Chasing the Sahyadri rains – a tribute Monsoon Drive

Until the Monsoon of 2012, most of us wouldn’t have imagined a Drive just to drive and enjoy the Rain. The inception of HiVayKing Monsoon Drive changed it all. We blissfully spent at least a weekend in the Monsoon month of July in the last 6 years in Western Ghats, along with like-minded travel folks.

The HiVayKing Monsoon Drives have been decommissioned since this year. The ones who attended them are addicted to the Monsoon Drive “concept”. It had a ring to it – the rain, the Maharashtra green, the petrichor, the drive circuits, the road not taken, the food, the “photo shoot” points, the flash sales, the clues, the convoys, the rain dance, the friends made, the bonding…… thousand words wouldn’t be enough. I have seen them from both perspectives – as a participant as well as being a part of the organizing team for 4 years. Back then, HVK was among the first to begin such a concept, today, everybody and his uncle organizes one. But, HVKian way of organizing them has a lot of learning and takeaways – the quest to always finding the road not taken, “less trodden roads lead to beautiful places”, it is the drive that matters, the meticulous way of organizing everything in detail and so on.

Over the years, there has been HiVayKing Monsoon Drives in Kerala & Karnataka, but Maharashtra in Monsoon is always special (to me) – the magical greeeeen, the spectacular ghats, the magnificent countless waterfalls, the swelling reservoirs, the vibrant Arabian Sea lashing the hilly coast, the soulful food (Missal Pav, Vada Pav, Solkadhi, Poha, Kombdi Vade and what not), the pounding rains, the nostalgia and most importantly, an opportunity to meet THE HiVayKing.

Since there was no HiVayKing drive this year, we came up with a theme of driving down the memory lane, covering the routes of all 6 HiVayKing Monsoon Drives of Sahyadri along with Konkan and Kadamba – in one drive. With a scrupulous plan already in place atleast 30 days before D-Day, all we had to do was eagerly wait for the D-Day.

We thank the HiVayKing CHD and HVK for the support during the trip. If you want to go on such a drive or if you are eager to know the locations of our drive, visit http://bit.ly/sukhdevroad

Here are some stats before the pictures do the talking.

Total Distance = 3505.4 kms
No. of states/UT = 06 (Karnataka, Maharashtra, Goa, Gujarat, Daman & Diu, Dadra & Nagar Haveli)
No. of Sahyadri ghats covered = 8
No. of tolls crossed(working) = 33 (21 in KA, 12 in MH)
No. of refuels = 07
No. of Kms in each state/UT :
MH = 1947.3 kms, KA = 1266.5 kms, GA = 181.6 kms, GJ = 49.3 kms, DNH = 49 kms, DD = 11.7 kms
No. of Waterfalls = at least 500+ (not even kidding, there was one at every turn in every ghat)

CAUTION : This is a photo-log with lots and lots of pictures

July 12th and 13th, 2018 :

We started from Bangalore Airport at 0618pm to reach our hotel in Thane the next day at 0809pm. Yet another drive over 24 hours – this time, the distance was 1283.7kms (from Attibele area). It was a sedate night drive through NH4 (Dinner was at Mysore Cafe after Chitradurga). We covered three beautiful ghats of the Sahyadris. We witnessed awesome rains in the Ghats as well as pounding rains in Konkan. We faced a 6km jam to get to Thane. We entered Navi Mumbai area at 0540pm, it took us 2.5hrs to reach the hotel in Thane, thanks to bad roads, pothole jams.etc.

It started raining right heavily right after we crossed Dharwad, almost entirely for the next 5 days

First meal of the trip in MH and it had to be ethnic

We entered the circuit after Breakfast, early morning rains

Green, green, everywhere!

And waterfalls, waterfalls, everywhere!

Reservoirs too

Well, this is just the beginning

Full gushing flow of rivers

Lots of hair pin bends too…

And the view of meandering roads from top

The vistas

More hair pin bends

And some slushy roads

Scene 1 : before the rains pour down

Scene 2 : when it pours

Water, water, everywhere!

We drove through many bridges filled with brimming rivers

And a road full of waterfalls

And then comes Ghat no. 1

Lots of view points

And the first 1000kms done

More and more gushing rivers as we descend to Konkan

NH17

A decent Veg Thali

Approaching ghat no. 2 after Lunch

The next set of waterfalls we witnessed

More vistas

Maharashtra Unlimited – truly!

The Expressway was a bliss too – filled with so many waterfalls, also ghat no. 3 for the day

25++ hours later (this is just from KIAL), we reached our hotel. Ofcourse, after the pothole jams of Bombay! We were to meet HVK and few other guys in an hour. 

That was a very quick Dinner meet of ~ 2 hours. We were mostly zonked with lack of sleep and the next day was a late 6am start as well, so we took leave earlier than usual.

July 14th 2018 : 

On this day, we drove 592.4 kms from Thane starting at 0612am and ending at Pune at 1000pm. The original plan was to stay in Thane but because of the pothole jams, HVK suggested us to take a different route to Pune avoiding Bombay. We wanted to start at 5am, but pushed to 6 to atleast get 5.5 hours sleep. The route was exciting – through MH, GJ, D&D, DNH. Some waterfalls, some roads kissing the coast, some forts, some buttersmooth tarmac, some bad roads. Compared to the previous day, we only had 1 major Sahyadri Ghat on this day… nevertheless, the rains were with us throughout the day.

Bombay Dreams. Our stay was <12 hours this time. Will come back soon

We cruised on the highway for some distance, had breakfast at Vittal Kamath

And then, we turned into our kind of road

to see yet another “waterfalls”

The other side

And then, some makhaan roads..

…to see the Arabian Sea (the first beach of the trip)

We drove parallel to the sea for quite some distance

HVK had warned us about such waterloggings in this region, due to incessant rains

Roads were wide and good in Gujarat

The rivers, lakes, ponds were swelling in this region. An area which got 60+ cm rain in 36hrs this SWM season.

This fort area was serene.

We entered Gujarat again, for the second time in the day after a short visit into the D&D UT.

We explored a few new roads (this itch never goes away, does it?)

And then, we entered another Union Territory – Dadra & Nagar Haveli

Some country roads of DNH. Ah, the rains gave company all the way.

But, we got back into MH again. 

to see more beautiful vistas, roads that are not marked in Maps, roads that no one takes.

Pounding rains and swelling rivers.

My road will always be different from your road

Well, we got back into DNH to witness fabulous roads – this was simply the best in the whole trip, and of course, ghat no. 4 of the trip.

The rural landscape

Yet another river Bridge

And that’s the end of DNH, back into MH and the typical interior roads of MH

Here you go

All the causeways were swelling in this region

We crossed a flooded one

And we saw this breathtaking waterfalls

The only section of the trip where it didn’t rain much – because we were much east from Western Ghats. 

We crossed a non-Sahyadri Ghat

We reached Pune at 1000pm. That’s the end of Day 2. 

July 15th, 2018 : 

It was a relatively late start since distance was lesser than the previous days. We started from Pune at 0714am and reached Kolhapur at 0825pm, just in time to watch the World Cup final. It was a distance of 461.2kms involving 2 Sahyadri ghats.

Pune vistas

Approaching Katraj Tunnel. Well yes, it rained entirely this day too.

Typical MH breakfast

Khambhatki Ghat was inviting!

We crossed 2K kms in the trip

Once we got into the circuit routes, the intensity of the rain quadrupled. 

The vistas

Countless waterfalls, yet again!

We hiked to see a Waterfall

It was magnificent, we were almost at the top of the falls, so the height can’t be just in the picture below

The streams were gushing!

This might give you some idea of the height

But this will give you a better idea!

The scene at the reservoir

As we approached ghat no. 5, it was time for Bhutta. What are Sahyadri ghats without a Bhutta stop?

Spot the ST bus

More and more waterfalls

As we descend down into Konkan

NH17 was real bad in this part of Konkan due to road work and lots of potholes

Roads were much better when we turned back into the circuit roads. A roadside waterfall.

Yet another roadside gushing river

Time for another photoshoot

Bad roads begin when we get back to NHs

Approaching ghat no. 6 of the trip

It was completely foggy so we missed all the views

Bad roads continued as we neared Kolhapur, it was Sunday evening, we faced some traffic too.

We made sure we had one of the best food in Kolhapur. This is the ethnic Veg fare.

Kolhapuri Chicken along with Tambda Rassa and Pandara Rassa

..and after a sumptuous dinner, we reached our stay at 0825pm just in time for the Match.

July 16th, 2018

This day’s distance was the least in the entire trip, we had planned it in such a way because one of us had to catch a flight from Goa at 10pm. So we wanted to reach some shack/beach side restaurant in Goa before 6pm and spend some time. We started from Kolhapur at 0715am and reached a beach resort very close to Dabolim Airport at 0550pm. It was a distance of 439 kms for the whole day including the drive to our hotel after Airport along with dinner drive to a place 10kms away. It was just one ghat down to Konkan and rest of the day was going down South in Konkan.

Rains, Rains, Rains!

Entering Ghat no. 7 of the trip. Foggy!

A landslide prone Ghat

The views

And of course, waterfalls!

Rivers in Konkan were in full spate!

Crossing the Konkan Railways

And photoshoot time

And then, we reached Arabian Sea

Heading down South, we crossed many River Bridges in Konkan

An amazing connecting road to reach NH17

But NH17 is a mess due to road work

At 550pm, we reached a Beach Resort near Dabolim Airport, to spend about 2 hours by the Sea before dropping our friend to the Airport

Cafe with Sea View

For our friend, this trip was from Bangalore Airport to Goa Airport, we had another long day to go.

Dinner, by the Sea

July 17th, 2018

The last day of the drive. We just had one more ghat pending to cover all the Sahyadri circuits of HiVayKing Monsoon Drives. After Lunch, it was the plain old NH4 all the way back. We started extremely early from Arossim (in Goan standards) at 0745am and the last metre of the trip was clocked at 1030pm, it was a distance of 729.1 kms.

Goan roads are always a bliss!

With great difficulty, we found a restaurant open for Breakfast at 0830am, after that it was a quick “early” morning drive into MH before rest of Goa woke up

This sector had a lot of tree falls

Although the views were fantabulous

And yes, like all days, it was raining all the way

Ghat no. 8 – the last one of the trip. Oh yes, lots of waterfalls

The views

How many waterfalls do you see?

Time for another photoshoot

We witnessed a reverse waterfall too. Thanks to the westerlies

And streams everywhere 

We then went into our kind of roads

A water tunnel

Into the Wild!

Such a soothing sight

A walk into the wild to see the streams

Further into the route, we crossed a River…

..through a loooong Bridge

We also crossed flooded causeways!!

and flooded roads

After Lunch stop, we were back onto NH4, yet another NH4 drive after a Monsoon Drive.

but the rains continued all the way to Bangalore

The last pitstop of the trip – just after Chitradurga, to fill our hungry stomach and the Car’s. We entered Bangalore well after Peak hours (it was a Tuesday) and the drive through ORR was comfortable.

If you’ve read till here, thank you =)

Road updates :
NH17 – https://www.facebook.com/groups/hvkumar/permalink/10155962722824565/
NH4 – https://www.facebook.com/groups/hvkumar/permalink/10155964253764565/
NH50 – https://www.facebook.com/groups/hvkumar/permalink/10155967535584565/