Team-BHP - Magficient Malvan

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Recently we completed 1635 kms of travel , to Malvan from Hyderabad through Homnabad - Gulbarga - Bijapur - Chikkodi - Nippani - Radhanagri - Phonda - kankavli - kasal - Malvan - Vengurla - Anjuna - Sawantwadi - Ambola - Belgaum - Yargatti - Lokapur - Bagalkot - Hungund - Raichur - Hyderabad. 5 days of journey through some of the best roads in Karnataka & scenic landscapes of Maharashtra & Goa.

Overall road conditions are good , amazing highways in Karnataka, both state & national highways, NH 218 & SH 20 are real beauty.Yes as stated our other members KRDCL will teach lessons to NHAI on building highways and definitely AP govt has lot to learn from KRDCL. NH9 is average, came across bad patches for 20kms between Sirvar - Raichur & 20kms of stretch between Chikkodi - Nippani is totally gone due to rains. 20kms stretch between Chikkodi - Nippani took us 45mins - 1Hr under rainy conditions . NH7 80kms from Jadcherla- Hyderabad is a delight to drive in Night with good indicators through the entire stretch.

Both the Ghat sections between Nippani - Phonda & Amoboli - Belgaum are in good condition [ i read queries by various members from Pune & Mumbai towards Goa]. Both routes took us 3.5hrs non stop.

Actually we thought of doing a coastal Andhra trip [ Read Konaseema] which is equally beautiful as Kerala backwaters, but not promoted properly. Did all the preparations for the travel, but by Nov 1st we were informed about the cyclone which is in its initial stages around Andaman Nicobar and expected to cross coastal andhra around 6th - 7th Nov.

So we have to search for an alternapte option , where in i've decided to make it to Malvan in Southern Maharashtra along Konkan coast.change in destination resulted in dropping 2 members from the trip and in the end its only 2 of us, me & my cousin chandu who did all the travel.
Route is decided to be through NH9 till Homnabad - NH218 till Bijapur - SH112 to Nippani, then enter Maharashtra - Radhanagari - Phonda- Kankavli - Kasal - Malvan.

I stay in south western part of Hyderabad which made me prefer the Belgaum - Raichur - Hyderabad route for our return journey, which makes me reach home earlier than the Belgaum - Gulbarga - Hyd, later one is a better option for people staying in western Hyderabad. Even though we encountered some bad patches on route 1, we were able to 714kms in 12hrs 45mins excluding break time of 90mins. If you dont want to consider which part of the city you stay in then hyd - Gulbarga - Belgaum is always recommended for its good road condition, ring roads that are built which helps us to cross the towns without venturing in to the towns.

Fantastic sections of road conditions are Homnabad - Bijapur 240kms; Belgaum to Husungund 200kms, Jadcherla - Hyderabad 80kms, Mapuca - Maharashtra border 50kms.

Started our journey on 7th Nov 10AM at Saidabad-Hyd , reached Patancheru by 11AM , Homnabad by 1PM, 160kms of journey took us 3hrs. NH9 is in ok condition. Next 240kms to Bijapur through NH 218 is a breeze, amazing highway, this one in excellent condition, outer ring road in Gulbarga helped us to be on the right path in quick time to Bijapur. Had lunch at a roadside Dhaba in Sindgi & reached Bijapur by 4:50PM.

We went straight to Gol Gumbaz , we were lucky to reach the place in time as the closing time is nearing by, which is at 5:40PM. Premises of Gol Gumbaz are maintained properly inspite of lack of support by its visitors who did all littering inspite of all the requests by tourism dept.
Few snaps of our drive on 1st day drive till Bijapur.

A very interesting route indeed. Photos ...where are the photos ?

I did this trip in May 2009. But forgot my digicam and handycam outside the lift of my building. So it would be nice to revisit with photos taken by you!

NH218 between Homanabad - Bijapur [ 240kms, connecting NH9 to NH13 & NH4.

We stopped at a dhaba just 70kms ahead of Bijapur and found this decorative piece. Good decorative taste by the owner

Sun flower plantation on the way to Bijapur. Surprisingly we observed that they are not facing towards sun

Yes, its our turn to put LAGAAN to those people who ruled us for 2 centuries

Gol Gumbaz @ Bijapur

Details of Gol Gumbaz

Front view of Gol Gumbaz

Art

Sunset From Gol Gumbaz

Carvings @ the top floor

Side view of Gol Gumbaz

180 Degree view of the structure

Day2 [ Bijapur - Chikkodi - Nippani - Radhanagri - Phonda - Kasal - Malvan] , close to 310kms
Last night we checked in to Hotel Pearl , within 2kms distance of Gol GUmbaz, had dinner at Kamat's located in the premises of Hotel Kanishka. It rained around 3AM reminding us that the "JAL" cyclone effect is prevailing over Deccan regions. We thought escaping that effect on coastal andhra and aimed towards Konkan and seems like its following us.
Next day morning we started by 6AM and reahed chikkodi by 9AM, had breakfast at XYZ sagar rest. From chikkodi to Niappani around 20kms of travel is through bad roads which took us anywhere between 45mins to 1hr.
From Nippani beneath the NH4 flyover passes the road to Radhanagari. Once you cross the Karnataka border and enter Mahrashtra the road conditions improved. Stopped at few spots on the banks of Radhanagri lake , took as usual some snaps. This lake has lots of potential for conducting water sports, can't find any such activity during our travel.
We have been driving through continuous rains & drizzle all along the road till Radhanagri. From there on the drive to Malvan was without rains. Road conditions are pretty fine in Maharashtra.
Reached Phonda and filled up the tank for Rs 52.8 per lit which is almost 5 Rs less than Hyderabad.
We took a left diversion before kasal which was a narrow road for some 10kms and then joined a a bit wider road. Reached malvan around 2PM. Had lunch of Surmai fish and then we started our search for stay options. Have searched for stay options for past 2 days but almost all the resorts/rooms are fully occupied. That called for some exploration by us by checking out each resort. We headed in the direction of Tarkarli and Devbagh, so finally after 2hrs of search we got a Twin bed single room for 1 night INR1000. We are a bit lucky here as the occupants of this room have chagned their plan to stay at malvan that night & going to Goa well ahead of their plan. I've realized later that stay cost at Malvan is a bit on higher side when compared to goa, might be imbalance between demand & supply.

Snaps for the day2

Drive through rain on the Bijpaur - chikkodi road [ KSH 12]

Crossing River Krishna

Sugarcane fileds near Chikkodi

Our Machine in Phonda Ghats

Honda at Radhanagri Lake

Radhanagri Lake

Panaromic View of Radhanagri Lake

Western Ghats

Sahayadri Mountains

On the Border of Kolhapur & Sindhdurg districts

Chandu flexing his nerves after 650kms of drive

River Near Malvan

Konkan Flora

Konkan Rangoli

Tarkarli Beach

Devbagh Beach

Fishermen bringing their catch to shore

Lantern at our stay

Some amazing, clear and crisp pictures udaygk77. Whats your kit?

Lot of people have done Malvan and rave about the cuisine there. Did you get a chance to taste that?

Keep the flow and let the pictures roll.

Cheers

Great drive. My first introduction to this route! Good to know that NH218 is a fine road to tread. Also the Radhanagari lake is awesome. I visited some thing similar called Ayyanakere in Chikmagulur.

The devbagh beach that you refer to, where is it located? Malvan?
Because I thought it was in Karwar.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ampere (Post 2146138)

Its next to Tarkarli, near Malvan and famous for Dolphin spotting.

Quote:

Originally Posted by amit_3306 (Post 2146458)

Its next to Tarkarli, near Malvan and famous for Dolphin spotting.

The JLR resort in Karwar is also called Devbagh! Hence the confusion.

some very good pics. :thumbs up I liked the sunflower one. But I am surprised to know that sunflowers not facing the sun. Never heard or seen before. But all of them facing one direction thats for sure.

I like your Lagaan caption too. :)

Quote:

Originally Posted by udaygk77 (Post 2143159)

That is one hell of a route. Nice choice and great pics. I would love to do this one at some point. Was this a pre planned route or is it something you just followed your instinct and proceeded?
Great pics and Honda city before the lake looks good. This route is added to my list of travels to be done in near future.
One more questions - Will this route be so good during end of December?
Also how would the scenery be during March/Apr?

Quote:

Originally Posted by himavanth_m (Post 2146851)

Himavanth,

We planned only till Malvan through NH218 route. I was suspicious about the route from Bijapur - Chikkodi - Radhanagri - Malvan , as there was not much information by our BHP members of late.

However except for the chikkodi - Nippani route it was all smooth. Malvan to Vengurla - Anjuna happened in the last minute as it was cloudy & drizzling in Malvan and all the activities are done, except sindhdurg fort & snorkeling were cancelled, that called for travel to Vengurla via Bogwa beach & Nivti fort. Return journey from Anjuna - Hyd was done through Amboli as i've read information that now the route ic lear from landslides. If not for the Karnataka stahe highway 20 from Belguam to Raichur, we would have done Belgaum - Bijapur-HYD.

KSH20 is a beauty and will match to NH218 standards for almost 200kms, last 150kms is not as wider as the initial 200kms.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MileCruncher (Post 2146064)

Milecruncher,

I use Sony DSC-HX1 - 9MP with 20X Optical Zoom, gave nice results. Yes Malvan cuisine tates very good. Had Surmai, Halva fishes during our stay.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ampere (Post 2146138)

Ampere,

Devbhag beach is the extension portion of Tarkarli. From Malvan its a piecce of 500mts of land strip in width for 10 -12kms , on the left side you have River kalri & right Side is Arabian Sea, Karli merges in to Arabian Sea 10 -12kms ahead of Malvan town, called as Sagar Sangam. There are ferry options to visit Sagar Sangam point, its a 1hr ride [ to & fro]

Day3 [ Sagar Sangam point - Tsunami Island - Sindhdurg fort - Rock Gardens - Kolamb Beach]

After having a sound sleep, we woke up around 6:30AM and went for a morning walk around the beach surroundings.There are lot of stay options [ Read resort] along the beach and i guess these have changed teh economy of Malvans. They are now busy making life out of the tourism potential in Malvan.

We were served by hot chai once we returned from our 1hr walk, next 3hrs have been indoors as the rains have lashed Malvan coast. Utilized this time to get ourselves ready for the day ahead.

Around 10:30AM rains have stopped and by 11AM we reached Tarkarli jetty, where we have boating options to visit sagar sangam point, Bogwa beach & Nivti fort, near by light house visit.

I've also observed some ready made boat brought by a visitor & he ventured in to the river waters, was pleasantly surprised to see that we can explore the river waters without any dependancy on the local boats, if you have the right machine. We paid Per head INR 140 for the trip and got the tickets for ride. There are boats which can accompany 6 to 8 members, you can have the boat all for youself by purchasing all the tickets required for travel.

Our journey to sagar sangam point started around 11AM, its a 45mins ride to the sangam point which is at a distance of 6-10kms. It resembled the backwater ride through Vembanad lake in Kerala which we did back in 2001. Only difference being River karli is accompanied by western ghats on the left hand side and land strip on the right hand side.

You can see good amount of Migratory birds at the sagar sangam point with nice white sand on the shores, its a interesting fight between the sea tides and river before river merges in to sea. Our boat didn't took us to the near by island which has all the birds taking rest [ boat rider was very sensuous & wanted to respect the privacy of the guests :-)].
We had other travellers in the boat who are from Kolhapur who wanted to have drinks at sagar sangam which gave use nice 15mins to explore the place.

After that we started our journey back to Tsunami Island which is a small sand strip which erupted after the Tsunami in 2004. Malvans are pretty quick in identifying this and this place has immediately made it to the must visit places in Malvan [ appreciate the marketing skills of rural india].
Tsunami island is actually in between Sagar sangam and Tarkarli jetty so depending on the crowd at this place, boatman will take you there either during onward or return journey. There are even vendors on this small sand strip selling wadapaws, coconut water etc.

Spent some time on the Tsunami island with some suspicion at the back of minds "what if the sand strip sinks suddently , wierd thought though"
Back to Jetty by 12:30PM, went straight to small hotel, had nice food with surmai fry, my cousin satisfied himself with few extra pieces of Surmai , as i want to have some room let for dinner.

Went straight to Sindhdurg fort to know that boating to fort is suspended due to rainy conditions, after some snap time & exploring the sea sellings, found that rock graden is the next place to visit.

Rock garden is a place to visit during high tides where in sea tide will overcome the hieght of rocks and occupy all the rocks around that space. Its maintained pretty well when compared to the fact that Malvan is a remote village.

Visited Chivla beach is a semi circular shape beach, in one end there is this bungalow of narayan rane as informed by localites. This beach has some resorts along its line. Spent some time here and then moved on to Kolamb beach, hardly found a soul here, the beach is all for us. I think Kolamb being a bit away from the town helps it to retian its glory. Clean white sands than the Devbah beach makes it attractive. Has a near by hill too which we haven't explored as started drizzling.

It was chai time and then we decided that as we are running out of places to visit and we had time to kill ,we will make it to Vengurla next day. During our fact finding task we were told that its a must to visit Bogwa beach & nivti fort which we are on the way to vengurla, along the Sagar mahamarg - MSH4.

While returning back to our room we made a visit to MTDC tarkali resort, to do a check of the resort, as i have plans to bring my family to this place next time. MTDC is the best resort i can say [ as informed by other travellers], due to its location, clean beach surroudnings.

Some of the snaps for the day

My Ammunition [ Cigarette smoking is injurious to health :-), mandatory caption, where ever it is displayed]