On the road: Bangalore-Wynad-Kannur

From Ford Fiesta

We drove down from Bangalore to Kannur for a vacation, which was our longest drive since a long time. Bad roads, not-so-good ergonomic health and the loss of interest in driving as a pastime prevented me from the long(300-500KM) drives that I used to do in my Maruti 800 and Zen. Also the liking for public transport to avoid the stress of driving kept me off the roads as well.

We had to take a detour because of the poor condition of the Virajpet-Kuttupuzha ghat road which is in a pretty bad shape since couple of years. We drove down the NH-212, towards Kozhikode and went up north to Kannur soon after we descended the ghats. We took a break in Wynad, at Vythiri while going down and at Kalpetta, while coming up. 

Bangalore-Mysore was just 2 hours in the early hours - it would have been even less if the access to the peripheral ring road(NICE) was accessible from Bannerghatta Road. With all the traffic trouble that Bangalore is going through, it is a shame that a road which is built two years ago is still sparingly used because of politicical interference. I am not sure if the builders, NICE, were very practical by approaching courts instead of trying for some kind of consensus. They are loosing money for their investment as well. 

From Ford Fiesta

It took another 3h30m to Vythiri, where we took a break for the evening and drove down the magnificient ghat roads the next day which takes you down to Kozhikode on the coast. We took a deviation towards Kannur from Tamarassery towards NH17 and drove another 3 hours to reach our destination. Traffic slows down in the densely populated towns of Kerala which is barely 10KM of each other. The last 10meter was a bit tough to manuover - a narrow road and a gate that leads to our home in Kannur tested my driving skills - not so good I have to admit in such circumstances, scratches on the passenger side in two parking lots would vouch for that. But we figured out later how to get in easier later, I was turning the car too quickly and was getting into a jam and we opened the gate in the reverse direction to get couple of precious inches.

From Ford Fiesta

We didn't do too much of driving around except for a trip up 40km to visit my brother and family as well as my wife's grandmother.

We returned the same route, but with another 3 hour break at a relative's place in Kalpetta, which was very scenic as well with tea gardens coffee plantations around. Lunch was on them and we left for Bangalore at 12 noon. It was a good drive till Gundalpet except for a small crack on my windshield caused by a stone which landed up somehow on the car. We took a detour to Bangalore near Mysore, which was a big loop around the outskirts of the town adding more than 20KMs to the distance, but peaceful one. Mysore-Bangalore highway was crowded, but it is a 4-lane highway with a separator in between. We had a stopover in between for feeding the baby, which we thought would keep her asleep, but didn't. It took 4 hours for the same distance that we did in 2 hours while going - thanks to the heavy traffic and poor connectivity across the city. We took a detour on the not-yet-completed peripheral NICE ring road, but we had to take a big U turn because of the accessiblity problems from Bannerghatta road to the NICE road. 12 hours on the road with a 3 hour break in between left me tired for sure.

Ford fiesta Diesel did pretty well on the road overall though a small stone cracked the windshield.  Road grip was pretty good, felt very safe at high speeds(~100kmph)At around 18km per liter of diesel, cost wise it was not that bad a deal. Aircondition does affect the pull of the vehicle, the hairpin curves of the Tamarassery ghat road had to be dealt with in the first gear and the road being cracked didn't help either. Ergonomically, the car didn't measure up well with poor lumbar support which left a low back pain after the drive. Leg space is poor as well, if you have to comfortably change gears and hold the steering wheel,  you need to leave your left leg bent because of the divider between passenger and driver seat. That left me with a sore knee while driving down, which was not in a good shape after a long run the previous day. But overall a pleasant drive and I was happy with my ergonomic health as well!