It is a Christmas and new year season. This is the only time where we find time to go out for tours. So, we suddenly for a trip to Mahabaleshwar, Maharashtra.
Mahabaleshwar is around 600KM from Hyderabad, India. Mahabaleshwar is a famous hill station and you find Ooty kind of weather in this area. The best time to visit this place is in the Winter.
We started around 3PM in the afternoon in Hyderabad and reached Mahabaleshwar by 3.30AM in the morning. There was several routes to reach this place and we used google maps which helped us to go through the shortest possible route.
Wai is the area below the hill station. So, if we have to reach Mahabaleshwar, you have to go through ghat road. In between Wai and Mahabaleshwar you have Panchagani. Wai, Panchagani and Machagani are separated by a distance of 50KM.
We reached Wai by 3.30PM and there were no rooms available. This was the best season to visit Mahabaleshwar and adding to it was the Christmas break, so none of the hotels had rooms. So, we slept in the car till 8PM in Wai. It was very cold there and even though we didn't measure the temperature, it would definitely be around 10degrees or below. We again started our journey towards Mahabaleshwar from Wai.
From Wai, we reached Panchagani in half an hour and through some reference we got room in Aston Hostel, Panchgani. That hostel was in a picturesque location and above picture was from the hostel balcony.
We got fresh quickly and started exploring the palces in Panchagani. We went to following places in Panchagani.
1. Sydney Point
2. Parsi Point
3. Table Land (Where pandavas are said to have resided, you also see their footsteps, also, there are five plateaus around, there is also a small cave which you must visit, it was damn cool inside the cave)
The above 3 images are of the cave which you must not miss to visit.
4. Mapro Gardens (This is the place where you see flower, fruits gardens, Mapro Jam is very faous and you must buy without miss. Teel you, Mapro Jam is delicious)
It was afternoon by the time, we crossed off all these places and from there we started journey towards Mahabaleshwar. On the way, we visited,
1. Strawberry/Carrot fields (these are famous here, don't miss to buy them)
After crossing these fields, we headed towards deep forest area, which takes to Mahabaleshwar. We went to Lord Shiva temple in Mahabaleshwar and started our return journey to Panchagani.
We reached Wai by 8.30PM and went to Wai Ganapathi which is very famous. Later, we headed towards Hyderabad and reached Hyderabad by next day morning 11AM. On the way took a nap in the car for 2 hours.
The adventure:
For us driving on the ghat road was not an adventure but when we felt we were doing an adventure when we followed Google Maps. Absolutely clueless of the routes, we blindly followed Google Maps and while in forward journey everything was smooth but during return in one of the areas, we took a left which was next to the one which google map pointed. This actually, led us to a town where roads were under repair and when we still followed google Maps, we ended up on a bridge which was under repair and there was Bhim river on both sides. By the time we realized, we were way into google map trap and on a bridge where we couldn't even take a reverse turn. We had to reverse the vehicle carefully and come down from the bridge, any mistake, we would have ended in the river, courtesy: google :-p :-p.
Route Map:
You need not go to Pune, if you want to go to Mahabaleshwar. after crossing Mahabaleshwar, you have to take a deviation to left which leads to Mahabaleshwar.
Sangareddy->Zaheerabad->Kalaburgai->Solapur->Kegaon-/Mohol-/Pandarpur/Bhima River->
Morochi->Wai->Panchagani->Mahabaleshwar
Road condition:
Except for the few patches after crossing Zaheerabad, road condition is very good. The patch between Zaheerabad and Solapur where the road is under construction and is very very bad and had lot of diversions. Drive carefully on this road and you will have a wonderful drive all along.
Vehicle for Travel:
We used Honda Amaze for travel, and with a mileage between 18-23KM, for a travel of approximately 1350KM (To & Fro), we filled total diesel valued 4,500/-. And we had approximately, 300-400 rupees of diesel left out.
Places we missed to visit:
Our plan was only for one day and we missed following places.
1. Krishna River Origin
2. Dhoom Dam
3. Kalburgai fort/temple
4. Lingamala Falls
5. Echo Point
6. Elephant's head point
7. Temples in Solapur.
Visit to Mahabaleshwar must be for 3-4 days and you have to visit many places on the way in Bidar, Solapur if you are travelling from Hyderabad.
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