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One can safely take the salem route now, and avoid the bhavani route. Work has progressed well and apart from few small stretches one can have peaceful highway drive.

Since I did not get any replies before I started, I decided to take the Salem route and regretted it later.

Bhavani-Salem stretch is pretty bad with a very short distance of the road completed and rest all bad and dusty roads with umpteen number of diversions.

Salem-Thoppur stretch is good towards Thoppur. Good part of this stretch is completed, but 20-30 kms still bad and under work in progress.

So, I would suggest to avoid Bhavani-Salem-Thoppur leg for some more time.

Regards
Rex

Hows the condition of the Bhavani - Coimbatore stretch now? Is it good?

Which car was this, my family who took the Crv and colleague in a City said road is much better and easier compared to Mettur route. Crv was doing some crazy timings and speed also. Am talking about taking Thoppur - Salem - Bhavani through the NH

Am confused now, since i have to drive down month end in my swift :Frustrati

Bhavani-Coimbatore stretch is pretty much done. No significant issues here.

Regards
Rex

We were on an 1.6L Accent.

You can manage Thoppur-Salem since a good part of it is done. But, it would be a strict 'no' for me regarding 'Salem-Bhavani' leg.

Regards
Rex

Any good restaurants with clean toilets along this route between Bhavani and avinashi?

There is one "fake" Saravana Bhavan in Bhavani. I had to go there since we couldn't find any other decent ones...

Driving down to Alleppey tonight. Will be taking Hosur - Salem - Coimbatore - Cochin route. Anything I should watch out for?

Roads are BEAUTIFUL! Since the 4 laning is almost complete at a lot of places, you can do some good speeds, but watch out for crazy morons on the wrong side of the road. I suppose you wont click very high speeds since you'd be on a night drive.

Thanks Benny. Will keep an eye out for the crazies. Well, even at day times I don't do high speeds!!!

hey update the condition please, will be driving down to cochin this weekend ;)

Went to trissur last weekend. I took the mettur-bhavani route. The four laning is almost complete for some 40 odd kms after bhavani towards coimbatore. After that its back to the same old 2 lane road. Even i was dissapointed, as after reading the reviews, was thinking 4 laning is complete till coimbatore.

For breakfast, i found some decent hotels in Mettur. Take the mettur by-pass, cross the bridge and you reach a circle. Left goes to bhavani. Take the right..go 1 km towards mettur and you find some decent hotels on the left. These are definitely a lot better than the "Saravana bhavan" at bhavani.


Four laning is in progress from trissur to chalakudy ( didnt go beyond that ) and be prepared for diversions/flyover constructions all over.

Drove to athirampilly last week.The four lining from Thrissur to Chalakudy is only 60% complete.It is still at places where fly overs and bridges need to be constructed.High speeds are not recomended since there are many 4 lane to 2 lane transitions, and road diversions(at kodakara).Generally the roads are good, but since the monsoon has set in , the conditions might get worse.

John

Started at 610am from Silk board and with 10 min traffic pile at krishnagiri reached Salem at 845am. Road surface excellent, thoppur has been redone but with zillion speedbreakers while descending, saw 2 trucks who had jumped tracks and gone on to the opposite lane at about 3/4th mark of the ghat. Truck on the back looked badly bashed and driver cabin completely smashed up. Don't know if it's the bump, rain or the rash driving which caused this.

After 30mts break in Salem proceeded to Bhavani, road is not that great and diversions galore for about 20 kms. But all this is forgotten once past Bhavani, you can zoom till avinashi. Be very careful since local drivers are maniac and can give you nervewracking experience with opposite lane driving and lane cutting without a thought.

Road surface is excellent till Palghat and I arrived at 1245pm with under 6 hours drive.

310 pm Palghat to trichur road surface is good buy very notorious for accidents, trichur bypass 70% completed. Proceed to chalakudy and with 4 laning and diversions, drive is slow. Reached alwaye after 2.5 hours drive in peak traffic.

Old 4 laning after angamally seem so narrow and is as good as driving in ORR in Blr.

Tamilnadu is making big leaps with road infrastructure while karnataka and Kerala is chugging around close to idle. Towns like Dharmapuri, Perundurai and many other smaller villages have all been moved from the busy NH but with good connectivity/exits.