Team-BHP - Chennai - Bengaluru - Sringei - Madikeri - Mysore

Wow, What a trip it was. Lots of cancellations, lots of postponements and lots of preponments. Pilgrimage to holy places, Honey moon at Suntikoppa, Business at Madikere, Tourist at Mysore. A power packed week.

Yours Truly got married on May 2nd this year. There was a lot of deliberations about where we should go for our honeymoon, but ironically both the parties concerned ie., me and my wife were not really interested. It was a exhaustive wedding, 1 year of preparation, 3 months of hectic preparation, 1 month of intense preparation, 1 week of celebration, 3 days of marriage & 10 days of rest. 5000 people in total attended the marriage and there was huge traffic jam on Chennai Bangalore highway near Vellore where the marriage hall was situated. OT: which is the correct thread to post Marriage Experience? Maybe the mods should open something similar to Street Experience. :D

Pics and rest coming soon.

Planning:
Honeymoon : Where could we go? Where should we go? Where would we go? These were the questions in everyones mind, but me and my wife were not interested. We found heaven in our own room, so really not interested in going out. My sister dint like our idea, she said marriage should be followed by honeymoon.so she booked us a package at a resort near Suntikoppa in Coorg. It was a 2 nights 3 day trip. Dates were moved around many times to accommodate my work and some important family functions. Finally we were booked for 2nd of June till 4th. The plan was take Shatabdhi to Mysore and catch a cab to Suntikoppa. Then my sister got the package extended my a day and so it was till 5th of June.

Suddenly, there was a function of a very close family friend at Sringeri on 1st and 2nd of June. Again after much moving around, it was decided that we would start from Chennai on 30 May, reach Sringeri. After attending the function, we would be dropped at Hassan, where we had asked the resort people to arrange a cab to pick us up. Rest of my family would continue to Chennai and we would proceed to Suntikoppa from there.

Day 1

Date : May 30th 2010:
Time : 8.00am
Car : Innova
Passengers : Me, my wife, my dad, my uncle, his assistant and Driver
Distance : 675 kms (on map my India)
Target : To reach Sringeri in 12 hours.

We were all packed and ready by 7.30 and my uncle and his assistant came in at 8.00 and we started immediately. Reached Ponnamalle by 8.30am and entered Hotel Highway for breakfast. Half hour of refueling car and tummy, we started exactly at 9.00 am. The car was packed to full. 6 adults their luggage and gifts for the function. Drive till Bengaluru was enjoyable. Our plan was to reach Kunigal by lunch time and have lunch there. The driver kept the cars pace at a steady 100 kmph. We reached Electronic city jn at 1 pm. I had done a lot of research on the route in mapmyindia.com and in Team-bhp forum. Instructed the driver to take the nice road. Having the laptop with me I kept asking queries about the route and was getting real time answers in team-bhp. http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/route-...san-coorg.html . We took the nice road till Bannerghatta road. After a longish detour we were back on NICE road. The road was simply brilliant, I was cursing the driver in my mind for driving, again with team-bhp’s help took the Magadi Road exit. Small but very well laid road, bad in patches but the rest makes it up, we encountered heavy school traffic. It was 1.45pm by then and one could hear everyones stomach growling. There is no decent hotel on this road. Reach Magadi town hoping for a good hotel, again none-zip-nope-zero good hotels. Stopped at a bakery and got some sandwiches, cakes, biscuits and some cool drinks to keep us alive till we find a hotel. Joined the highway jus before Kunigal. About 15 20 kms after Kunigal found Hotel Mayura, run in old fashioned government cafeteria style. Was very neat and clean, food was jus about average.

Now that tummy was full. I grabbed the steering wheel from the driver, he too needed rest. It was 4pm by now and the hunger had slowed us down, we were behind schedule and had to make up sometime. The road was really good till Hassan. Reached Hassan and dint take the first road into the town, took the bye pass and went into town. It was difficult to find directions to Chikmagalur from there. By this time we had clocked 500 kms and needed to be refueled. Stopped at Bellur for diesel and were off again. After asking a couple of Autoriskshaw guys, we found the road. Chikmagalur was a breeze, I have been on this route couple of times and remembered the route. This is were the Ghat section starts. We still had a good 100 kms to go and it was already 7.15 pm. Saying a small prayer I turned the car unto the ghat road. Then it was 2 hours of the most intense driving that I have ever done. Road was twisting and turning like anything and most of turns were blind. Sometimes the road would turn hard left and right repeatedly for more and one km at a stretch. Reached Sringeri at exactly 9.15 pm. Target achived. Dinner was waiting, hot and piping. After dinner checked into a very small lodge with very basic facilities.

Pics in an hour.

Quote:

Originally Posted by raghu230506 (Post 1941242)

Wow let me be the first one to congratulate.

Wish you a happy married life.

Second wishes today for the same ocassion on TBHP.

Thanks Mate.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MX6 (Post 1941249)

Well Smartcat has made his marriage a travel experience and posted in travelogues. So feel free to add to your travelogue the same as well unless Mods have other ideas.
Congratulations again. And 5000 attending a wedding in TN? I often hear 5000 getting married on a single platform in TN (under the big hand of a political bigwig with his blessings), but this is the first time I hear 5000 attending a wedding. Did you take loan from 5000 odd people for your wedding? :D

Mine is more of a travelogue than a wedding experience. No I dint take loan for 5000 ppl :uncontrol

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fordmanchau (Post 1941287)

Congratulations man!! Have a wonderful life.
This seems to be the marriage and honeymoon season. Go ahead and post your experiences and pics. We are all eager to know :)

Thanks again mate.

Day 2

Date : June 1st 2010:
Target : Attend 1st day function. Start to Kollur by 2 pm. Return to Sringeri by 9pm.

The function at Sringeri was spread over 2 days. Visited the temple in morning and the function itself was inside the temple complex. So, it was a relaxing and calming experience. All of spent the first half of the day inside the temple. Feeding the fishes in the Tunga River, noticed one thing about the fishes, they seemed to prefer bread, biscuits, rusk to the regular puffed rice. I guess they have been fed puffed rice all these years and seems to want variety now, if u thrown in puffed rice only some would be eaten others would be let to float, if you throw in breads or even banana for that matter, it is gobbled up in seconds. Had a hearty meal at the temple itself, this is where I found out how much people like you if you talk their language. Even though we are from Chennai, our family speaks telugu, my wife’s schooling for some years was in Bengaluru, so she spoke Kannada fluently, she spoke something in kannada to the person who supervise the serving of the food, he was so happy to see a person speaking kannada in a group who speak only tamil and telugu, she got better service than us and also three sweets and 2 vadas more than us.

My Uncle wanted to see Kollur, my Aunt (my dad’s and uncle’s sister) had also the function, she and her husband also joined us in our trip. The last time I went to Kollur was about 4 years ago and it took about two and half hours. Then again with some real time help from team-bhp we started from Sringeri at 3pm, big mistake. The plan was to reach Kollur by 5.30, finish the darshan by 6, start from Kollur by 6.30 and reach Sringeri for Dinner. The lemme tell about the driver here, he was not our driver, but Uncle’s driver, though safe and experience, he has no experience what so ever driving in Ghat sections. He was terribly slow. The route taken was Sringeri-Agumbe-Someswar-Kollur. We stopped at the sunset point in Agumbe. My dad, uncle and their sister had a nostalgic photo session. My aunt’s husband was working in Kudhremukh when they got married so my dad and uncle along with them had been to all these place about 30 years ago, they chatted for about 15 mins at the sunset point. I am not sure whether this sunset point was there when came here last. By time we reach Kollur it was 7 pm and just as we entered the temple, the Sanctum Santorum was closed for evening pooja, waited for half hour and by this time a considerable crowd had gathered and it was 8.30 by the time we came out. The power was off inside the temple, they lit this huge ‘Deepa Stambh’, was a beautiful sight.

I was little bit upset by this time, because the last time I came here I heard that they close the ghat roads by 10 pm, I thought we were struck in Kollur and my uncle who was a priest had come here to perform the function in Sringeri, the function is suppose to start at 5 in the morning. Talked to some of the local people and they said that there is nothing like the road is closed, maybe I heard it wrong the last time I came here. Talked to a policeman just to confirmed he too answered in the affirmative saying that the roads are never closed for car movement. Had dinner at Kollur itself and started at 9.15. Both my dad and uncle asked the driver to sit in the last row of the car and asked me to driver. Kept a steady 60 in the speedo. While climbing half way through the Agumbe ghat saw a Alto with a Old man, a middle man and women struck, stopped and asked if they needed help, they said they were from Agumbe and help would arrived in 5, 10 mins, thanked us anyway. Rest of the return journey was uneventful, reached Sringeri at 11.30. Straight to bed, had to get up early next day.

These Pics are all mine :)