again at 1:25 pm. The Hubli Dharwad section is still a 2 lane. The stretch is 28 odd kms. and I took 30 odd mins to complete. we weren't hungry but my Car was. It was well below the half mark. I thought not to take any chances and I was sure of a IOC petrol bunk near Sankam residency at Belgaum. So reached belgaum at 3:40 pm. It was 853 kms on the ODO. The roads all the way from Nice road till Belgaum is butter smooth. I could easily maintain 130-140 at some stretches and 110-120 most of the time. Filled up fuel and left at 3:50 pm. Then had a 10 min natures call break at on of the road side restaurant near Nippani. Reached MCD Kolhapur at around 5:15 pm. It was 962 on the ODO. We had spicy paneer and vegie burgers and coke and hit back the road at 5:45 pm.

Now comes the 2nd worst drive of the trip. The roads are just fine from Kolhapur to Satara. What's more annoying is the bikers. They occupy 1 entire lane and overtaking buses and trucks is really difficult. They dont even move even with honking. They do have a marking on the left side of the road which should usually be used by them but no one does. And the roads become good to bad to worse as we move towards Satara. The roads from satara to Pune is also a nightmare with few butter smooth stretches and all of a sudden , stretches with uneven patches and pot holes. Also there was close to 5-6 diversions between Satara and pune. It was a slow progress from Kolhapur. Somehow reached Mumbai Pune expressway at around 9:35 pm. It was like heaven to drive after coming through all the bad stretches from Kolhapur to Pune. We stopped at Food mall on the expressway which comes exactly after 15 kms from the expressway toll. It was 10:00 pm and 1210 on the ODO(210 actually as it got reset after 1000 kms ) . Food was good here. I had to reach goregaon and used google maps to find the shortest and fastest route. It showed the route through Navi mumbai - Airoli - JVLR .So took that route and finally reached my place at 12:25 am.

[paragsachania]

Had a quick dash to Pune and back on the weekend that passed. The road conditions are completely favorable till Satara after which the usual ranting starts for what you can refer as an epic of delay in 6 laning the stretch till Pune.

Though the roads cannot be termed as non-motorable, it does cause a lot of irritation, especially if one is driving towards Pune as he would have already driven 700+ kms from Bangalore on a super good tarmac.

Saturday, Nov 1st - Bangalore-Pune (10H46M) with 04:50AM Start (Logged from Home till Sinhaghad Road Entry in Pune)

Sunday, Nov 2nd - Pune Bangalore (12H09M) with 02:30PM Start (Logged From Sinhaghad Exit in Pune till Vidyaranyapura in Bangalore)

Toll updates are as below:

The onward journey was mostly a fast paced one due to empty roads all the way till Kolhapur while the return witnessed heavy traffic not after Pune but between Islampur all the way till Kagal with a rally of 2 wheelers occupying one full lane on a Sunday evening heading for a Joyride!!

The onward journey returned me the FE of 16.9kmpl as per MID while the return stood at 20.6kmpl with a much sedate style driving at a steady 100kmph from Pune till Chitradurga and between 110-120 from Chitradurga till Bangalore.

Note:The surface between Satara and Pune is driveable but has a lot of patches all round. So better to drive under natural light than rely on your car's headlights!

[Drivethru]

Last week I travelled the hubli Mumbai section of NH4. Roads are good throughout and the satara Pune section has improved. I managed to reach Bombay from belgaum in Around 7 hours with a small break at McD in kolhapur. Stayed at hotel sankam residency in belgaum previous night and the place is decent with adequate parking and very close to nh4.

[jkrishnakj]

I did a Bangalore-Pune trip on the 17th of this month. As usual, from NICE road entry till Kolhapur is a breeze, post which I was slowed down tremendously.

I started from home at Bangalore ( JP Nagar, live closer to the NICE road entry) at 3.50 AM and I reach home at Pune ( Near NIBM ), at 2.15 PM - and I myself was quite surprised by this. And I was doing the routine 100-110 KM/Hr speeds, covering a total of 907 KM's.

I read last week that the Pune-Satara 6 laning work will see some progress now - so, some good news.

[ampere]

Originally Posted by jkrishnakj

and I myself was quite surprised by this. And I was doing the routine 100-110 KM/Hr speeds, covering a total of 907 KM's.

Quite possible. Its not the speed, but the consistency which makes all the distance (oops... the difference! Any way I mean both the words ) . And add to it, a cruise at just about triple digits is relaxing on a 4-lane. Just that one should not get carried away by folks whizzing past.

[hrman]

Originally Posted by paragsachania

Had a quick dash to Pune and back on the weekend that passed. The road conditions are completely favorable till Satara after which the usual ranting starts for what you can refer as an epic of delay in 6 laning the stretch till Pune.

Nice update. What is the name of the app? And saw you have subtly masked off the max speed on the onward trip.

[jkrishnakj]

Yes Ampere - And I realise that the minimal breaks help as well.
I will be coming back to Bangalore on the 5th December and the roads are very salivating. Clearly, flying seems to be cheaper, but am sure I will end up cranking my car on the 5th.

Pagar - Please share the APP. Seems interesting.

[paragsachania]

Originally Posted by hrman

Nice update. What is the name of the app? And saw you have subtly masked off the max speed on the onward trip.

Oh yes. The onward journey did see some faster runs on few empty straights. Hence I have masked the recorded max speed deliberately.
That said,cruising was mainly limited and maintained between 100-120kmph max.

Originally Posted by jkrishnakj

Yes Ampere - And I realise that the minimal breaks help as well.
I will be coming back to Bangalore on the 5th December and the roads are very salivating. Clearly, flying seems to be cheaper, but am sure I will end up cranking my car on the 5th.

Pagar - Please share the APP. Seems interesting.

Thats MyTracks available on Playstore. Plenty of such apps exist that has more parameters too. Sportstracker is one of them.
This one is simpler and I seem to likr it for that.

[paragsachania]

Drove to Pune again on last Tuesday and returned back on Wednesday night.

Having started at 12 Noon from my Vidyaranyapura Home I reached Pune home at 23:30 Hours with 5 breaks in between.

Its sugarcane season - I may have overtaken at least 100 Sugarcane tractors between Sankeshwar and Satara (6:30PM - 10:00PM).

Advising extreme caution to those planning this particular stretch (Satara-Pune) after dusk to have good set of lights for highway and typically keep your windscreens clean and flash your lights on regular basis whenever in doubts.

Remember - That slow moving truck that you see on the left lane while you are calculating your overtaking maneuver will end up being a crawling tractor!!

Driving again this Friday noon and returning late on Sunday night.