[arighna.dutta]

Originally Posted by cpabhijit

Working and living in Ahmedabad, getting transferred to Calcutta is a great opportunity for a road trip!

Route & Preparations
Chose to drive through Jaipur – Agra – Varanasi – Durgapur, with stops in all these places.

Day 5 – Varanasi Durgapur 500kms 11 hrs

Thanks for the share.

Seems, on the last stretch of your Day5, we were giving company to each other for a very short stretch on NH2 at the border of Jharkhand and West Bengal amidst the thick black smog across the coal belt area.

I was driving from Maithon to Asansol, which is the last major city you would come across before Durgapur while travelling from Jharkhand.

I was appreciating the sedate driving, appropriate use of high beams and no maniac usage of the LED lights for negotiating a pass apart from admiring the uniform layer of the dust settled on the Karoq, which I generally end up relating with long distance travels and seems to be true in this case.

It is very unlikely, but if at all you had noticed, then, it was a dusty red Innova, also under a nice layer of dust, was diligently marking the lane changes and hopefully was driving properly .

EDIT: iirc, it was 28th Nov, 2020

[siddhant]

Nice travelogue with good information about the route. Google Maps assumes you'd drive continuously and always optimizes for time. Hence, the routes it suggests can be highly sub-optimal in terms of driving experience, especially for longer routes.

A good strategy is break a long route into smaller routes that you are likely to cover in 4-6 hours and research them independently. While doing that, try selecting the route which gives you the maximum speed and is only a few kms longer.

For example, this is for a route from my place to my grandfather's place in Odisha.
Route 1 (suggested by Maps): 264 kms, 7 hr 30 min. Speed = 35.2 km/hr
Route 2: 291 kms, 8 hr 3 min. Speed = 36.1 km/hr
Route 3: 333 kms, 8 hr 1 min. Speed = 41.5 km/hr

Anyone who is unaware of the local conditions will most likely take Route 1 but that will be very exhausting because it is a well known mining route in my area with several trucks plying on it throughout the day. Route 2 doesn't have good roads for almost 40-50% of the way. Route 3, the route I take, has the best roads although it is almost 70 kms longer than Route 1.

[KartikRajasekar]

Wonderful travelogue... About the gmaps, did you check your settings? See if you've checked the "avoid toll roads" option or added a two wheeler mode. Google maps can some times work in a weird way depending on the settings you keep.
During my first business trip to US I was using Gmaps predominantly for walking directions and using public transport. Then I rented a car for the very first time, was also the first time driving in a foreign country. I punched in the destination which was around 300miles. Gmaps was promptly asking me to take a left into a pedestrian pathway! Narrowly escaped a Fine

[cpabhijit]

Originally Posted by turbowhistle

I remember Apple Maps being this bad but Google Maps are catching up soon.

Apple maps keeps getting the destination wrong whereas GMaps suggests weird routes!

Originally Posted by Hayek

Extraordinarily well written travelogue which made me feel I was right there with you as you drove all the way. A few things did surprise me:

Thank you Hayek. I'm generally very slow picking up speed and like you rightly said, acceleration damages the mileage most. It is evident from the way mileage dropped off on the last day.

Yes, MP roads after Indore are quite bad and full of truck traffic. This was only 300kms more.

1990!!! I can only imagine how the conditions would've been then!!!

Originally Posted by arighna.dutta

Thanks for the share.

Seems, on the last stretch of your Day5, we were giving company to each other for a very short stretch on NH2 at the border of Jharkhand and West Bengal amidst the thick black smog across the coal belt area.

I was driving from Maithon to Asansol, which is the last major city you would come across before Durgapur while travelling from Jharkhand.

EDIT: iirc, it was 28th Nov, 2020

Attachment 2112309

Imagine that! That we were on the same stretch and you noticed me and you found my travelogue and after nearly 2 months, you still remember having noticed me!!! Amazing.

Yes, 28th Nov I was driving from Varanasi to Durgapur.

[cos.sec]

Wonderful Travelogue. Would have loved to see more pics.

Skoda makes one of the best looking cars.

For your google maps issues, check if the toggle for "AVOID HIGHWAYS" in settings is ON.

[thetank]

Excellent travelogue. Nice details. It was the closest to a drive. Would like to call out the overtaking incident on Day 6 that I could completely relate to. There are times when you want to take it easy but something triggers us to get back on the accel. Cheers!!