[libranof1987]

For a while now, I've wanted to drive along India's entire coastline. It did not have to necessarily be in the same trip, but I did want to drive right beside our shores on both the coasts. I've also wanted to drive to the southern most land mass of India, as with the tips in each direction. Naturally, the next logical thing seemed to be planning a trip that got me both.

As we set off with the thought process, there were numerous iterations based on: where do we start (as in, hit the coast), is the intent to just drive, or to visit places, no. of days at our disposal, do we achieve our goal (of driving along the coast) or go straight to India's southern most point through the path of least resistance (read: quickest route). Rameshwaram - Dhanushkodi and Kanyakumari were fixed and we had to plan our trip around them.

Everyone I spoke with lauded the idea, until talk came of navigating through Kerala. That's when each one recommended finding an alternate route. The state's single lane undivided highways just aren't worth the hassle, they said. Rightly so. But this questioned the very premise of the trip. This lead to all the itinerary drafts we'd prepared until then to be pushed aside, and we were back to an empty Excel tab, and a clear Google Maps page.

We explored several options: going until Udupi, then crossing over the hills into Mysore and driving all the way down south and then a shortest way home. A route to include Pondicherry. Spending some time in the hills. Literally, all of south India was being considered.

Just as we froze an itinerary that got us most of what we wanted, we found out that the Nehru Cup Boat Race was to be held in Alleppey around our dates. This sealed it. An annual spectacle, on our dates in a city we were originally slated to cross - way too much of a coincidence.

We essentially went back to our first plan of driving alongside the entire coast all the way until Kanyakumari - the Boat Race was entirely worth the misery of driving through Kerala. We shuffled the direction of travel to ensure we were in Alleppey on the dates of the race, and we had an itinerary locked down!

[libranof1987]

Logistics and planning:

We'd just got the Crysta a little over a month before the trip, and the first service done two weeks prior. The SA mentioned that Adblue typically lasts 5-6k kms, and that there would be a ~2.5k kms buffer by the time the low Adblue warning shows up. With the odometer at 1,25x kms, it looked like we'd go through the trip without having to worry about this. I haven't yet got the warning even at the end of the trip: odometer at 4,9xx kms.

I carried the following along (although each of these are always in the car):
1) Air compressor
2) Jump cables
3) Air Pressure gauge
4) Basic tool kit - Stanley
5) Misc: Zip ties, Swiss knife, newspapers, garbage bags

6) Medical kit: an exhaustive kit with emergency medicine, as well as regular medicine for common issues

Hotels:

We booked hotels at Chikamagalur, Rameshwaram, Kanyakumari and Alleppey - since these were places we definitely intended to visit. The plan for all the other hotels was to book them on the fly. Eg. we weren't sure when we could leave on day 1 and were open to any of Kolhapur, Belgaum or Hubli. Similarly, for the Chikamagalur - Rameshwaram journey: we weren't sure how much we could stretch and where we'd break the journey. The initial plan was to halt at Tiruppur but we choose to do Chikamagalur - Bangalore - Madurai (night halt) - Rameshwaram instead, literally at the time of checking out from Chikamagalur. Worked out well, considering the rain situation at Mysore that day. (the same day even Bangalore witnessed massive flooding). We encountered blinding rain at several spots but were lucky to be slightly ahead of the onslaught.

The idea was to retain flexibility on how much we wanted to travel on specific days - glad we did so, because we changed our plan again on the Alleppey - Gokarna stretch. Initially slated to break the day's journey at Kannur and Udupi, we instead pulled through to Bekal on day 1, and then Gokarna on day 2.

This is where we stopped:

Belgaum: Fairfield by Marriott

Chikamagalur: Thotadahalli Homestay

Madurai: North Gate: had a poor experience. Booked this on the fly, and primarily because it is close to the Meenakshi temple.

Rameshwaram: Hotel Ashoka: a nice, clean hotel with a secured parking in the heart of Rameshwaram, and walking distance from the Rameshwaram temple. Daiwik Hotel can be an option, but it is much more expensive, and far away from the city.

Kanyakumari: Sparsa Resort: a decent hotel right on the beach, close to the ferry point for Vivekanand statue, sunrise and sunset points.

Alleppey: Ramada by Wyndham, at the enviable location of being right next to the Punnamada lake. We found that they have their own viewing gallery for the Nehru Cup Boat Race so booked their package for the race, and eventually decided to stay with them.

Bekal: Oaks Residency: a nice, clean hotel right on the highway a few kms before Bekal.

Luggage: considering we were four adults and a child, (essentially five adults, considering the car seat) and my Crysta has captain seats in the middle row, one seat was occupied in the third row. To ensure optimal space management, we ditched the suitcases and brought out all the duffel bags / rucksacks. This worked wonders and we managed to fit in two weeks' worth of luggage in the boot + one seat on the third row without intruding on the third row passenger's space.

[libranof1987]

Day 1: Pune to Belgaum

Considering a late, post-work start, we were okay to halt at any of Kolhapur, Belgaum or Hubli. There wasn't much traffic, even on the notorious Pune - Satara stretch and we made good time. Belgaum was easily achievable and we briefly toyed with pushing until Hubli. However, it didn't seem worth the hassle, right on the first day of the trip.

At the trusty Sai International for a quick snack and tea:



We camped at the Fairfield by Marriott, which is right on the highway. This is a very popular hotel for a night halt for those doing Mumbai / Pune - Goa / Bangalore.

Day 2: Belgaum - Chikamagalur

We set off around 8.30am and decided to head straight to Chikamagalur. We had considered taking a detour to visit the Railway Museum in Hubli but given that it would add at least 3-4 hours to our travel time, decided against it.

We hit the common bypass for Dharwad - Hubli in no time, and the single undivided road slowed us down considerably, given the volume of truck traffic (esp. several carrying wind turbines).

Once we crossed Hubli, we had barely any traffic for company (despite it being Saturday) and we made good progress. One constant companion across Karnataka highways through the entire trip were the toll booths. It is just ridiculous! But when you drive through Kerala, you realize you'd rather pay hefty toll and drive on beautiful four-lane highways than pay none and self-inflict the misery of single lane undivided highways perpetually littered with traffic.





Enticing coconuts..



.. and then a stop for lunch off Davanagere





Bypassing major towns



A whole lot of Betel nut trees

[libranof1987]

Day 2 and 3: Chikamagalur

We made it to Chikamagalur around 4.30pm - greeted with lovely sunshine. It had rained heavily the night before and earlier in the day so the skies had just opened up.

Tall silver oak trees reaching out to the clouds, coffee shrubs and a gentle nip in the air greeted us as we made our way through to the homestay in a coffee estate: a lovely property done very tastefully, I'd incidentally stayed with them well over a decade ago, at the recommendation of a BHPian.





Walking through the coffee estate







There wasn't any specific agenda to the day; the idea was to walk around the estate and visit Mullayanagiri peak that's about half an hour from this place. Given that it was a Sunday, the place was full, with cars parked until half a km away from the peak. Mullayanagiri welcomed us with thick fog, strong winds, and temperature in the early 10 degrees. Of the three times I've been here, this was the second instance I decided to not walk all the way up - considering the heavy fog!

On our way to Mullayanagiri





The hills alive with innumerous streams and waterfalls

[libranof1987]

Day 4: Chikamagalur to Madurai

While the initial plan was to do Chikamagalur - Mysore - Tiruppur (night halt) - Madurai (drive through) - Rameshwaram, we decided to drive via Bangalore instead, right when we were about to leave from Chikamagalur. We had toyed with this idea right since the beginning but felt we'd try a new route out, instead of the vanilla national highway. However, given the rains and the chaos they bring about on smaller roads, we felt it'd be best to stick to NH48. A good decision eventually, considering rains terribly battered much of that region that day.

While we experienced blinding rain at a few places, we were lucky to be slightly ahead of the rains, and could proceed without any interruption.

We reached Electronic City - Hosur rd by about 2.30pm and debated where to halt for the night.

It is here that we got onto the Kashmir - Kanyakumari highway: NH44

Chikamagalur - Rameshwarm is about 15 hours per Google Maps, so a real driving time of about 20 hours, considering breaks. We decided to break the journey at Salem or Karur, depending on how we made progress.

However, given the brilliant roads in Bangalore, and Tamil Nadu, and that we were coming off a relaxed day earlier, we decided to push as much as we could. We intended to visit the Meenakshi Amman temple at Madurai the next day, and found that it is shut noon - 4.30pm. This could mess up our plans a bit - if we chose to halt in either of Salem or Karur, we'd have to have an early start the next day in time to make the temple visit. This would have been near impossible had we taken the Mysore - Tiruppur route.

We finally decided to instead push all the way to Madurai. This meant that we'd have to drive well into the evening and night - not our preferred way of travelling - for the flexibility of an easy morning, and relaxed visit to the temple.

This is where the beautiful highway helped - despite continuous rain and occasional heavy rain, we could maintain a steady momentum. A shout out to Tamil Nadu on actually understanding and implementing bypasses the way they should be - allowing for a fairly uninterrupted drive.

But negative marking for random barricades across the highway - a huge security risk, very prominent reflectors and warning lights notwithstanding. Quite the nuisance they are.

We drove through the Thoppur ghat on this drive, and I was surprised to see the prominence of safety directives here: right from the very intrusive rumbler strips, to constant reminders on speed limit and gear to maintain, to lane adulations, run-off areas and what not.

It was only recently that I read about how accident-prone this ghat actually is.

We finally made it to Madurai at 11.15pm - a marathon 14 hour drive, covering 700 kms.

Day 5: Madurai - Rameshwaram

The previous day's effort paid off - we didn't have a rushed morning and could go for the temple visit around 9.30am. We had a surprisingly relaxed visit to the temple, not a lot of crowd. This was a day before Ganesh Chaturthi - just in the nick of time.

We were out shortly after, and set off for Rameshwaram. The topography began to change as we neared the coast - coconut trees were in abundance, as were several water bodies and rivers on their way to the ocean.

We arrived at Pamban bridge around 1.30pm.

[libranof1987]

Rameshwaram (Day 5 and 6):

Pamban bridge is India's first sea bridge, and connects the Rameshwaram island to mainland India.

Given that it was 1.30pm on a weekday, there was sparse crowd; that allowed us to stop and enjoy the view to our content.

There are two bridges here: one railway bridge and one roadway. Construction for the second railway bridge is in progress. The railway bridge is a bascule bridge, allowing for two ships to pass through.











Rameshwaram is the birth place (and burial site) of Dr. APJ Kalam.

The recently inaugurated Kalam Museum is a short distance from Pamban bridge, before Rameshwaram town.



The museum has a collection of a huge number of photos of Kalam at various occasions, and stages of his life, many of his personal effects, life-size enactments of several aspects / events from his life. It is also where his mortal remains are buried.

Truly a lovely experience - the entire effort at creating / maintaining this museum is very commendable.

We then made our way to our hotel, right in the city centre.

It is a short walk from the hotel to the Rameshwaram temple; had a quick visit in the evening.



The Doordarshan tower



Dhanushkodi

Dhanushkodi is an abandoned town a short distance from Rameshwaram. The town was washed away during a cyclone in 1964, and you can see ruins of a few buildings now. Legend has it that you can see lights from Sri Lanka in the evening - it is that close to mainland Sri Lanka!

A proper road connecting Dhanushkodi was completed only in 2016. Until then, people would have to travel either by foot or Jeeps.



Ashoka Pillar at the tip: a memorial pillar for the cyclone victims





The closest we get to Sri Lanka



The lighthouse



The ruins of the erstwhile town



There is a temple dedicated to Lord Rama: the Kothandaramaswamy Temple. This is where Rama is said to have pardoned / offered refuge to Vibhishana, the brother of Ravana, who was against Sita's abduction by Ravana.





Next up, we visited the house where Dr. Kalam grew up. This has some more pictures of him.



Later in the day, we visited the Hanuman temple, which also has the floating stone said to be used in the construction of the Ram Setu.

We then went to the Pamban bridge dockyard.



We were pleasantly surprised to see Ganpati pandals in almost every street in Rameshwaram. This was perhaps the first instance seeing Ganeshotsav being publicly celebrated to this scale outside of Maharashtra. Our hotel was celebrating Ganeshotsav as well.

[libranof1987]

Day 7: Rameshwaram : Kanyakumari

With an early start, we set off towards Kanyakumari; driving through Tuticorin (rather, bypass) and Tirunelveli. Swarms of wind turbines (Muppandal Wind Farm) welcomed us to Kanyakumari. You'll see miles and miles of them as you cross over the mountain range.

It is at Tirunelveli that we got back on the Kashmir to Kanykumari (NH44) highway, all the way until Kanyakumari.





Storms brewing up



Settled in our hotel right on the beach, we took a walk along the promenade.



View from the Watch Tower





Day 8: Kanyakumari

We took the short ferry ride to the Vivekananda Rock Memorial. The memorial is built on the rock said to be where Swami Vivekananda attained enlightenment.

Interestingly, this isn't the only claim to fame for the rock.

Aeons ago, when dinosaurs roamed the landscape, India, South America, Australia, Madagascar and Antarctica were one supercontinent called the ’Gondwanaland’.

From about 600 million years ago, this Gondwanaland started fragmenting into different landmasses and gradually, over millennia, the supercontinent split up. Around 160 millions years ago, India, Sri Lanka, Madagascar, Australia and East Antarctica broke away from the rock island under the memorial.

Between 180 to 118 million years ago, when India separated from Antarctica, it left behind this islet, a desolate witness to the merging and breaking of Gondwana landmasses. Geologists call the Vivekananda Memorial ‘the Gondwana Junction’ because it marks a place where India, Madagascar, Sri Lanka, East Antarctica and Australia were once joined together, writes Pranay Lal

Source

On the boat to the Vivekanand Memorial rock on the left, and the Thiruvalluvar Statue on the right





The Vivekananda Memorial





Sripada Mandapam



Once back on shore, we took the short walk to the Kanyakumari temple, and the Triveni sangam.

Triveni sangam: this is area where the three seas are said to unite: Bay of Bengal, Arabian Sea, Indian Ocean.



Later in the day, we went over to the sunset point, greeted by clear orange skies!









Day 9: Kanyakumari - Alleppey

As we set off from Kanyakumari, we took a detour from NH66 to visit the Suchindram temple. A unique temple with three deities: Lord Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva carved in a single rock, it also has several pillars that produce musical notes when tapped.







This little detour cost us a lot of time as we (rather Google Maps) couldn't find a way back to NH66. Had we chosen to follow the suggested route, we'd have ended up in a river. No kidding. We eventually decided to ask around and got on NH66 with more than an hour lost chasing small lanes. From then on, regardless of what Google Maps said, we stuck on NH66 all the way until Alleppey.

A pitstop at Kovalam beach





Sunset over the Kollam - Kottapuram waterway



The 12 hour drive brought us at Alleppey.

[libranof1987]

Day 10: the Nehru Cup Boat Race in Alleppey



One of the main attractions of the trip! Held every year at Punnamada lake in Alleppey, this race is competed by chundan vallam (snake boats).





At around 100 ft long, the boats have 64 paddlers (32 rows with two on each row), two-four to act as rudder at the back of the boat, two-three in the centre to provide rhythm, encouragement and beat and a captain.



The spectators along the lake front provide ample encouragement, and the atmosphere in generally is very joyous with a cacophony from vuvuzelas creating quite the racket!



Held after three years, this year's race had 77 boats competing, 17 of them snake boats.

The Umpires!



The day's proceedings began around noon with the smaller boats: heats with four boats each where the top two qualify, then quarterfinals, semis and then finals. The smaller boats have about 20-30 paddlers. There was a race with women paddlers as well.





At 2.30pm, the heats for the snake boats began.



The heats were dominated by the Kerala Police team as they left their competitors literally a mile behind; then came the quarterfinals, semis and the final that ended up being extremely competitively fought. The Kerala Police were upset and ended up at P3.

The winning lead



What an incredible sight this race is! What intense madness - and yet, tremendous fun! It is truly a spectacle one must witness and experience.

Here are some videos from YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I5tK...el=DDMalayalam

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OvHr...nel=Ash2travel

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RJP0...=KeralaTourism

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ur21...NTHOMASABRAHAM

[libranof1987]

Day 11: Alleppey - Bekal

A straightforward drive on NH66.

There is massive construction in progress for four-laning of NH66, and once complete (currently scheduled for 2025), it should make for a very quick and pleasant drive through the state.



A celebratory Onam meal



Again, we chose to push through as much we could. The initial plan was to halt at Kannur and Udupi en route Gokarna; however, we eventually decided to make it in two days with Bekal being the night halt. A 15 hour drive later, we pulled into Bekal.

[libranof1987]

Day 12: Bekal - Gokarna

With a good night's sleep, we checked out and set off on our day's drive. Knowing we'd cross Mangalore city, I thought of stopping over at Pabba's for breakfast; after all, a little gadbad never hurt anyone!



Happy to be back in KA (much for the roads, much less for the toll), I was back on familiar roads. Having studied in Manipal, I've done numerous rides on this stretch: a few times to Mangalore, and several to Kapu. The highway expansion construction had begun during my time, and a ride to Mangalore meant, you came back several shades redder!

While I was happy about the quick drive, wasn't not so much about flying past the entrances to Udupi, which is where we typically got off the bus (Mumbai / Pune - Mangalore buses didn't enter Udupi). I'd have wished to spend some time in Manipal, perhaps on another day, another trip!





I was excited to drive along Maravanthe beach again, having seen / heard so much about the transformation. Back in college, Maravanthe beach meant a nice midnight ride + bun masala at the shacks there + spending time at the beach with buddies. Then, there was the single lane highway, a small strip of road next to it with some shacks, rocks and then the water - barely any shore.

The landscape has changed drastically - a delight nevertheless.









Not a shack in sight and the harsh sun beating down, we got back in the car and moved along.

Next stop: Murudeshwar!

My first visit here was 15 years ago, when the campus was newly constructed, the Shiva statue was done while the temple was yet to be completed. Sadly, the upkeep has been fairly poor.







There are life-size enactments of significant events in Hindu mythology in the cave inside the Shiva statue - very well done!

The is also a viewing gallery on the 14th floor of the Gopuram - a lift takes you up. It offers nice views of the statue and the coastline.





This checked out, we set off for the final way point on our journey: Gokarna!

We were staying on Om beach, and reached well in time to spend some time on the beach, and catch the sunset.



Day 13: heading home: Gokarna - Pune

The final leg of the trip was open: the original idea was to spend one night each at Gokarna and Hubli. We eventually decided to have a relaxed final day of the trip and booked for two nights at Gokarna. However, there was a red alert issued for the next few days for Maharashtra, Karnataka, especially for the coasts with heavy rain predicted. Not thrilled at the idea of being holed up in the hotel room, we decided at 7pm to instead head home the next day. With Ganesh Visarjan on the original go-home drive, this made more sense. A good decision, considering the relentless heavy rain that came about for the next few days.

Given the ~10 hour drive, I did not want to reach Pune at peak hour traffic. We set off from Gokarna at 6am, and by criss-crossing across multiple state and national highways, reach Belgaum just shy of noon. An uneventful journey later, we were back home at 5pm, drawing curtains on a thoroughly enjoyable road trip.

[libranof1987]

Our eventual itinerary and route:





Total fuel: 300 litres of diesel
Total fuel cost: 26.5k

Total driving distance: 3,631 kms, 3,590 kms (excluding in-city)
Total driving time: 84 hours (only highways)

Total toll: 3,380
MH: 740
KA: 1,590
TN: 905
Kerala: 145

[libranof1987]

Closing thoughts

This trip ended up being exactly how we'd imagined and wanted it to be, and much more. All our trips until then, self-drive road trips or otherwise, have typically been at most 10 days.

These 13 days on the road took us through coffee estates, through hills, and the plains of southern India and then alongside the coastline through harsh sun and shine, and torrential rain. We saw the topography and culture change as we made our way through multiple states, one example being how different the sambar tasted in each of the three southern states!

This was never going to be a very comprehensive, all-encompassing trip to cover any specific state, or the coastline or a particular region. But it felt enough to get a nice flavour of the diversity of our country and leave behind an aftertaste we'll enjoy!

Now, onto the next!

[Aditya]

Thread moved out from the Assembly Line. Thanks for sharing!

[Rajeevraj]

Very nice travelogue. Thanks for sharing. A nicely thought out itenary and a very good time to do the trip also. Nice intercept to the boat race too.

Is there an issue in the post ordering? Post 3 talking about Chikmagalur and then followed by the start of the trip?

[thirugata]

Originally Posted by libranof1987

Attachment 2359726

Bypassing major towns

Awesome route to drive, wonderful travelogue.

By the way this is Pushkarani at Santhebennur.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVvwbEMGhY4