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Trip to Mahakumbh 2025 in my XUV700: The experience & key trip pointers

10th February 2025, 10:06 by Deepankar Sadekar

Try to reach Prayagraj by 5AM, this will help in getting an easy parking spot and a boat to the Sangam.

BHPian speedmiester recently shared this with other enthusiasts:

My friends and I completed our Kumbh travel this week. We decided to drive down as this was the best option given we had a limited time window.

Opted for the XUV700 for this over my iX1 in the interest of time. We didn’t book any hotels prior to the travel.

We left Bangalore at 9:45PM on 2nd Feb and plan was to drive to Prayagraj without stopping. Since all of us can drive, this turned out to be easier. We could see a lot of cars/vehicles driving to Prayagraj from multiple states on the way.

We booked a hotel in Rewa for a quick nap and to freshen up on the way, reached this hotel at 10:30PM on 3rd Feb. Settled down for a 2hr nap and we got up at 1AM, freshened up and left for Prayagraj at 2:30AM on 4th Feb.

Rewa to Prayagraj is about 127kms and we covered the distance in couple of hours. We reached the parking lot at Arail Ghat by 4:40AM. Luckily there was no fog and little or no traffic on the road helped.

We reached the boating point at Arail Ghat at 5AM and booked a boat just for the three of us. The authorities were restricting the boats from leaving the ghat before 5:30AM. We reached the Sangam platform at approximately 6AM, we completed our Snan in 30minutes and we were back to our car by 7AM.

Since we had a lot of time at hand, decided to visit the temples on the other side, which turned out to be a wrong decision. We decided not to take the car to the other side and rely on ericks and bikes.

The temples were closed for the day as Bhutan’s King was visiting along with UP CM. We decided to return back on foot, but some of the Pontoon bridges were closed and we had to walk a lot in scorching heat to reach our car. We left Prayagraj by 12:45PM and reached Rewa at 4PM. Booked a room in Rewa for a well-deserved sleep and rest.

We left Rewa at 7:30AM on 5th Feb and on the way visited Bhedaghat Waterfall, which was recommended by my colleague. We stopped over at a small resort at 9PM right on the Maharastra-Telangana Border.

Final day, we started the drive back to Bangalore at 4:30AM and reached Hyderabad by 8AM. Since we had a bit of time, visited the Statue of Equality which is close to Bangalore-Hyderabad highway. Started for Bangalore at 12Noon and reached back home at 9:55PM. The last 50Kms from Airport to my home took over 2.5hours.

Total distance travelled is 3550.6Kms in under 50hours of driving time.

Few pointers

Try to reach Prayagraj by 5AM, this will help in getting an easy parking spot and a boat to the Sangam. We had a clear run to the parking lot with no restrictions.
At Kumbh, situation can be very fluid, and restrictions can be placed at any time. We were lucky to get a boat to the Sangam, this got closed by 8AM for VIP movement.
I would highly recommend to just restrict the visit for Snan at Sangam and return. The temples will still be there and can be visited anytime when the crowds are lower, but the auspicious Maha Kumbh Mela will not come again in our lifetime.
Be ready to walk long distance if planning to explore
The road conditions are very good for more than 98% of the distance. Any car can do the distance if it’s in good nick. I could see all types of cars right from humble Alto to the mighty Fortuners on the road to Prayagraj.
Keep an eye out for wrong side driving post Nagpur, this is rampant in MP and UP. We anticipated this and were very careful around these places.
There are enough restaurants with decent rest rooms on the way.

Har Har Mahadev

The machine for the long drive