[ilbkrishna]

Lolzzz... Close the road for a year and keep it open for 5 years!!

Shiradi and its never ending woes... Its a pain to think about the stupid yellow boards ramming down the ghats of Charmadi!! Last time around narrowly missed losing my life when an overloaded Tata Sumo couldn't get off my way. This inspite of me stopping my vehicle on looking at him coming my way..

In any case, this would be a good chance to explore all available options to drive back to Mangalore..

Mod Note: Smiley usage is restricted to two per post on Team-BHP. Please do NOT use more than 2 smileys in a post.

[prashkul]

Originally Posted by ampere

If you are heading to Kukke first then, Hassan-Shiradi-Gundya-Kukke. Good roads all the way. Esp Gudya-Kukke is brilliant.

Kukke-Dharmasthala : Kukke Gundya-Nelyadi-Dharmasthala.

You can return via the same route. Its good.

Kukke has a new hotel, which I just saw at the Bisle side of the entrance (I think it was comfort Inn). You can take a look.

Thanks Ampere.

Did the trip last weekend, but only to Kukke. Took Hassan-Shiradi-Gundya-Kukke. Good roads all the way. I was surprised by the road conditions in Shiradi ghat - better than Mar-2013. Gundya-Kukke: New road for the most part, fun to drive.

We stayed at SLR Residency. Took AC room at about 1850 for 3 persons - good hotel.

[ampere]

Originally Posted by prashkul

We stayed at SLR Residency. Took AC room at about 1850 for 3 persons - good hotel.

I think I remember seeing this hotel beyond the temple, on the way towards Guthigaru/Jalsoor. I remember seeing a new hotel coming up just at the entrance to Kukke.

[prashkul]

Originally Posted by ampere

I think I remember seeing this hotel beyond the temple, on the way towards Guthigaru/Jalsoor. I remember seeing a new hotel coming up just at the entrance to Kukke.

I think the new hotel you are referring to is Vijay Comforts. This is before SLR Residency, and comes first after the river bathing facility. SLR is further down from Vijay Comforts, but before the temple itself.

[paragsachania]

Date: 6-July 2014
Onward Route: Belur-Mudigere Hand Post-Kottigehara-Kalasa-Kuduremukha-SK Border-Bajagoli-Karkala
Road conditions: Bangalore-Hassan:

• Rumblers now around 10kms after the First toll on Bangalore-Mangalore Highway. Be wary wherever you see a flashing orange lamp on the median. There could be a ribbon floating around the area after that newly inaugurated breaker!
• Hirisave 4 lane work is still under progress and utterly shabby markings that can cause accidents if driving at night with road suddenly becoming single lane.
• Shantigrama remains 2 lane and one needs to be careful when the road becomes 4 lane where the median starts. It’s on a curve with an incline.
• Belur-Hassan as always has the speedbreakers (mentioned earlier): Set of 4 pairs starting from the moment you get into the Belur road till you drive another 20 kms from here at various locations. However, each of these are marked well, so you better pay attention to road signs.
• Belur-Mudigere – Excellent roads
• Mudigere-Kottigehara – Excellent roads
• Kottigehara-Javalai-Kalasa- New Surface after Javali and that makes it good roads all the way till Kalasa
• Kalasa-Kuduremukha-Bajagoli-Karkala – Super good roads with Kalasa-Kuduremukha-SK Border getting a new layer

So, the whole stretch from Bangalore to Karkala via Kalasa and Kuduremukha has zero bad patches!

Date: 7-July 2014
Return Route: Karkala-Bajagoli-Naravi-Guruvayanakere-Belthangady-Ujire-Charmadi-Mudigere Handpost-Belur-Hassan-Bangalore
Road conditions:

• Barring only very small patches after Naravi before Guruvayanakere, this was all good till Ujire. The bad road reported is not really that bad to make you think of an alternate route. Its only a very small percentage
• From Ujire all the way to Kottigehara via Charmadi is bliss. Excellent roads all the way

And now, let the pictures do the talking:

Belur-Mudigere-Kottigehara:

Kottigehara-Kalasa-Kudiremukha:

Charmadi Ghats at 4PM:

[JMaruru]

There is a mention of express train between b'lore - m'lore in this year's rail budget. I hope, it would have better journey timing than the current train.

[guyfrmblr]

A word of caution for those who are travelling towards Kukke Subramanya. All the roads towards Kukke are blocked due to the flooding of Kumaradhara river over the bridges. The only road which is accessible is Sullia - Guttigaru - Kukke. But the conditions are not favourable here too. Have a look at the pic below shared by my cousin. There was more than knee length pool of water on Sullia - Kukke road and some Bangalore registered vehicles tried negotiating it even after warnings given by locals . Many Bangalore registered cars got stalled according to my cousin. The pic was taken after pushing the car out of the pool. The water level was very deep at the centre of the pool.

[mvp]

Originally Posted by guyfrmblr

A word of caution for those who are travelling towards Kukke Subramanya. All the roads towards Kukke are blocked due to the flooding of Kumaradhara river over the bridges. The only road which is accessible is Sullia - Guttigaru - Kukke. But the conditions are not favourable here too. Have a look at the pic below shared by my cousin. There was more than knee length pool of water on Sullia - Kukke road and some Bangalore registered vehicles tried negotiating it even after warnings given by locals . Many Bangalore registered cars got stalled according to my cousin. The pic was taken after pushing the car out of the pool. The water level was very deep at the centre of the pool.

Attachment 1261277

I am rather sorry to post this update late.

I started from Vidyaranyapura at 5:30 on 12th July and reached Subramanya at 10:30 Hrs, with multiple breaks for 60 minutes. Route taken was via Sakleshpur and Gundya. It was raining intermittently from Hassan and the roads from Sakleshpur to Gundya was in good condition. Needless to say, the road from Gundya to Subramanya was in excellent condition. Had darshan at 12:30 and retuned back to the Hotel.

Heavy rains started around 4 PM on 12th July for about 90 minutes. We decided to experience the "Rainfall + River" combination and headed to River Kumara Dhara (bathing ghat complex). It was an excellent experience of strolling around for about 20 minutes, with large umbrellas purchased from Sakleshpur. The river level was rising fast and we were wondering if the river would overflow soon.

We left Kumara Dhara and after freshing up, had a good "mangalarathi darshan" at 7:30 PM. Special darshan tickets are available at Rs 100/ each and the gate opens at 6:30 PM. The gate closes at 7 PM and opens again after 7:30 PM. We entered at 6:30 PM and no sooner you enter the temple, you can see two platforms on either side. We climbed up the platform and settled down to have a good view of the mangalarathi (If you dont seat yourself on the platform, you have no option to but to exit out immediately) The temple elephant comes in and bells the large bell at the entrance of the temple. We retuned back to the Hotel at 9 PM and continued to wonder about the rising level of Kumara Dhara.

It started raining heavily from 10pm onwards and continued for the whole night and upto about 6AM in the morning. Light rains continued further.

My wife completed 'angapradhaksha" at 5AM in the morning and we had the first darshan at 6:30 in the morning.

We left the Hotel at 7:30 on 13th July and were not really surpirsed to find the river overflowing at the bridge on Gundya road. Somebody suggested that we try the Puttur road and after traveling for about 10 Kms came to know from a driver coming in the opposite direction that the river is overflowing on this route too.

The last option was via Sullia- Madkeri - Mysore and we started off from Subramanya at 8:50 AM. Before we could hit Sullia, we were taken aback to see the rainwater overflowing into the roads. A jeep and min-bus could pass through (from what we could see but not sure if they could really cross). We had no chance to even consider a risk in our Swift Dzire. We were then guided into the interior roads and the water level here was quite close close to the road level. We were luckly enough to pass through in time it is most probable that this road would also have been blocked a little later. We reached the Madkeri road bypassing Sullia and reached Madkeri around 11 and furthe Mysore ring road at 1PM.

However, it turned out to be a very nice drive during monsoon amongst the thick rainforests, enroute. We have taken several photographs and yet to download them.

We stayed at Hotel Sheshanag Ashraya. The rooms have been renovated (since my last visit) and meets city standards and is well maintained. The tariff for AC room Rs 1800/-. Although there could be few more such options, the advantage is you can walk down to the temple in few minutes and no hassles for parking the car near the temple complex. I saw a new Hotel by name Vijay Comforts and from the exterior look, it appeared to be the premium Hotel at Subramanya. But, it is situated around 1KM away from the temple.

[guyfrmblr]

Originally Posted by mvp

The last option was via Sullia- Madkeri - Mysore and we started off from Subramanya at 8:50 AM. Before we could hit Sullia, we were taken aback to see the rainwater overflowing into the roads. A jeep and min-bus could pass through (from what we could see but not sure if they could really cross). We had no chance to even consider a risk in our Swift Dzire. We were then guided into the interior roads and the water level here was quite close close to the road level. We were luckly enough to pass through in time it is most probable that this road would also have been blocked a little later. We reached the Madkeri road bypassing Sullia and reached Madkeri around 11 and furthe Mysore ring road at 1PM.

The place where you took the diversion into interior narrow road is called Kandadka and you would have reached Sullia - Madikeri SH by driving through a place called Ubbaradka. They laid concrete on that stretch but they couldn't build proper drainage system due to the adjacent estate owner refusing to share the land for building gutter. One can see a large pool of water at that place whenever it rains. According to my cousin, the Tahsildar came later and asked owner to allow Government to build a temporary gutter for the rain water to flow.

[rajshenoy]

I am hearing that shiradi has become pretty messy. Is that true ? I will be travelling during independence day weekend. Charmadi looks much better but I will be having an infant with me. So shiradi route will be better in terms of frequent breaks

Confused !!

[Samurai]

Yes, I took the Shiradi ghat 3 days back. It has got bad pretty fast, and it is still July. There are some really big craters. I dropped one wheel into a crater and was amazed to find it to be at least 7-8 inch deep. Thankfully I have big SUV tyres, so I roll out of it easily.

It is not so bad as to need to avoid it. Just watch out for bad stretches and craters. Night driving is a bad idea since you won't see the pot holes easily.

[rajshenoy]

Originally Posted by Samurai

Yes, I took the Shiradi ghat 3 days back. It has got bad pretty fast, and it is still July. There are some really big craters. I dropped one wheel into a crater and was amazed to find it to be at least 7-8 inch deep. Thankfully I have big SUV tyres, so I roll out of it easily.

It is not so bad as to need to avoid it. Just watch out for bad stretches and craters. Night driving is a bad idea since you won't see the pot holes easily.

So looks like if its not raining and roads are dry One can manage. How long is the bad stretch ? The above pics on the alternate road looks mouth watering

If rest of the route is good, i might still want to go via Shiradi.

[Samurai]

Very small stretches of bad roads. Not worth avoiding Shiradi for now.

[ilbkrishna]

Hi,

Traveled the shiradi on the 18th. Roads are degrading by the hour. Saw the mortar giving up when the lorry ahead of me had to brake hard thanks to a yellow board cab stopping to watch a water fall.
All in all, my two cents is that we would be looking at tyre gobbling potholes anytime by the start of August. Be supremely cautious if you are travelling uphill since most of the roads are wearing off here first.

Shall be travelling most likely again next week. Shall keep you posted.
Cheers.

[blue_pulsar]

Guys had a question on Kudremukh. I know this is probably not the right thread to post a question on Kudremukh, but the folks among you active on this thread definitely have the information I need

Last time I visited Kudremukh, July 2013, we were given a passage time of 1:30 by forest department to pass Kudremukh. We overshot that time and had to pay fine. Is there a way to extend this time at the entrance itself? I just want to do photography of the mountain range. Within 1:30, getting good photographs is not possible.

Thanks in advance!!