[hvkumar]

Originally Posted by issigonis

hv,

I have two queries ( slightly off topic) :

1. Is it possible to do Bombay-Delhi using the GQ route in nineteen (19) hours, driving non-stop except for fuel stops?

2. Is it possible to do Bombay-Surat on the NH8 in two (2) hours, non-stop?

The steed is a Logan.

Regards

I have done Bombay-Delhi in 17 hours leaving Bombay at 3 am. You can do it in 19 hours, now that the entire route is complete.

Bombay-Surat is 280 kms, impossible to do it 2 hours. My best time is 3.40 hrs. The sector is very high-traffic and nowhere close to expressway standards. You can do those speeds only in the Baroda-Ahmedabad expressway (87 kms toll gate to gate, where my friend just took 29 minutes yesterday!)

[Akadian]

Dear Kumar,

I wonder if Bombay - Surat can not be done in less than 3 hours at around midnight. Say start from Bombay at around 12 midnight and reach Surat by quarter to three. It is just a guess and I'm not saying that I've done anything like that myself. I second your opinion that Bombay - Delhi can definitely be done in 17 hours starting from Bombay at 3 am

Regards

[hvkumar]

No, Akadian, Bombay-Surat is high-density traffic and even with a car travelling at steady 120 kmph speeds (impossible) it will be very difficult to reach Surat in 3 hours. Traffic is especially high at midnight since the trucks clear octroi posts in Thane around that time and there is more traffic at that time. In any case, there is no slack time for truck traffic in this road, although in day time the car traffic is also something to contend with.

The Ghodbunder-Manor section is the slowest in speeds and the Virar toll gate can take upto 10-20 minutes to clear (it is one of the most incompetent toll gates I have ever seen). Only after clearing Manor, traffic eases up a bit, and you can drive very high speeds after Valsad.

[Akadian]

Ah! I see. That clears up the picture, then. I was imagining that around midnight one could get a free pass on the heavy traffic. But the way you explain it, I understand now perfectly.

[issigonis]

Originally Posted by Akadian

Dear Kumar,

I wonder if Bombay - Surat can not be done in less than 3 hours at around midnight. Say start from Bombay at around 12 midnight and reach Surat by quarter to three. It is just a guess and I'm not saying that I've done anything like that myself. I second your opinion that Bombay - Delhi can definitely be done in 17 hours starting from Bombay at 3 am

Regards

No, Akadian, Bombay-Surat is high-density traffic and even with a car travelling at steady 120 kmph speeds (impossible) it will be very difficult to reach Surat in 3 hours. Traffic is especially high at midnight since the trucks clear octroi posts in Thane around that time and there is more traffic at that time. In any case, there is no slack time for truck traffic in this road, although in day time the car traffic is also something to contend with.

The Ghodbunder-Manor section is the slowest in speeds and the Virar toll gate can take upto 10-20 minutes to clear (it is one of the most incompetent toll gates I have ever seen). Only after clearing Manor, traffic eases up a bit, and you can drive very high speeds after Valsad.
__________________
Kumar

Methinks
1. Bombay - Surat, distance 280-300kms can be comfortable done in four-and-a half hours; with spirited driving it can be done in a shade below four hours.

2. Bombay - Delhi ( distance please?) can be done comfortably in say twenty hours, driving non-stop, except pit stops for fuel and toilet.

A major factor seems to be the time that one starts at.

Hypothetical query : If I start at 7 am in the morning from Bombay, will I be able to reach Delhi ( Palam airport) at 3 am the following day?

Regards

[hvkumar]

I do the Thane-Surat section (260 kms) in 3.40 hrs, starting at 3 am. This is despite the high-traffic conditions and the delays at the Virar toll gate.

Bombay-Delhi (1,450 kms) is a fast 17 hours (no-break non-stop drive, except refuelling), and you can do it in 20-21 hours even with halts.

Starting off early (in my case 3 am) from Bombay is the best way you can do this fast drive since you can clear A'Bad by 930-100 am before the rest of the world wakes up. After A'bad, it is a clean drive till you reach the outskirts of Jaipur in evening peak hour.

Starting off at 7 am may delay the drive by 1-2 hours.

[black_panther]

Originally Posted by hvkumar

Except for some bad sections in Bhognipur-Jhansi and some incomplete roads in Shivpuri-Kota section, the route is super-fast.

Shivpuri-Kota is complete except for a couple of incomplete bridges.
Only the Kota bypass is incomplete. It will be hardly 20km in and out of Kota.

The roads are desolate and this should be an effortless driving.

[hvkumar]

You can check out the Lucknow-Kanpur-Jhansi-Shivpuri-Kota-Udaipur route in the following link

NORTH EAST 2009 - hvkumar | Google Groups
Speeds I managed:

Kanpur-Jhansi, 225 kms, 4 hours
Jhansi-Shivpuri, 88 kms, 1.15 hrs
Shivpuri-Kota, 240 kms, 3 hrs
KOta-Chittorgarh, 160 kms, 1.45 hrs
Chittorgarh-Udaipur, 120 kms, 1.25 hrs

[gvasant]

Dear hvkumar
Thank you for all the pains you took in giving the details of the journey. As I was out of station and didn't have access to the net I couldn't reply.
After all these suggestions from you and all in the forum, I finally feel that I take the Lucknow-Agra-Jaipur-Udaipur-Ahmedabad-Vadodara-Mumbai route. This is not much more than the Jhansi riute and also I would get expressways almost on the entire route. How is the Agra-Jaipur road (230 km.)? It is definitely a NH, but not part of the expressways. Since we drive regularly upto Agra from Lucknow, it takes us about 5 hours to reach there. Do you feel that we would be able to make it to Vadodara by late night if we start from Lucknow early in the morning??

IInd question : On my way back I need to come Via Hyderabad & Nagpur.
As I would be in Mangalore (that's where I have to go from Mumbai), would it be advisable to go to Bangalore and take the NS corridor, or some other way??
Pl guide
Regards

[hvkumar]

NH11 between Agra and Jaipur is a decent highway, but please avoid it after dark. You should take 4 hours for this stretch. You need not enter Jaipur city, you can directly reach NH8 after Jaipur towards Kishangarh/Udaipur.

Reaching Baroda looks a very aggressive plan, but let us pace the drive:
- Lucknow-Agra, 5 hrs
- Agra-Jaipur, 5 hours (including some time lost in navigating Agra, breaks)
- Jaipur-Udaipur (via Bhilwara), 5 hrs
- Udaipur-Ahmedabad (via SP Ring Road), 4.30 hrs
- Ahmedabad-Baroda, 1 hr

Yes, from Managlore, take NH48 to Nelamanagala (before Bangalore), take short cut to Dodballapur to join Nh7 and take NH7 all teh way via Hyderabad to Nagpur. From Nagpur, you have 3 choices - the first on NS corridor via Seoni, Laknadon, Sagar and Lalitpur to Lucknow, the second via Betul, Bhopal, Bhind to Lucknow and the third via Katni, Jabalpur, Kajuraho, Jhansi to Lucknow (or even via Rewa and Mirazapur to Lucknow via Allahabad)

[gvasant]

Thanks a lot for the guidance.
Your'e right. This is indeed an aggressive and probably too ambitious a plan. I thought as I have done Lucknow-Delhi-Lucknow in a day, starting early morning and back by late night, that too on NH-24 (No expressways).
The timings you have given are also correct, specially because I would be having my family (parents and wife) along, hence breaks are necesary.
Do you have the latest update of the Kanpur-Jhansi-Kota section??
This, as you told earlier is shorter.
ALso, thanks for helping me out on the Mangalore-Bangalore section.
Sorry for all the trouble.
Regards
Gunjan

[hvkumar]

Originally Posted by gvasant

Do you have the latest update of the Kanpur-Jhansi-Kota section??

One of our friends had reported that the NH25 to Jhansi remains as bad as it was when I went by in April. Road widening work is still on, but the road conditions are not bad and you can maintain decent pace. I myself left Kanpur at 4 am, left NH2 for NH25 at 5 am and reached Jhansi at 830 am, a drive of 235 kms in 4.30 hours which is very fast.

From Jhansi, the road is very fast and I reached Kota at 1 pm and Udaipur at 5 pm, but this was extremely fast, no-break driving which you may not be able to do because of the family. Nevertheless, I thin k you can reach either Kota or Chittorgarh for a night's stay.

[gvasant]

Thank you. This has made my travel plan extremely easy.

[LongDrive lover]

Hi Gunjan,

I am just back from a trip to Udaipur and Mt. Abu. On return, I checked this thread to suggest you to take a little longer but much faster route. And, not surprised that here already you have planned for that route. No second opinion is required on what Guru like HVK suggests for any highway of this country. The timings suggested above are perfect. I too traveled with my family, and took exactly the same time in our Safari: Lucknow - Jaipur 10 hrs. including brakes. Agra-Jaipur too is a superb 4 lane highway now.

As HVK suggested, dont enter into Jaipur city while going from Agra. Look for signage for Ajmer/ Udaipur when you are nearing Jaipur. That bypass on NH 11 will take you to the end of city and meet the Jaipur-Delhi bypass (NH8) on the Ajmer/ Udaipur side. As we have to stay in Jaipur for that night, we made the mistake of entering the city, and paid a heavy price of negotiating bumper-to-bumper city traffic. Even if one has to enter the city, it is better to take the bypass and enter later into city from entry points from the bypass.

Jaipur to Udaipur (next day), we traveled liesurly with a long break at Chittorgarh for visiting Fort. In my opinion, with parents, Udaipur could be a reasonable target for night halt as that itself will be 1000 kms run. Pushing beyond that, though possible with very aggresive driving, would be stressful for family. You may be a better judge, though.

[black_panther]

Originally Posted by hvkumar

One of our friends had reported that the NH25 to Jhansi remains as bad as it was when I went by in April. Road widening work is still on, but the road conditions are not bad and you can maintain decent pace. I myself left Kanpur at 4 am, left NH2 for NH25 at 5 am and reached Jhansi at 830 am, a drive of 235 kms in 4.30 hours which is very fast.

From Jhansi, the road is very fast and I reached Kota at 1 pm and Udaipur at 5 pm, but this was extremely fast, no-break driving which you may not be able to do because of the family. Nevertheless, I thin k you can reach either Kota or Chittorgarh for a night's stay.

You can cover Kanpur-Jhansi in 4.5 hours at decent speeds. I was driving between 9:30 and 2:00 PM, therefore faced a lot of crowd crossing the local markets as most small towns/villages do not have a bypass. In the early morning or late afternoon, this stretch should be faster.

After crossing Jhansi, you can easily pull upto Udaipur. There are no decent stops after Kota. Just after crossing the Chittor bypass, there are Petrol Pumps with decent facilities.

If you are planning a night halt before Udaipur, I would suggest Kota instead of Chittorgarh, as the latter has a bypass.

RTDC Hotel Chambal in Kota has decent facilities.