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3 hrs for somearound 162 I would say is pretty decent road conditions. So walayar to Mannuthy is a 2 lane is it?

Any notable eateries on this section?

Yes, Walayar-Mannuthy is 2 lane

Eateries :
(1) Oottupura at Walayar. Heard it is good. Non-veg
(2) Malabar Restaurant, Near Kanjikkode : Nice, with good sea food options
(3) Sre Aryas at the T junction just before Palakkad where the road turns to the left towards Trissur : Veg, Typical Tamilnadu vegetarian food. Very Good
(4) Aryas : Wadakkanchery - Very good like Sre Aryas
(5) A non-veg restaurant adjacent to Aryas, Forgot the name. No idea about quality

Wouldn't recommend any other eateries in this section - Have tried almost all

In addition to above, since you are going to somewhere near airport, check a restaurant (Malabar) at NH47-Airport road jn itself. Its a 24 hrs restaurant and they serve good hot food.

I was thinking of the Walayar - Mannuthy stretch. On the Mannuthy-Airport road, the another good option would be Hotel Adithi at Angamaly, near the new KSRTC Complex, if you prefer Kerala style food, espl Appam/Egg curry/Veg Stew :)

The Aryaas, a few miles after the toll (on the RH side) is surprisingly lousy

Folks - Need some route/road conditions help. This is for a friend who plans to travel to Sultan Bathery (from Bangalore) for a day and then to Guruvayoor.

From my quick reading of older posts I think the route is:
Sultan Bathery->Gudalur->Nilambur->Manjeri->Malappuram->Kottakkal->Kuttippuram->Edappal->Kunnamkulam->Guruvayur

Do let me know if there are better options as well as road conditions.

Another alternative can be Sultan Bathery-> Panthalur -> Nilambur and the route that you have mentioned.

I don't have the report on latest condition of the road.

Sultan Bathery->Kalpetta->Thamarassery->Calicut->Kottakkal->Guruvayur is the best route for now.

Avoid Sultan Bathery->Gudalur->Nilambur route for a few days as there are lots of fallen trees in the ghat section almost daily that effectively make the road single-laned in some of the (blind) curves. Also, some fencing work is happening before the monsoon starts to prevent some boulders rolling down and also repairing the side-walls which were damaged in the last season.

EDIT: Saw the above news in last week Mathrubhumi newspaper. In any case, NH-212+Calicut Bye-pass+NH-17+SH-69 is the fastest and smoothest option as of today.

Above is probably the best route as of now. But with the opening of the Chamravattam bridge a new route has opened up from Calicut side. This is Calicut-Feroke-Parappanangadi-Tirur-Chamravattam-Ponnani-Chavakkad-Guruvayoor. Road conditions are very good and much less traffic compared to the NH17 route. Apparently this route is 40km less than the NH route.

On the downside, the roads are relatively narrower and I have not seen any first hand report of anyone taking this route and any potential savings.

Feroke-Parappanangadi is to be avoided as it is too narrow and fully damaged in many stretches. Rest of the section should be good as per what I have seen in January/February this year. Obviously, I have not taken Chamravattam-Ponnani part then but the rest of it when I went to Tirur and then Guruvayur (via Tirunnavaya->Kuttippuram).

Alternative route reported to be in very good condition would be Ramanattukara(southern end of Calicut bye-pass)->Right turn just before Calicut University->Olipramkadavu Bridge->Tirur->Ponnani. This way, you can combine the advantages of maximum driving on Calicut bye-pass and also the new Chamravattam bridge.

Both the routes from Feroke to Parappanagadi (The narrow one that starts from the old Feroke bridge via Chaliyam-Kadalundi as well as the one from the side of the bus stand via Vallikunnu) are in good condition now. I took these route last week in my Tirur Calicut drives. The Feroke-Chaliyam stretch has been relaid completely and is very good now. Of course very narrow

I too will second ajithbr, through Ponnani will be the best option. Roads are good through all routes mentioned in other posts. However Ponnani route has comparatively lesser traffic

Even though news reports say the Chamravattom bridge saves about 30 kms, the actual reduction in distance seems to be only about 10 kms or so as per Google Maps. Considering that there's a level crossing on the road connecting Calicut University and the Tirur-Kadalundi road, and the fact that you have to pass through a quite a few towns (Parappanangadi, Tanur, Tirur, Ponnani), do you think there would be significant savings in terms of time ?

I have felt that volume of traffic is lesser in this route compared to Valanchery route. It took me 3hrs 40 mins to reach Guruvayoor from Calicut on a Saturday evening drive in Valanchery -Kunnamkulam route. My friend who stared around the same time through Ponnai route took some half hour less.

Frankly No, I dont think there will be any savings in time. I have taken all available routes between Calicut and Tirur multiple times. The NH route takes me 1 hr 15 min from Meenchanda mini byepass to Tirur. The Feroke-Kadalundi-Parppanangadi -Tirur, Feroke-Vallikunnu-Parappanagadi-Tirur, Univ-Parappanangadi-Tirur, Chelari-Parappangandi- Tirur all take exactly the same time even though these routes are 10-12 km shorter. So I would expect the same scenario between Tirur and Guruvayoor also.

The benefit I have observed is lesser traffic which means a less stressful drive (especially during peak hours). So these alternative routes can be taken if you are looking to avoid the heavy NH traffic (especially if you are travelling during evening to night time).

Note: If you go via Feroke-Chaliyam-Kadalundi then there is no railway gate since you cross the railway track at Feroke itself (By going below the track after the Feroke old bridge). There is one gate between Tanur and Tirur
where overbridge work is happening.

Note2: Read in the paper that the charge for the new KSRTC services from Kozhikode-Guruvayoor via Tirur-Chamravattam is Rs53 while the standard route is Rs70+ . So I assume there should be 20-30 km difference in distance.

We did a Chemmad (5.5kms to the east of Parappanangadi) - Aluva trip through the newly opened Chamravattom Bridge two days back. We started from home at ~05:30 and could do this stretch in 2 hours and 30 odd mins. For the return trip we took 3 hours and 40 odd mins as we could start from Aluva at ~16:00. The traffic was pretty dense and there were few traffic block at Pookkayil Junction(thanks to the ego-clash between the some idiotic drivers) and Ponnani Junction

• The Railway Over-Bridge on Tirur - Kadalundi Road is temporarily closed for repairs. For this reason, one needs to take a right turn at Moolakkal and take a relatively smaller and curvy road. There are proper signboards on the way, thankfully. This road will join with the Tirur - Kadalundi Road at Pookkayil Junction
  
• The toll collection is yet to start on Chamravattom Bridge
  
• There are no toll collections on the route (including the NH)
  
• The bridge is very crowded as it's a newly opened one and majority of the drivers cruise on the bridge as if they've come here to enjoy the beauty of the bridge and the river. There are many ice-cream vendors (the auto-rickshaw walaahs) on either side of the bridge, by the way. :D
  
• The Ponnani Junction was pretty much crowded and there were 4-5 policemen at the junction

We could see a reduction of only 20 odd kms (may be because we had to take an alternate route at Moolakkal Junction) compared to the route we usually take. Though we saved some time, I must add that we usually take more or less the same time irrespective of whatever route we take. The positives of taking Chamravattom Road is that there are no tolls (a saving of Rs 85) and lesser traffic. Adding to that one can drive at 71kmph in this stretch without getting caught by speed cams/guns. *evil grin*

My guess is that once toll collection begins, the traffic density in this stretch will become low.

You could have better bypassed the Valanchery & Kunnamkulam towns thereby saving some good amount of time during the peaks. :thumbs up