Journey to Goa

We are a bunch of four good friends and we used to work for the same company. We discussed quite a no of times about visiting Goa from Hyderabad. We quickly started to figure out what is the way to go from here. We promised ourselves that journey should be adventurous to say the least and we have decided to go in my car. Although we know it is a risky proposition, we were confident that we can pull it off as one of us is a very experienced in driving and another one is not bad at all. That's the plan A. For eventualities we had devised a plan B as well. Plan B is if anyone of us drops at the last moment, we thought of adding another friend of mine. The basic qualification for this is that one has to be a good and experienced driver to say the least.

As usual one got stuck in office, and we quickly switched over to plan B. We had a get together on the previous day night and were all set to go. We thought of buying maps and other travel related stuff but finally we ended up with nothing. I must admit I got a wealth of information from yahoo travel posts.

Now let me introduce the gang, Pritesh, Vasu and Venkat. Pritesh the ever enthusiastic automobile maniac, Vasu a typically laidback techie and Venkat. I don't know how to describe Venkat though. I am sure my friends will add a line or 2 about the same in the comments section.

We initially thought of starting up the journey at 4 A.M. in the morning, but later have changed it to 6A.M. and were able to start only at 7 A.M. We took NH-9 road as suggested to Solapur instead of the Kurnool route. We took Miyapur road and the road from Miyapur till Sangareddy the road was really bad. It took us almost 2 hours to reach Sangareddy because of the road condition and the heavy incoming traffic. Once we crossed Sangareddy the road was good.

We had our break fast around 10 A.M near Zaheerabad and resumed our journey. We reached Zaheerabad after 3 and ½ hours. If we drive non-stop we can do the same distance in 2 and ½ hours at a decent average speed. We started motoring along trying to make up for the lost time. On the way we found a beautiful fort at Naldurga which is roughly about 267 kms from Hyderabad.



This place is pretty picturesque and nice for some good pictures. We reached Solapur around 3 P.M and we knew we were going slow. But for us safety was more important than time. We stopped over at Solapur for lunch and had lunch at Anand Restaurant. Our plan was to go to Belgaum from Solapur and lot of people had suggested the roads were good via solapur. We resumed our journey at 4.30 p.m and headed towards Bijapur sounds more like Vijapur.



We have reached Bijapur around 6.00 p.m. This place is famous for "Gol Gumbaz". We stopped at Bijapur and bought Road Atlas and Karnataka state maps. We had a quick coffee and after some map searching and enquiries with local taxiwallahs we took the road to Bagalkot at around 7 P.M. The road was narrow but in good condition and the traffic was less.





10 kms prior to Bagalkot we hit a ‘T’ junction from there we took right towards Belgaum. From this junction it was 138 Kms to Belgaum. The road was too good, it is a four lane road. During this entire stretch the petrol bunks are few and far between so one has to be careful and it also lacks good restaurants. So we have decided to have our dinner at Belgaum and we reached it around 10.30 P.M. We stopped at a petrol bunk in Belgaum and enquired about the road to Goa. From Belgaum we had to cover a good deal of ghat section so we have decided to stay at Belgaum for the night. We stayed at Sankamthai Hotel and had good sumptuous food there. Our plan was to resume our journey next morning.

25/03/2007.

We resumed our journey at around 9 A.M after a good night rest and break fast. Belgaum to our surprise is a big place and it is very easy to get lost there. We took Amboli road and the landmark was hotel Milan. After a lot of confusion we got onto NH17 after Sawantwadi.

This place is famous for Cashews and fruit pulps and one can get a good bargain there.













We reached Goa around 2 P.M. and took a deviation from Mapusa. We straight away went to the Vagator beach as it our old favorite.We had our lunch on the beach shack and the food was good.

We stayed near Baga beach in a small resort which is pretty close to Titos and it has a pool. Since it is off season we managed it for a very decent price. Once we checked in we again headed back to Baga beach this time. We had spent lot of time in the beach.

This beach is full of activity and there are lots of tourists. Water sports are quite popular here. If you are looking for solitude definitely this is not the beach for sure.
Around 8 P.M we came back to the hotel and took a shower and wanted to go to Tito’s. We couldn’t manage to get into Tito’s as there was some private party going on. We were quite disappointed and spent our time at Mombo. We had our dinner at Subway and headed back to our hotel.

26/03/2007

We woke up early and headed straight towards Vagator beach, needless to say that is our favorite. We were there by 8.30 A.M in the morning and had fun in the beach till 11 A.M. We had a brunch and then went back to our hotel. At this time of the year Goa was absolutely hot. We spent couple of hours at the pool and then went back to the busy streets of Baga. We spent most of the evening in around Baga and did lot of shopping. We had finished our dinner at Subway again.

27/03/2007

We resumed our journey back to Hyderabad. We started at 9 A.M in the morning. We crossed Mapusa and took NH-17 and reached Sawantwadi. We bought cashews and fruit pulps for a very good price. From Sawantwadi we took Amboli route on SH-121. After Amboli SH-121 joins NH-4. Here I must warn people not to take Ajara road, it is pretty confusing.

The whole area is a pretty picturesque ghat section and as per our information it rains heavily during monsoon in this part of the world and one has to be vary of the bad roads during that time.

We reached Belgaum by 2 P.M and had our lunch at same Sankmtai hotel. This time we have decided to proceed towards Raichur rather than the usual Bijapur. We enquired at the hotel about the road condition and were told that it is in good condition.


To reach Raichur we had to pass through Bagalkot and we used the same road which we had used earlier. We passed through Bagalkot, Hungund and Lingsugur before we reached Raichur. This route is a state highway and luckily it turned out to be good mostly but one has to be keep the rains in mind before deciding on this route. We had a light supper at Lingsugur and drove non stop back to Raichur.

We had reached Raichur at 1:00 A.M. We stopped at Raichur briefly for petrol and proceeded back to Hyderabad. We have reached Hyderabad around 4 A.M in the morning. This return leg was only around 715 KM and I think can be covered in 14 hours with out too many long breaks. We took 19 hours to reach Hyderabad and considering the breaks we had taken in between we all felt very proud. I must also say a word about my car here. Maruti Swift is a beauty for long distance travels. It never ever complained on anything and the mileage was on average a very good 16 KMPL with AC. Only problem which I guess was the leg room at the rear seat but again I think one can live with it.