Solo ride to Mangalore and Udupi

Solo ride to Namma Kudla (Mangalore) and Udupi

I don't want to start with About section in this blog, as this trip was totally about visiting the temples :) 

So will be explaining about the temples with the blog content itself. 

Well to start with, I always had a dream of travelling to my hometown managlore by bike, but due to many circumstances I was not able give a hit. Finally its a day when I watched the Movie Highway, it inspired me a lot to go on a trip to Managlore,I know there is no proper connection with the movie :P but still it made a difference.

How it Went : 

It was 28th Feb of 2014, I woke up by 4:30 AM did some pushups to attain the fitness for the long drive and then prepared a cup of maggi as the startup breakfast. By 5:30AM I was all set for my long drive, kept my engine for idealing for a couple of minutes and started via outer ringroad, by 6am I was near Gurguntepalya signal, in another 25min I had crossed the nelmaangala junction towards NH75. The visibility was too poor so I couldnt take my bike above 70kmph till 6.45 or so.

@ nelmangala

The National Highway 75(48) is upto the standard and there are absolutely no bumpers or pothhles in this route, you will not find any hotel owners till 7.30am on this highways, I came across many hotel, but I preferred Mayura Hotel which is near to bellur cross, they are quite high on the price list but should try there dosa and

@ Mayura Hotel

crispy vada, meanwhile my bike was taking breath while I was having my breakfast, by 7.45am I was done with breakfast, and sticked with my timesheet to reach the next stop, it was Hassan which was supposed to be the next stop, but I continued my journey around 20km away from Hassan and stopped for a tea break and then I had called up my mother to inform about the current location, she was shocked when I told I am near sakleshpur, and I had a nice lecture since I covered almost 200+ km within 3.5hr, I took a long rest at this place and fueled up the vehicle too. 

This is the place where the actual beauty of western ghats will be reviled, I had predecided that I wont make any urgency for the rest of my drive and wanted to enjoy each bit of beauty of the nature.

near Sakleshpur

Its quite easy to maintain around 60-70kph through this section, but I was riding at 50kmph and reached sakleshpur by 9.45am, after this stop the actual western ghats begins and it continues for another 65km till

NH 48

NH 48

nelyady, the route is truely mesmerizing, for some distance you will be seeing the tea plantation surrounding the NH then the true turns begins, you will come across many hair pin curves which are pretty much steep and sometime becomes difficult to navigate through. I heard that the view would be much more eye poping when visited during rainy season, but going on a bike would become a challenge then, I have read many blogs where brave hearts had done this route during peak monsoon season.

Western Ghats

Well coming back to my journey, I passed major sections of the western ghats stopping as on when required and I felt like I was on top of the world with the beauty around. Well by 11.30 I reached the nellyadi Junction and finished western ghats core section, I took a pit stop and had a badam milk to get rid of exhausting heat and humid range of sea coast, next stop was puttur I zoomed towards uppinangadi and took left devation to puttur which was 12km from here. In another 15min I was in front of the mahalingeshwara temple,

near polali

had a dharshan of the lord shiva and left the place within 15min, the next deviation point was BC Road which was 30km from puttur, I took around 45 min to reach BC road and took deviation towards state-highway 101 to reach my house in Bajpe. In between I had visited two more temple of Polali rajarajeshwari and ganapathi temple of ganjimath.

polali Shanka

After reaching my home, honked in front of the gate, my cousin sister and mother were shocked to see me with my bike :P . There ends my first day of journey.

Day 2:

The day started as normal woke by 6am refreshed and then helped my aunt in preparing morning breakfast and by 10AM after having breakfast I was ready for second day journey, I had visit one of the function at my aunt place so visited the place had lunch there and left towards udupi which was 50km away,

@ padubidri beach

this part of the road is the one which gives the actual experience to ride in the western ghats, these roads are not as wide as national highway but small enough to fit two passing cars and no railing protection too, well I

my bike @ padubidri

managed to reach the place called padubidiri where I was supposed to stay for the night, myslef and my cousin reached there house by 5pm and the first thing we did was dropping at beach, we were adviced not to get drenched in the beach, but I just wanted to see the coast, the beach was less than 1km from house ad I took my bike to the beach too some snaps and waited to see the beautiful sunset over arabian sea. After spending an hour at the beach we returned back to home and ended my second journey of the day.

Day 3 :

Woke up by 7am jumped on the bike to go the beach for the morning bath spent an hour at the beach playing with my cousins and reached home 8.30 got ready to have the breakfast, by 10AM we were supposed to leave to see the shree krishna of udupi,

Udupi Shree Krishna Temple

but due we couldn't make it on time and had to start an hour later, udupi temple was 25km from padubidiri, and zoomed by bike at 100s in NH17, by 11.30 I was at the udupi temple, had dharshan in another 30 min and I had to start to another place called palimar, which was around 45km

Nagargjuna Thermal Plant

I could make it to the place in another 1hr had lunch at the temple of palimar and then I reached home at padubidri, slept for hour, and then started to my mother birth place puttige, which was 30km took 1 hour to reach the place and had dharshan of somanatheswara from here I headed to the house at mangalore which was another 30km from here and reached in another 1hour. Took the break for the day.

Day 4:

The second part of the long solo drive began at morning 6am, I got up 5.30 am refreshed and my aunt had prepared nice crispy paddu for breakfast, she was about to pack to have it on the drive, but I asked her to server at home only and also asked her to pack up :P

Route after crossing nelyadi

 by 6.15am when there was slight sunshine I started my bike, I didnt wanted to start when its dark as it would be risky in ghat section. I reached bangalore-managlore highway in another 30min took some snaps of the morning sunrise.  The next stop was nelyadi, I thought of having a tea, but I wasn't lucky enough to get a tea also even though it was 7.30am. I couldn't stop there for longer time, started towards bangalore, after passing nelyadi

kukke sri Subramanya Temple

Route towards Kukke Sri

 I saw the board of kukke subramanya and thought of visiting the temple which was 25km, took 30min to reach the temple and by 9.30 I had darshan ok lord subramanya, by 9.30 I was out of the temple and without wasting the time I  started towards my destination.

view of Western Ghats

It was by 10am then I felt hungry in middle of nowhere in the deep forest stopped my bike took out the paddus packed and started having the breakfast :P by 12pm I reached hassan took some break to have tea by a nearby shop, I

View of Western Ghats

thought of reaching bangalore by by 2pm if I havent planned kukk, but now its extended, by 1pm I thought of having lunch and stopped at malgudis restaurant it was 1.30 by then and bangalore was still 100km away, I took my vehicle to its max potential and reached nelmangala in another 30min, and as expected the traffic was full as I started toward the city in another 1hr I reached my house just laid down on the floor slept for 3hr :P had a wonderful drive time..

Total Distance

Ride to Hampi Badami Pattadakallu

About Hampi, Badami and Pattadakal

Hampi is an archeological place with more than 500 plus monument in the surroundings. Hampi is located 20km away from hospet town and is around 300km from bangalore. 

Hampi is currently the remains of vijaya nagara dynasty and also the religious center for temples.
Badami is famous for it caves and is located in the district of bagalkot, the caves of this place dates back to 540AD and is the capital of chaulkya dynasty.
Pattadakal is also located in the district of bagalkot and it is 20km away from badami, this place is located near to the malaprabha river, patadakallu encloses 9 temples of which one is jain temple, the panoramic view of the temples are mesmerizing.   

 

Hello folks, I know this is the blog to express the bike riding experience but this time I would like to include my trip to Hampi and Badami which was done with a car, I thought of including this in biketripsfrombangalore blog only because this blog might help bike riders too.  Well lets start with actually content..
This was trip which was planned a week before by Puneeth and he asked other 3 idiot's if we were interested. I would never say no to any trips most of the time, later Ravi and Deepu too joined the plan too. The initial plan was to go by bike., but due to several  circumstances, we had to agree upon with a car.

How It Went

Day 1: 
Route : Bangalore - Chitradurga - Hospet - Hampi (350KM)

It was friday 29, November all four of us had taken relieve from the offical pressure and wanted to enjoy the trip of three days. I got up 4.30am in the morning, got freshen up and started towards Puneeth's place by 5am on my bike, I was kind of depressed to leave my bike at puneeths place but still was looking forward to have a great time with my close buddies, by 5.30am everyone was ready and we started towards the outer ring road and hit AH47.

Sunrise @ AH47

Our first pitstop was somewhere near nelmangala, we pulled our car to side and puneeth opened the car boot to pull out some snacks as I was feeling hungry, and I had the full control of all the snacks, we were chatting remembering all our college day fun and was cruising on the national highway at high speed, it was 6.45am by then, and everyone wanted to go for a pee break, and in mean time sun had just began raising it was an awesome view to see the sun raising over the side of highway :)

Puneeth in middle of AH47

We took some snaps and passed considerable amount of time.

Chitradurga-Hampi

It was 7.15 by then and it was bit late as per the plan, so we started our journey, we passed the fort city and are supposed to take right turn near chitradurga, but we missed the deviation and we proceeded almost 5km ahead. later on turning on the maps we were able to make it up to the route.

The fun drive ends here, we stopped near the chitradurga hampi road for a break and took some snaps of wind mills, later we observed that the single road is full of truck traffice and believe me folks I am noot joking this traffic is as much as our city traffic, we totally drained and depressed thinking about the journey we had to cover for the day almost 130km to reach the destination, as we continued our journey to add to the bad traffic we had to face the bad road too, our Honda City was crying hitting the bumps and I could make out from puneeths face too :( .

Virupaksha Temple

After a painful 4hrs of journey we hit the hospet town, and we navigated to hampi with our navigation system which was just 15km away from hospet, by 12pm we reached hampi and checked into one of the lodge freshened up in few minutes and was ready to roam around. We were in dilemma to decide whether to take rented scooter for ride or our car, we found that car would be find to reach all the place, we got hold of a guide and we agreed to pay him 1000bugs for 6hr guidance,

Ugra Narasimha

Vitthala Temple

we started from Hampi bazzar street and visited some of the famous temples in and around hampi, narasimha temple, lotus pond, shiva temple, monolithic bull and so on and at last the most anticipated place called Vitthala temple, this is the place which had the stone chariot and pillars which can produces different notes of music, this place is to be covered through an electric vehicle as per the norms of the archaeological survey of India to save the architectures. It was 3pm by then and we were hungry and dropped to a nearby hotel to fill up the tummy, after completing our lunch session to moved towards hapi town and we were asked to see the virupaksha temple and our guide finally gave up, he was not the best as he dint stick up to his word of 6hrs, we has with us for less than 4hr and collected his full payment, anyways we didn't want to get into the scene, and we wanted to pass some considerable time at tungabadra river,

Tungabadra River

later we visited virupaksha temple and then started towards the kadlekai temple, from where we had a beautiful view of the virupaksha temple, it was almost 7pm by then, and some security guys had asked us to vacate the place, and we started towards our room, had dinner at one of the German restaurant and ended up at the room.

Day 2 : 
Route : Hampi - Hospet - Kustagi - Katral - Badami - Pattadakal - Aihole - Hunagund - Kushtagi - Hampi (320km)

We started at around 8am in the morning and badami was 150km from hampi, the estimated time to cover was 3hr and we are right on track, we crossed hospet town and hit the national highway 13,

Sunflower field

this would be yet another freeway kind of road, the condition of the NH was too good, and you could see some sunflower plantain by the side of road, we took break point at one of the plantation field for pics and later hit the road again, now the actual fun started,

Capped 180kmph

since the road was clear and straight Puneeth wanted to hit the gas to its max, it was like a drag race effect at the NH, Puneeth could make it upto 188KMPH and later deepu took the turn and he could hit 160KMPH, we crossed kustagi and took left onwards gajendragad which is a single road and we had to maintain decent 80 pace, later near katral we had another right deviation towards badami which was 35km away,

Badami

 in another half an hour we were at badami and we fascinated to see the panoramic view of the Badami caves and its surrounding from the parking spot, we took the ticket and started hiking toward the caves, this cave could be covered within 30min and view from the top of the cave was truly eye popping.

Myself :P

We spent an hour or so at Badami and then started towards pattadakallu, it was almost 12pm by then, and patadakkalu was 20km away, we took more than an hour to reach pattadakallu, thanks to the wonderfully maintained road by our government :P, anyways patadakallu was also equivalently beautiful

Pattadakallu

and seems like the architectures dates back to 800AD, after spending an hour or so at the temple we had lunch at a near by stall and then we decided head toward aihole, the condition of the road towards aihole

Pattadakallu

is one of the worst somehow made it towards aihole and truly speaking we didn't like the place at all, no maintenance nothing at all, we saw the arch sitting inside the car and we decided not to go through aihole, so we started to head back to hampi were we planned to stay for the night.

Towards Kushtagi

We stopped near aminagad and this place sell one of the best karadantu packed some sweet for home and office and we headed back to hampi, we reached hospet by 6pm Deepu noticed a new kannada movie in the nearby theater and asked us to stop over and watch the movie, and without knowing what the movie is we took ticket and entered the cinema hall, later we came to know that it was a damn horror movie based on true story it was 6-5=2 movie, after completing the show we were literally shivering and scared to enter the car also, puneeth double checked the center lock and we headed towards mild jungle of Hampi and we were scared to death :) by 8pm we entered Hampi refreshed at the room and then we decided to go to the same German restaurant, sorry guys I don't remember the place name, but these place prepares some of the best pizzas and the ambiance of the place is also too good, by 9pm we hit our bed and we planned to visit TB dam in the morning. 

Day 3: 

Route : Hampi - Hospet - Chitradurga - Bangalore (350km)

All four of us were ready by 8am and as planned TB Dam was the next spot to be visited, we reached dam by 9 am and there was bus which was ready to take us to the hill top,

Tungabadra Dam

the view of tungabadra dam from hill top was too good and we took some snaps here and there, then we moved towards the park and aquarium located at the dam area, and they have also opened  boating recently and quite well maintained. It was 11am by then, and we had to start towards bangalore by then,

Windmill near Chitradurga

so we started towards our car and we hit the crossing of chitradurga road, again the painful journey towards chitradurga started, myself and deepu were in deep sleep, the journey continued for another 2hrs and later we found some people selling bananas at very cheap price we filled up the car boot full of bananas and moved towards the AH43 we took pitstop nearby and had some pics of windmills again, finally we touched pune bangalore nh and we were happy to see some speed on speedometer again, in another 2hr 30min we were at our homes.

Our Team - The 4 Idiots

 

Madurai - Rameshwaram - Kanyakumari (A complete Package)

Madurai - Rameshwaram - Kanyakumari 

About Madurai

Madurai is one of the ancient southern Indian city currently located in the state of Tamil Nadu, it is famous for its ancient historical temples. Madurai is situated on the bank of the vaigai river. Madurai is famous for its meenakshi temple which houses massive 9 storey gopurams(towers).

Places to visit : Meenakshi temple, aayiram kaal mandapa, Gandhi museum, Thirumala nayak mahal

About Rameshwaram

 

Rameshwaram, situated about 164 kilometers south-east of Madurai in the state of Tamil Nadu. Rameshwara is considered as one of the most scared pilgrimage centers by the Hindus.The temple is built on an island in the Gulf of Mannar at the tip of the peninsular that projects out of the Indian Subcontinent towards Sri Lanka. 
Places to visit : Pamban bridge, Dhanushkodi, Ramar padam, wax museum, kodanda ram temple, Lakshmana and Agni theertham.

About Kanyakumari

Kanyakumari is located at the southernmost tip of peninsular India. It is the place where the waters of the Bay of Bengal, the Indian Ocean and the Arabian Sea meet.The place Kanyakumari is known so due to the temple dedicated to the goddess Kanya Kumari. From the Kanyakumari one can view spectacular sunrise and sunset.At this place the spiritual leader Swami Vivekananda also spent some of his days in meditation upon a rock off the coast.

Places to visit : Vivekananda rock memorial, wandering monk, Gandhi madapam, sunset spot(kovalam beach), padmanabapuram palace, vattakotai fort, suchindram temple.

How it Went :

This trip could be called a a complete package coz it involved fun, excitement, fear, emotion, respect.... 

As usual I would like divide the experience in terms of days.

Day 1:

Route : Bangalore - Hosur - Krishnagiri - Salem - Madurai (471KM)

I woke up by 4.45am in the morning took some fresh breeze and did some morning exercise to support the long drive,and was ready by 5.30am. Picked up my huge baggage, started my bike and ran the engine for 2-3min ideally. Then I started towards silk board junction where I am supposed to meet the great explorer called Rajaneesh (Rajjo), no complaints to rajjo this time, he was slightly on time by 6:05am. we had few conversations and started towards the destination, we decided that the next stop would be krishnagiri where we planned to have breakfast. 

Near Chandapura

We reached Karnataka boarder with foggy weather surrounding, once we were near the toll, we saw that the traffic was almost kilometers in length, we managed to escape the heavy traffic manuring through the cars and trucks and accelerated towards krishnagiri, again at krishnagiri it was the same condition of traffic somehow managed to escape the traffic, at about 5-6km we found a  hotel (Sarvana bhavan)

Near Krishnagiri

we were asked to park our bike inside some passage way and we entered the hotel, we were totally depressed after seeing the crowd inside the hotel, everyone were waiting for some or other group to vacate the seat, we waited for few minutes and decided we cannot have the breakfast in this hotel, it looked liked as if there are no other hotel near (but it actually turned to be true :) ). We moved to our bike and struggled to take out the bike of passage way, once we were out we were back on track back and we were cruising in AH43, I found that I was running out of fuel, I signaled rajjo about the fuel level and I was searching for nearby fuel station, found a bharath petroleum and my bike exactly stopped in front of  bunk and pushed my bike to the filling point and fueled it up, then the search for the hotel began all along the way,

Near Dharmapuri

most of the hotels were closed coz of the diwali festival and we couldn't find any hotel for another 50km, and finally near dharmapuri, to our right side we found a huge sign board of hotel rajabhojana, the breakfast was really good and the ambiance of the hotel was also good, I would recommend this hotel for other travelers. After a heavy breakfast we took some snaps outside the hotel and started our journey. The next pitstop was salem toll booth, this was around 40km from hotel and the drive was really good as were passing through medium ghat section. We reached the toll booth, took break for few minutes by this time we had covered almost 200km, we started our bike and started

Family From Bangalore, Namakkal

towards destination. there was a right deviation near salem junction, one goes to ammanpet and the other goes to kanyakumari, we were bit confused (can say I was bit confused as it doesn't matter for rajjo :P ) and I didn't take the fly over and came beneath it, and found we should have taken the flyover, anyways we picked up the right route later and moved towards the AH43, our next pitstop was another 50km away somewhere near namakkal district, we stopped there for a while and then moved towards the nearby bakery, where we met a amazing family whom we saw long back near salem, these family were on there TVS wego (husband,wife,kid) they were on a KA41 registered vehicle and we were wondering where this people are coming from, he told they were coming from Bangalore, we

Kaveri River

were stunned for a moment and asked them can we take there pic, and they gave a good pose :D . After they left the spot, we too started and we took some pics near kaveri river from mettur dam next stop was for fuel and spent good amount of time there at HP bunk.  Finally when we were 50km away from madurai, rajjo bike gave up :P this time not because of engine failure, its coz of puncture, I signaled rajjo about his bike state and then search for puncture shop began, and we were luck enough to find a punture shop within 1km, we spent about 20min at the shop and had our soft drinks breaks too, once the bike was ready, we started to madurai, it was 3pm by then and search for the lodge began, by 3.30 we found a descent lodge for 1000 bucks  and took the first day stop.

Palani Range

We were totally strained as it was the

Rajjo's Bike

first longest drive for both of us and took some rest. By 5pm we refreshed and thought of going to meenakshi temple, it was diwali evening and the street was heavily crowded. We were scared how crowded the temple would be, but to our luck, the temple was totally empty, the sculpture and the architure of the temple were really beautiful ,we had dharshan of meeshashi devi and lord shiva and we were out of temple 7pm, we roamed near the temple and came to our room by 8pm, we turned on the tv to see kaun banega karor pathi and watched for a while,we

Madurai Meenakshi Temple

were hungry by this time, so we went to the hotel of the lodge had tummy full of food, once we reached room we were sleepy and we hit the bed.

Day 2:

Route : Madurai - Rameshwaram (180KM)

The plan was to get up by 8am and start by 9.30am or so. But its my routine to wake up early  as by 6.30am and start the activity, so I woke up at the same time, had bath and woked up rajjo by 7am, he might have been cursing me, I believe he used to wake up as late as 9.30am at home, I told him that we have to start early to escape heat and start the sight seeing early in rameshwaram, he agreed and we were ready by 8am. We vacated the room, and I switched to  my google maps and found out of madurai and towards the rameshwaram, just for confirmation we asked the localites too, and we got green signal. 

Madurai-Rameshwaram AH43

In no time we were out of madurai, and we hit the AH43, this time its not a 4 lane road, but its a single road and the road was broad enough. It was sunny in madurai, but as we moved towards manamadurai it turned out to be cloudy. But this weather was awesome for drive, it was wet track in some part of the highway and rajjo was finally happy as he found some curvy roads.

Near Ramanathapuram

This track had lot of trees and perfect country side road. We stopped in between where ever we found the spot to be good. and took pics along our drive, btw we didnot had breakfast at lodge hotel as only pongal was available, so we thought we will have somewhere in the highway, but this highway doesnt even have a single descent hotel, and moreover it was diwali day and most of them were closed, we thought we might find some hotel in ramanathapuram, guys this part of the country has lots of wandering goats, as you know they are kind of dumb in response, I had nearly missed a accident because of it while overtaking a auto, my front tyre hit the belly part of the got I was at round 60kmph and I knew I have hurted the goat badly, really felt sad for it, I stopped for a while but couldnt help the poor animal, had no other option and had to leave the place.

View from pamban

We entered the ramnathpuram district and we went in search of hotel. But as suspected all the hotel were closed, finally we had to stick with bakery items and had some buns and juice and left the place, rameshwaram was another 50km away, we crossed the ramnathpuram district and by this time the weather turned out to be worse it was getting darker and darker, we took some snaps nearby, and when we were 30km away, heavy downpour started, I asked rajaneesh shall we stop he was like, I am ok with anything, so I continued for another 2km, but the rain was getting intensified so I pulled my bike nearby and changed to my rain wear, rajjo as usual no other outfit, and sticked with his riding jacket.

View of Rameshwaram

We started when it stopped raining, another 5km and again it was heavy downpour rajjo was cursing the rain as it was spoiling his new woodlands shoe :P, so I stopped near a bustop and we pulled over for a while. In another 15min the rain had completely disappeared. We were happy and zoomed our bike ask the weather looked good, we entered the island of rameshwaram over pamban bridge, guys this is a breath taking view, 360 degree of fanatic beauty of nature, no words to explain rajjo was kind of absent no idea what went inside him :) may be the spoiled shoe :)

View from Ramar Padam

we took some snaps and started to rameshwaram, while on the way we were at 60s, suddenly a person in his FZ chased us at 90s and suddenly as goat came in front of him, he applied the breaks and he lost the balance and he was pulled with his bike for another 100ft or so, it was a terrible view, the goats skin was ripped off and all it intestine was out, the riders body bleeding after rubbing across road, rajjo was totally blank, we saw the scene for a while and asked rajjo shall we leave, he had no expression was just watching me, I started my bike and I couldn't take my bike above 40kmph and somehow reached rameshwaram, we found a room for 800rs and took nap for a while, it was 1.30pm by then we were looking for the hotel but again no luck,again it was only bakery stuff which saved us.

Dhanushkodi Beach

we planned to start visit different places in rameshwaram, we started with nearby places and covered it quickly, the next point was dhanushkodi, this is the end point from where sri lanka was around 20-30km. It was 16km from rameshwaram and I was riding my bike and rajaneesh was pillion, we found a temple called kodanda rama temple the view was mesmerizing we took some snaps had dharshan of temple and moved to dhanushkodi,

@ Kodanda Ram Temple

we parked our vehicle and took the mahindra min bus to go to the end point of dhansuhkodi, this end point was  6km away. Few bikers do take there bike on this route but we didn't.

@ Dhanushkodi

This part of the town was completely destroyed by the tsunami, we spent 30min of time and we were back in our bus, we saw three KA registered dukes who had come these long way on the beach track, I took there pics and we reached the parking spot, rajjo did some shopping and we started towards our room, it was 6pm by then, we came to room refreshed and started to main rameshwaram temple, cameras were not allowed here nor the mobiles. The temple architecture was superb with mile long pillar structures.We had darshan of the jyothirlinga of lord shiva and were out temple by 8pm, took some bakery item as it was only line for our dinner and started watching completion of double century of rohit sharma :) and we slept off to end the second day.

Day 3:
Route : Rameshwaram - Ramanathpuram - Thirunaveli - Kanyakumari (310KM)

We had planned that we will start by 6am in the morning and all went according to the plan, we were ready by 6am checked out of the lodge took our bike from the parking shed and gave engine a good run for a while.Since we were out of fuel we moved to a nearby petrol bunk for refueling and started our journey. 

ECR

I was very much excited about this route as we would be taking ECR this time, which is one of my favorite road. In another 45min or so we were at ramanathapuram and we found the deviation to the left which connects to the ECR.

Near Sayalgudi

I got a confirmation from a auto driver, these people are well versed with route, when I asked does this route goes to kanyakumari he started explaining the complete route, was very happy from his response.The road found to be little bit bumppy for few kilometers and we were scared as we couldn't  cross beyond 50s in that section, then after few kms the road turned to be super smooth and the weather was awesome, it was cloudy and road was wet from the previous day rain. We were crusing in our 70s and 80s and the road was in perfect shape and had proper banking. We were searching for hotel for food, and we decided that we will not see the quality of the hotel , we will just fill up our tummy's first, but we didnt find any hotel for another 100km  we took sufficient break in between, and at around 100km

Rajjo with coffee

away we saw a nearby hotel and we stopped for coffee break, we were hungry too after seeing the dosa, we thought of having one, while we were in hotel, we saw another group of bikers KA registered and had a conversion with them, they were coming along the coast from west to east (bangalore-mysore-calicut - guruvanyoor-thiruvanatapuram-kanyakumari - rameshwaram - pondy - bangalore)  I was really impressed by them said all the best to them and then we left the place, we were continuing on the ECR taking some pics and asking here and there for the route, then we came across a junction were we were supposed to take the right devitaion, but the local guy told we can take left this is were we got mis gudied and entered into tiruchenddur.

Near Thoothukudi

We reliased after covering 10km when we observed that the traffic was reduced to zero and the road was not wide enough, then we again asked one of the passperby and we

Thruvaneli-Kanyakumari

found that were in wrong path, but he told in another 5km we can touch another highway and reach kanyakumari, we almost reached a place called tiruchendur where a guy told we should have taken route of thirunaveli which was 5km behind, so as per his advice we took that route,  this was NH7A and road was too good, we topped at 90s and reached Bangalore-Kanyakumari highway in no time. Kanyakumari was around 80KM from here, rajjo told me that he would need to change his engine oil, so we stopped near a fuel station, but he didnt had any equipment to take out the screws, so had to continue, we were cursing at 90s in NH7 and we entered the region of Nagercoil district, where there were thousand of wind mills planted,

Kanyakumari

and as we expected it was heavy windy region, so we reduced our speed to 70s took some snaps of the mills, my bike clocked 1000km of the trip and stopped to take the break.

Gandhi Madapam, Kanyakumari

After a while we reached the kanyakumari point, the road was closed and we took inter city road to kanyakumari. After 5km we came across a lodge and it was entrance of the  kanyakumari town. We booked the room and it was 600rs. It was 12.30pm by then, we took

Sachindram Temple, Kanyakumari

rest and then left for lunch. We came back after lunch, took 2hrs nap and we started by 4pm, when we went for ferry ride for rock memorial it was closed by then, so had no luck for that day, so we sticked with other plans, we visited gandhi madapam, wandering monk and few other near by places, it was evening by then so we thought of going to suchindram temple which was 15km away, by the time we came back it was almost 6pm, so we came to room and changed to beach-ware, we saw that kovalam beach was 4km away, so  we jumped to go to the beach. We didnt carry anything, when we went to beach, we found that it is not place to enjoy the beach fun, rather it was for sunset point and beach walk, we were two buffoons in beachwear's :) anyways we didnt care, we went to place which was remote had spent some time playing in beach and returned back.

Day 4:
Route: Kanyakumari - Thirunaveli - Madurai (235KM)

Next morning we went early to see the morning sunrise, but we were slightly disappointed as it was cloudy,

Sunrise @ Kanyakumari

but some how managed to take some pics, then we went for the ferry ride after breakfast, the

View from Rock Memorial

queue was almost kilometer in length finally it was our turn after an hour. The ferry service costs 34 per person and it takes less than 5min of to reach the rock memorial. The view from the rock memorial was spectacular, far off we could see the thekku malai reserved forest and its huge range which were covered with clouds, it was surrounded by thousands of wind mills we were in the split rock for more than an hour taking pictures in different poses :P.  Then when were about to leave, again we saw lengthy queue to get inside the ferry but it was quite quick this time,

View of Thiruvallar and Rock Memorial

we reached the bike and left to the room, rajjos bike was looking for oil change so we found a nearby garage and got his bike fixed. It was almost 11.30 by then, both of our bike were running out of fuel and our tummy too. So fueled up both, and said bye bye to kanyakumari.

Vivekananda Rock Memorial

The next stop was madurai which was pre planned to stay for that day, so taking good number of breaks near the tolls we were about to reach the madurai city, but it started raining heavily, so I parked near a temple and changed to my rain wear, but the rain had stopped by then I had no mood to remove it again, so we left to madurai and reached our old lodge Empee by 4pm, we took rest for an hour and we decided to go to the temple again, but this day the temple was heavily crowded we had dharshan of lord shiva and meenakshi  and we were back to our room by 8pm, we went for the dinner and slept of early as the next day jounrney was supposed to be started at 5am. 

Day 5:
Route : Madurai - Salem - Krishnagiri - Hosur - Bangalore (475KM)

This is the day where I can say we had race with the time :D.    

Near Dindugal

We started by sharp 5am, we checked out of the room and started our journey, I turned on the Google maps to find the route towards the national highway. I had a bare idea about the

Near Namakkal

map and road, but it was dark outside and we managed to ask direction to the localites and within 25min or so we hit the national highway, as my vision is poor during low light I couldn't make out between the curb and the road and had slipped of the track while joining the highway but somehow managed to take control of my bike and stopped for a while, rajjo was behind me and told that's highway as if I don't see the road :P. It was 5.30am by then still very low light, I told rajjo that I cannot ride beyond 70s, and we were following a truck for another 15min, by 6am the view was quite visible and I was driving at my 80s, we saw a toll booth nearby and stopped there for few minutes, after this break we decided we will take break at every toll

Near Dhamagiri

booth, and on average the toll booth repeats for every 60-65kms, we throttled our accelerators to max, we were ridding in 90s and 100s all through the distance till Bangalore. In between we had to face light rain here and there,

Near Dharmagiri

and we were lucky till krishnagiri it was cloudy which was giving good shade for us to ride. It was 11.15am or so when we reached krishnagiri, and we were relaxed, for us reaching krishnagiri is like reaching bangalore

Near Krishnagiri

in less than 30min we reached hosur crossed the pathetic traffic and stopped near electronic city flyover, we took the fly over and we were at silk-board by 12.30pm, I couldnt find rajjo after that, may be he got missed in the heavy traffic so I left to my home took hot water bath slept till evening. It was an awesome experience, my bike had covered 1804km.   

Total Trip Distance