[ranjitp1]

Originally Posted by FlashMustang

Dear Team BHPians,
Thank you for all your valuable inputs on this thread. They were very helpful.
Based on the information available on this thread, I intend to take the following route to Tirupati from Hyderabad on the 15th of August:
Gachibowli ORR -> Narketpally -> Addanki -> Medarametla -> Naidupeta -> Srikalahasti -> Tirupati
I'll be travelling with my parents (aged 67 and 59).
I intend to start by around 5:00 am on Aug 15 and reach Tirupati by evening/night.
We intend to reserve the next day for the darshan at Tirupati, and if time permits, visit SriKalahasti too.
I'm planning to start back from Tirupati on the 17th of August by 5:00 am and reach Hyderabad by evening/night.
Any inputs from fellow BHPians would be helpful about the following:

1. 15th being Independence day, should I expect a lot of traffic on the road? Any inputs about latest road conditions or local conditions along the way (celebrations, diversions, etc. to expect) would be helpful. If I should take an alternate route to avoid any hassles, please suggest that.
2. Again, this being a long weekend, would there be too much rush at Tirupati for the darshan and will we be able to complete the darshan on 16th? We have planned to take the Seegra Darshan tickets upon reaching Tirupati (as advised by the TTD call center).

Thanks in advance and look forward to all your inputs.

No exceptional rush on the roads,but rush in the temple definitely yes since its a long weekend.

Roads are all good.Carry food,you are not going to find any great places to eat enroute.

Book a place to stay in Tirupati well in advance,else you are going to find it tough as all the good places would be sold out.

[spannerhyd]

You might want to take a peek at the crowd and it possible try to get a slot by taking the Rs. 50 darshan which you can get from any of the TTD counters in Hyderabad. This will reserve a time slot for you.
Alternatively, you can buy the seegra darshan ticket after reaching Tirupati. You can finally decide, which darshan to pick based on the crowd scenario.
Another option for senior citizens is a special darshan which is offered in two slots one in the morning and the other in the afternoon. The reservations/booking for this darshan take place in a separate queue in front of the temple and the queue starts pretty early in the morning. So, if you plan to take this option, your parents should be in the queue pretty soon.
The quota is also limited and as my memory goes, it is around 800 tickets per day. An attendant per person is allowed in this darshan.

As ranjitp1 pointed out, there are "no" places where you can stop and eat, so I suggest that you carry your food. It took me about 11 hours to complete that trip (around 605 kms) and I did not have to cross 95kmph at any point in time. So, if you are planning to start by 5:00 AM, you will definitely reach by early evening.

One other thing is the strain continuous driving can cause, so you might want to take a hotel reservation in Tirupati and then take a cab/bus to Tirumala. This will give you a days rest and keep you fresh for the return drive.

Have a safe drive!

[FlashMustang]

Thank you, ranjitp1 and spannerhyd for the very helpful advice. I have made the reservation for the accommodation for 2 days at Tirupati (Aug 15 and Aug 16). We'll carry our food too for the journey. Since the three of us would like to have the darshan together, and since only my dad qualifies by his age for the senior citizen darshan, we are planning to take the Seegra Darshan tickets early morning on Aug 16, and have kept aside the entire day's time to complete the darshan. I'll be driving at a sedate 60 kmph to 80 kmph to avoid getting stressed out from the long drive. I'll post the driving experience/update on route once we complete the trip. Thank you, everyone!

[FlashMustang]

Thank you, everyone! It was a great drive! Here is a brief trip report:

Onward journey:

1. Started on Aug 15. Reached Gachibowli ORR junction by 5:00 am. Exited ORR for Vijayawada highway by 6:00 am.
2. Heavy traffic on Vijayawada highway, all the way till Narketpalli. There was an accident on this route, and clearing of the wreckage caused a bit of bottleneck & slow moving traffic. Toll booth wait time was about 15 minutes.
3. Light traffic on NAM Expressway. Road was four laned, except at certain villages. There were small sections of the highway being four laned. Miryalaguda bypass had quite bad roads due to flyover construction.
4. There were school children marching along at certain places which warranted driving a bit slowly, but nothing major.
5. Refilled petrol at IOC COCO bunk near Ongole.
6. As pointed NH5 had diversions due to flyover constructions at most junctions till Nellore. Beyond Nellore, roads were very smooth, all the way till Nayudupeta. Reached Nayudupeta by 7 pm (drove with a lot of breaks, mostly at speeds of 60-70 kmph, along with a nap between 2:30 pm-3:30 pm).
7. Reached SriKalahasti by 8 pm. Visited the temple, and started to Tirupati after dinner by 9:30 pm or so.
8. Reached Tirupati by 10:30 pm and checked in to the accommodation.

At Tirupati:
Reached Tirumala temple by 10:00 am by APSRTC bus. Seegra darshan tickets were closed for the day. We decided to visit the shrine once again at a later date. Visited Alamelumangapuram and had darshan.

Return journey:

1. Tanked up at Tirupati & started by 6:00 am, after a light breakfast.
2. Made steady progress. Reached Naidupeta by 7 am, and Ongole by 10:30 am.
3. Refilled petrol at BP Ghar petrol pump, and had heavy breakfast. Started again by 11:00 am.
4. Didn't stop much, and maintained speeds between 70-80 kmph for the most part.
5. Reached Gachibowli ORR by 6:30 pm.

Other information:
Total roundtrip distance: 1271 km
Average FE: 16.4 kpl
Car: Honda City V AT (2012 model)
Passengers: Myself and my parents
In general, the onward drive was quite tiring, partly because I had very little sleep the previous night, and I was tired. I couldn't bring myself to cross 70 kmph. The return journey was totally fun, as I was well rested, and I could maintain around 75 kmph for almost the entire part of the journey (except on ORR, where it was between 100-110 kmph). In addition, the familiarity developed with the route during the onward trip helped.
Please let me know if any of you need more information.

[rsksnt]

Last week, happened to experience this Dhaba. The location is great, between Ongole and Kavali but lack of running water makes the facilities poor. Owing to adjacent fruit orchards, flies galore. Electric fly repellents would be helpful.
Anyway let the operating contractor know of dissatisfaction. He informs us that it's a part of BPCL COCO facility, the issue has been pending for long and they're awaiting BP engineers to make available an alternate water source (contractor shut down the bore well due to salinity)

[Altisguy]

Here is the latest update on the stretch from Hyderabad to Tirupati/Srikalahasti. After having checked out various forums and having spoken to a handful of friends, I finally took the Bangalore highway and drove upto Kurnool from where I took the state highway to Kadapa via Nandyal. The road has been dug up with diversions at so any places that it becomes a pain to drive. Similar is the stretch from Kadapa to Tirupati with isolated stretches of good tarred roads.There are far too many speed breakers and most of them unmarked. This can be a real pain. Started from Hyderabad at 8:30AM and with two breaks of 20 minutes each managed to reach Tirupati at 6:00PM. Having gone through the ordeal decided to take the alternate route via Naidupeta-Nellore-Addanki-Ongole-Narketpally-Hyderabad. The roads are much better in condition and with tolls in between. While the onward journey was 565kms, the return was 60kms more than that. But the return was much lesser painful. Started at 12 noon and reached Hyderabad at 9PM with two breaks of 45 minutes and 20 minutes each. I would recommend taking the latter route rather than the former. Especially for folks planning to do on Srikalahasti, this route makes more sense than the one via kadapa and kurnool. This trip was done on 2nd and 3rd November 2014.

[JoseVijay]

Originally Posted by Altisguy

Here is the latest update on the stretch from Hyderabad to Tirupati/Srikalahasti. After having checked out various forums and having spoken to a handful of friends, I finally took the Bangalore highway and drove upto Kurnool from where I took the state highway to Kadapa via Nandyal. The road has been dug up with diversions at so any places that it becomes a pain to drive. Similar is the stretch from Kadapa to Tirupati with isolated stretches of good tarred roads.

Kurnool - Nandyal - Kadapa road widening has been going on for years. Only God knows when that would be complete. That is one of the worst stretches on your journey. Many years back I drove from Kadapa to Tirupathi and the roads were good then. Speed breakers on this stretch? I am a bit surprised. When did these come up? If you are starting from Hyderabad, taking the Addanki highway from Narketpalli is the best bet any day.

BTW, which car did you drive? Corolla or Santro?

[srimath]

Originally Posted by JoseVijay

.... from Kadapa to Tirupathi and the roads were good then. Speed breakers on this stretch? I am a bit surprised. When did these come up? ...

Kadapa - Rajampet - Koduru - TPTY always had speed breakers. I have been drving on the route from 2004 and they were present at that time.

[JoseVijay]

Originally Posted by srimath

Kadapa - Rajampet - Koduru - TPTY always had speed breakers. I have been drving on the route from 2004 and they were present at that time.

I drove on this stretch before 2003. Now I remember that there were speed breakers only at 3 or 4 places. They must have put up speed breakers later on as there were many accidents those days in this stretch.

[Altisguy]

Speed Breakers are not too bad but the problem is with them not being marked. I drove the Corolla. Also did the Hyderabad-Pondy trip three weeks ago, something that I intend to write about shortly.

[srimath]

I am driving to TPTY tomorrow morning and I will be taking the HYD Gooty Kadapa route. Last I travelled on this route was 8n April. Does anyone know the present condition of gooty tadipatri Kadapa route.

[narayans80]

Originally Posted by srimath

Kadapa - Rajampet - Koduru - TPTY always had speed breakers. I have been drving on the route from 2004 and they were present at that time.

I drove this route 2 years back. The speed breakers were not bad and all of them were within village limits (almost customary like 2 speed breakers per village), so was mostly at slow speeds at that time.

My update on Gooty-Tadipatri-Kadapa is not recent. I did in 2012, roads were good enough to do 100, except for small bridges where you could fly off in high speeds. Almost nil traffic. Villages had some bad roads, but nothing to worry even for a first timer like me.

[JoseVijay]

Originally Posted by srimath

I am driving to TPTY tomorrow morning and I will be taking the HYD Gooty Kadapa route. Last I travelled on this route was 8n April. Does anyone know the present condition of gooty tadipatri Kadapa route.

Why don't you take the Narketpalli - Addanki - Ongole - Nellore - Naidupet - Tirupathi road? The roads are good till Tirupathi. Any reasons for doing Hyd - Gooty - Kadapa route? How was this road when you travelled in April? I would always suggest you to stick to Narketpalli - Naidupet stretch.

[srimath]

Originally Posted by JoseVijay

Why don't you take the Narketpalli - Addanki - Ongole - Nellore - Naidupet - Tirupathi road? The roads are good till Tirupathi. Any reasons for doing Hyd - Gooty - Kadapa route? How was this road when you travelled in April? I would always suggest you to stick to Narketpalli - Naidupet stretch.

I need to visit a relative in Gooty hence the route. The road was decent in April. I wanted to know if the road conditions changed.

[hyd_traveller]

Did Hyderabad - Tirupati on 11/12/2014. The driving time was 08:30. Halts and traffic jam totaled up 1:45. Khairatabad to Fortune Kences took a total 10:15.

Since the start was at 7:00am, could cross Ramoji Film City from Khairatabad via Malakpet in just 40 minutes.

Took NAM (Narketpally-Addanki-Maredmetla) Expressway and exited NH9 at Narketpally Bye Pass at 8:15am and joined NH5 at Medarmetla at 11:45am. Reached Naidupeta at 3:15pm and was in Tirupati at 5:15pm.

There was a major traffic jam on Srikalahasti Bye Pass so tracked back and then went through the crowded temple town which ate up a clean 30 minutes.

The construction of a flyover on the Mirayalaguda Bye Pass over the Nagarjuna Sagar Road is a cause of worry for the car. The service roads are non existent and one has to drive over a pot holed stone riddled road for nearly 50 metres.

Crossing Piduguralla is also a concern till a bye pass is laid out.

The 6 laning of NH5 does not allow one to cruise smoothly and so every now and then one has to slow down and use service road.

On the whole, a real pleasure to drive.

Tolls :
NH9 (Hyderabad - Narketpally) = 65
NAM Expressway (Narketpally - Addanki - Medarmetla) = 151
NH5 (Medarmetla - Nellore - Naidupeta) = 175

Return on 13/12/2014 took 11:30. One reason is the heavy traffic till Srikalahasti as I started from Tirupati at 10:15am. Second is that I drove slower as father was feeling a tad unwell. Third is evening dusk made me slow down further (my personal handicap is poor eyesight in fading light). Fourth is that I took a halt at Srikalahasti for 15 minutes. Fifth is heavy traffic from Narketpalli onwards. LB Nagar to Khairatabad took me 1:15 on return compared to 0:25 while going.