[debuda]

On 12 Nov 2012 my wife and I drove out of Jamshedpur in our brand new XUV. We drove first on NH33 via Ranchi and Hazaribagh and then took the excellent NH2 (GQ) to Delhi. We halted at Varanasi and Kanpur before reaching Delhi.

At Delhi, we met up with our elder daughter and after a couple of days our younger daughter flew in from Bombay. Tomorrow, our son-in-law and his mother are arriving from Bombay and we intend picking them up from the airport and drive off (all 6 of us) straight from there in the direction of Amritsar.

In this maiden travelogue of mine on Team-BHP, I plan to use very few words and more pictures. So let's get started right away.



Our brand new XUV-W6 is very comfortable and I find the driving pleasure quite awesome.




We spent a night at BHU in Varanasi.




The Allahabad Bypass (about 85 km) on NH2 is a great stretch for car enthusiasts. It passes through wilderness and one rarely comes across non-highway vehicles, pedestrians, cattle, etc.




As we are staying near Nizamuddin, I decided to check out nearby places of interest. I started with the Dargah of Hazrat Nizamuddin.




At the Dargah of Hazrat Nizamuddin.




At the Dargah of Hazrat Nizamuddin.




At the Dargah of Hazrat Nizamuddin.




At the Buddha Temple at Bhogal (Hospital Road, Jangpura)




At St. Michael Church (Hospital Road, Jangpura)


The owner of this cool Jeep must be an off-roader. Check out the fat tyres!




Khan-I-Khanan's tomb




At Khan-I-Khanan's tomb




At Khan-I-Khanan's tomb





Peaceful co-existence!




Humayun's Tomb.




At Humayun's Tomb.




At Humayun's Tomb.




At Humayun's Tomb.




At Humayun's Tomb.




Mirza Ghalib's Tomb. I had a tough time locating it. Nobody seemed to know where it is. When I finally reached it, I was the only visitor. Sad.





Mirza Ghalib's Tomb.




Colourful conduits for optical fibre cable. Posting this pic to break the monotony of historical monuments!




At Dilli Haat.




At Dilli Haat.

[amrisharm]

A very good travelogue. Glad to see more pics and less words. looking forward to seeing the rest of the photos.

[subratasenn]

Excellent @Debuda. Pictures are vivid and speak more than words. Looking forward for more.

[SS-Traveller]

You've seen more of Delhi than us folks who lived half (or all) our lives in this city!

Originally Posted by debuda

The owner of this cool Jeep must be an off-roader. Check out the fat tyres!
Attachment 1016277

LOL - the owner is a poser. Look carefully and you'll notice it's a 2wd, and no off-roader worth his salt will ever hang lights from the bottom edge of the bumper, all ready to be ripped off at the first obstacle! And those tyres would get stuck in anything but pristine tarmac.

Would have loved to meet up with you in Delhi, but then you are off to Amritsar tomorrow. When would you be back? If you're still in Delhi at the end of next week, we would look forward to meeting up with you here.

Edit: BTW, since you have connected to NH2 via Ranchi > Hazaribagh > Barhi, how is the condition of this stretch of road at present?

[debuda]

Originally Posted by SS-Traveller

Would have loved to meet up with you in Delhi, but then you are off to Amritsar tomorrow. When would you be back? If you're still in Delhi at the end of next week, we would look forward to meeting up with you here.

Edit: BTW, since you have connected to NH2 via Ranchi > Hazaribagh > Barhi, how is the condition of this stretch of road at present?

1) Thanks a ton. I should be back on 24 Nov and would very much like to make it for the TBHP meet.

2) NH33 from Jamshedpur to Ranchi is satisfactory, barring about 20 km near Jamshedpur which is very bad. After Ranchi quite a bit of 4-laning has been completed and so NH33 from Ranchi to Barhi is mostly good.

[rajeev k]

The photos of the three different religious places of worship speaks about India and its secular existence. The street scenes are also worth mentioning as it again reflect many faces of the great Indian culture; India's unity in diversity.
Waiting to see more.

[TaureanBull]

Very nice pictures indeed!

Did n't you visit any eating joint like Karims near nizamuddin? If you can take out time you can visit World Trade Fair at Pragati Maidan, worth the effort.

[AutoIndian]

Debuda, fantastic pictures as usual. Now you have offered us another thread , which will keep all of us hooked. The "Peaceful Co-existence" is the picture of the day. Not to forget the shadows of the pigeons doing some "Gutur-Gutum", why not a caption for them as well?

Enjoy the trip & wishing you a very happy time with your family.

[agambhandari]

Great Pics. Nice Travelogue.

You say you are heading towards Amritsar. Just to give you a heads up, there is lot of "Work in Progress" due to the 6 laning in Process on the Panipat-Jalandhar Section of the GT Road (NH1).
It won't exactly be swift progress in there. In Fact its not really a Highway currently

I see you would also be passing my town! Its about 300Kms from Delhi

[gd1418]

I would suggest you to have your breakfast at Murthal - famous for its paranthas & white makkhan. Gulshan, Ahuja are some of the famous ones.

BTW, a nice picturelogue.

p.s: ooops, my bad. Didin't relaise that you already left for Amritsar on the 19th.

[me_sid]

Note from Mod: There are several spelling & grammatical errors in your posts. This negatively affects the board experience for other readers.

Kindly ensure that you proof-read your posts prior to submission. Also, it would be a good idea to use spell-checkers.

[debuda]

The 6 of us spent a comfortable night at Haveli motel at Ambala on the way to Amritsar.




At Golden Temple, Amritsar.




At Golden Temple, Amritsar.




At Golden Temple, Amritsar.




At Golden Temple, Amritsar.




At Golden Temple, Amritsar.




At Golden Temple, Amritsar.




At Golden Temple, Amritsar.



At Jallianwala Bagh, Amritsar.

[debuda]

At the Atari (Wagah border); about 40 km from Amritsar and just 24 km from Lahore.




Beating Retreat ceremony at Wagah Indo-Pak border draws thousands of tourists every day and the stands are always full on the Indian side. We were lucky to get seats right next to the border gate, thanks to my fauji friends.




One needs to be very observant to catch this briefest of handshakes, in the middle of much posturing and attitude display, during the ceremony.




Beating Retreat ceremony at Wagah Indo-Pak border.




Beating Retreat ceremony at Wagah Indo-Pak border.




My beautiful XUV near Pakistan.

[debuda]

My daughter’s Macbook Air + Tata Photon came in very handy in the car to search for best routes during our trip. Maps of my Garmin nuvi50LM navigation system sometimes did not show the optimal routes. From Amritsar, we drove to Kasauli via Jalandhar (bypass), Ropar, Pinjore, Baddi and Parwanoo.




Having breakfast at a ‘Vaishno Dhaba’ near Ropar.




My son-in-law and daughters waiting for lunch at Timber Trail, Parwanoo. The lunch, by the way, was excellent.




The XUV pulled effortlessly even on the steepest gradients with 6 adults and the max quantity of luggage that could be packed inside the car.




At Kasauli (Himachal Pradesh) – we spent 2 nights there.




The XUV at dawn in Kasauli.




Yours truly at 6430 feet altitude in Kasuali.




At Kasauli.




At Kasauli.

[pramod]

Silver XUV Looking very nice by the day! My choice of Silver XUV which is supposed to arrive in Feb is justified, looking at your excellent photos. And Ur family looks very cheerful indeed.

OT: The machine generated receipt that i received on booking XUV with initial 40k, did not give any indication of the time of delivery or any date at all. Is that expected? Just curious because, the Executive is not willing to commit to any particular period of delivery whatsoever.