It was a long pending trip to my home state of Kerala that I finally managed to do during the December holidays. Unlike my old Figo which has done multiple Kerala trips, the Aspire had done Calicut, just once in the last 6 years.
I've been wanting to visit Kochi as well which I haven't been to many years as well. So I decided to do a round trip from Bangalore to Calicut to Kochi and back. The only downside was that it was holiday season and I knew traffic was going to be bad.
Bangalore to Calicut is usually around 8 hours and we took a whopping 10.5 hours on the day after Christmas. Traffic and blocks were the norm once when crossing into Kerala. After a days break, we continued to Kochi via the Kodungallur route which was the route I did back in 2009 when on a solo ride to Kanyakumari. The under-construction expressway uses this route. Thankfully this route was not used by many buses and trucks and it was a good drive with traffic nearing Kochi. The roads in Kerala are super smooth too and even with the worn tyres on my car, the tyre road was almost nil.
As I was heading to Fort Kochi, I could have continued on the road heading south instead of heading towards Ernakulam and taken the RoRo ferry to Fort Kochi, which I did anyway later for the sake of experiencing it. We spent a couple of days at Kochi doing ferry rides and visiting a few Biennale venues and the carnival.
It took a while to get out of Fort Kochi due to the heavy rush in the opposite direction when we were heading to Ernakulam to spend a night and then do Ernakulam to Bangalore on the 31st which took another crazy 12 hours.
The car performed as expected with no issues except for a puncture after Salem which I got to know because of the TPMD alert. They were blocks due to flyover work and I was on the shoulder most of the time from where I assume I picked up a nail.
From there on till home, the drive was in the dark and my headlight focus although wasn't right, was good enough to manage. New Years' eve traffic in Bangalore started from Attibelle toll and was made worse because of the E-city flyover closure. A very stupid decision by the cops.
The total distance covered was around 1200 kms. I couldn't get the exact figure since the trip meter was reset when the instrument cluster fuse acted up again and I had to reseat it.
Fuel efficiency was 20 kmpl and speeds of 90-100 kph. I did rev the engine in lower gears out of frustration in traffic a few times which would have reduced it further and not to forget the innumerable blocks all through the trip.
Although the tyres are due for a change and have become noisy and rough surfaces, the grip is still good when braking hard.
The odo crossed 41k kms when I took it onto the RoRo ferry between Fort Kochi and Vypin. Something to remember.
A famous temple and the Matancharry Palace share the same compound at Fort Kochi. These elephants were parading from one temple to another.
Pictures taken from the ferry ride.
41k kms hit on the ferry!
A family friendly toddy shop in south Ernakulam. Must visit.
A stop over at Thrissur on the return leg of the trip.
The puncture I got just before Thoppur and thankfully before dark. The tyre shop didn't have a matching wheel spanner and it kept slipping on the bolts when the power tool was used. Thankfully I had the stock wheel spanner which hadn't been touched since the car was purchased.