6000km in 14 days: Did a 3 state road trip in my 15 year old Scorpio

There are hardly any good restaurants on the way between Ganapatipule and Harihareshwar, especially if you are a vegetarian like me.

BHPian VIJMAC recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

Hi friends,

This is my first travelogue and I hope you will like it. Your suggestions and feedbacks are most welcome. For the past several years, I have been a reader of Team-BHP travelogues and always wanted to write one of my own. But I somehow could not write, either because my trips were short ones or, I was lazy after returning back from the trips. This time, while I am a bit late, but still thought of writing my first travelogues as I finished a long trip recently. So here is my story...

Sometime around mid of November 2023, my wife and I were thinking of a long weekend drive around Bangalore. We had not taken our Scorpio (we call it “Black Bull”) out for a long time. Also our bull was getting 15 year old in Feb 2024. We thought it’s a right time to go for a long trip before we do the re-registration of the bull. As the conversation progressed, a thought came up that instead of a weekend drive, why not we go for a long trip? Generally, December last week is a free time for me and hence I proposed to my wife, “Can we drive to north for few days”? Wife said “I’m OK but, what do you mean, by driving north”? This triggered a detailed discussion for next few days. Me and my wife, both like long drives on our black bull. We both like adventurous places, drive through forest/rough roads, country-side, basically places where we find less crowd. Most of our road trips have been in KA, TN, KL or GA. Hence this time we thought of exploring north side of KA. After several rounds of discussions we decided to visit Gujarat, via the scenic coastal Maharashtra route (avoiding the popular and crowded Mumbai – Goa highway). Since December-end is the most crowded time of the year for a vacation, we had to plan our sight-seeing places and hotel bookings in advance. Over the next 1 week we were busy in route plan and bookings.

While deciding the itinerary, our objectives were clear:

• Journey is important, not the destination.
• Enjoy the drive during day time, no night driving. Sleep for at least 8 hours daily. Enjoy food & local delicacies. Visit 1 or 2 tourist spots each day, wherever possible.
• Our kids didn’t join us as they had their college exams around that time and preferred to stay home. So it was only me and my better half set out on this expedition.

Now, before we get into the travel details, let me introduce you my Black Bull:

• 2009 Mahindra Scorpio (Mhawk) 7 seater,
• 1,25,120 kms on odometer

Preparing the Black Bull for the trip:

• Thorough inspection of vehicle at Anant motors, BG road, Bangalore. Replaced the suspension bushes and arms which were worn out, oil top ups. Thorough washing.
• Fitted an 8 Inch Active Bass Tube Subwoofer with Inbuilt Amplifier 4200W, to enhance the audio quality
• Bought TUSA Digital Tyre Inflator & Ceptics 200W Car Laptop Charger/Power Inverter
• Tool box, spare headlight bulbs, Tubeless tire puncture repair kit, Medicine & first-aid kit
• Removed the 3 row seat for extra luggage space
• Tire pressure check and full tank of Diesel. Loaded Rs.4K on Fastag.

Here is the detailed itinerary and route plan:

DAY 1 (24/Dec): Bangalore to Dharwad (460 kms).

We started our trip on 24/Dec morning. Since Dharwad is my native place and my parents and brothers stay there, it was a natural stop for me enroute Maharashtra. Started at 5am from Kanakapura road (south Bangalore), took NICE road and reached the Bangalore-Pune national highway. Had coffee at hotel Ratnam, Dobaspet, about 65 kms from start point. Later had breakfast at Hotel Apoorva in Davanagere (These 2 places are our default stops whenever we go to Dharwad).

We reached Dharwad by afternoon, had special lunch prepared by my mom. Rest of the day went in chatting with my family, discussions about the trip, explaining my mom about the trip plan and convincing her that it is going to be a safe trip. Had good sleep overnight and got ready for our journey next day.

DAY 2 (25/Dec): Dharwad to Ganapatipule (380 kms)

We started at 6am knowing that the road after Belgaum is under construction and it may take more time to reach Ganapatipule. Main items on the agenda for the day were to visit Mahalakshmi temple in Kolhapur & enjoy the drive along the beach on Aare Ware road (between Ratnagiri & Ganapatipule).

Road condition from Dharwad to Belgaum is excellent and we reached Belgaum in no time. We had breakfast after crossing Belgaum and also bought some Kunda, a speciality sweet of Belgaum, to eat on the way.

Road condition after Belgaum was pathetic. But it was not a big deal for my bull, it has seen much worse roads in 15 years.

There was a moderate crowd at Mahalakshmi temple. We could have devi darshan in about 30mins and we headed to Ratnagiri, taking a diversion from the Pune highway (NH48).

The state highways now a days are in a much better condition. Though they are not multi-lane, the traffic is less and are well maintained. However road from Kolhapur to Ratnagiri was under repair. We were really looking forward to the drive on coastal route. By afternoon we reached Ratnagiri and the scenic drive began from there. Let the pics and video tell the story further.

After enjoying the beach drive and stopping at many places, we finally reached Ganapatipule. We checked into Westbay Resort, which is walkable distance from the temple. The resort is beautiful with good food and landscaping. We quickly took shower and headed towards the temple. There was quite a bit of crowd due to holiday season. The temple is right on the beach and luckily most of the people were heading towards the beach to see the sunset and temple was not crowded much.

After seeking blessings from Lord Ganesha we sat in the temple premises and enjoyed the sunset. Had a cup of tea on the way and went back to the resort. By this time resort was bright and glowing with colorful lights all over and the open dining area was decorated with a large (20ft+ tall) Christmas tree, as a part of Christmas and new year celebration. We walked around the resort for a while and fed biscuits to some friendly dogs roaming around in the resort. By this time we were very hungry and walked toward the restaurant for dinner. The food menu had a wide variety and we ended our day with a sumptuous dinner.

DAY 3 (26/Dec): Ganapatipule > Harihareshwar > Nizampur > Dasave (360 kms)

We woke up in the morning with a lot of excitement as we were supposed to take our vehicle through ferry at 3 places during the day today. By the time we finished our breakfast in the resort, the watchman had washed our bull and it was ready to charge.

Ocean view from resort restaurant:

We started our journey for the day driving along a narrow coastal route (SH4).

Though it is a single lane road, there was hardly any traffic and we could maintain good speed, while enjoying the coastal scenery. We had to take ferry at these 3 locations:

• Jaigad to Tawsal,
• Dhopave to Dhabol
• Vesavi to Bagmandla

The ferries run at a frequency of about 1 hour. The detailed timetable and ticket charges are available online at https://carferry.in/. We had planned our drive speed and stops on the way such that we reach the ferry point on time. If we miss the ferry then we have to wait about 1 hour for the next ferry, which can be quite boring and waste of time.

Ferry point : Jaigad to Tawsal

Along the drive, sometimes we come very close to the coast and sometimes we go over the mountains and get an aerial view of the coastline. Here are some pics, as words cannot do the justice in describing the scenery.

We reached Dhopave ferry point by noon time, just in time to catch the ferry #2:

Some more pics of coastal view after Dhabol:

There are hardly any good restaurants on the way between Ganapatipule and Harihareshwar, especially if you are a vegetarian like me. We had kept enough stock of snacks and soft drinks and hence didn’t face any issues. Due to some goof up by Google maps, we almost missed the ferry at Vesavi. One of the key issues with Google is that it always shows the fastest route and does not consider the width of the road. My bull could hardly pass through a narrow road it suggested near a small mosque about 1 km from the Vesavi ferry point. With some skilled driving and knowing the edges of my bull well, I was able to navigate and reach the ferry just-in-time.

After visiting these temples, we went to the beach which is quite rocky but very beautiful.

 Soon after the sunset we started our journey towards our destination for the day, our resort in Dasave. We started moving away from the coast now and the road was pretty good. Driving through the Tamhini ghat, we reached our resort “Shivraj Palace”, just before the dinner was getting closed. Resort was in a nice location beside huge mountains. We had a quick dinner and hit the bed as were quite tired because of the hectic day.

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