Delhi to Udaipur – One Crazy Drive

My stop watch tells me that it recorded "47 Hr 33 Min", My car’s trip-meter tells me that it counted "1447.7 KM", My camera tells me that it clicked more than 400 photos, I tell you guyz that I am back from Delhi to Udaipur trip. In Udaipur, it was a meet of BCMT forum and I said to myself why not I shall attend it and meet the travel freaks like me. But, I thought what about the leaves from office as I recently came from Valentines Trip | Delhi to Goa. Then a thought rippled through my body and I asked to myself can’t I do it in 2 days?? Will I need more than two days??

Answer came, yes I can cover more than 1400 KMs in two days at least to meet these guys and I have to so as to see live, how it feels being a member of one of the largest travel community of India. It was the first ever all India meet for BCMT named "When North meets West" and I am glad that I attended it to be the part of this historic meet of the forum.

Day 1 – 6th March, 2010 | Delhi to Udaipur

Since a lot of distance had to be covered in two days so you can expect most of the time we would have to drive. We had no option to leave as soon as we can on Friday night but due to some last minute extremely important issues I got stuck with office on Friday. Any how we were able to leave on 5th March, 2010 8:31 PM | Friday and distance need to be covered was approximately 700 KMs till Udaipur. Plan was to have dinner beyond Jaipur and morning Tea beyond Chittorgarh.

Driving in somehow more than moderate traffic we almost reached Jaipur after 4.5 Hrs and instead of rounding off to Flyover to bypass Jaipur city and take NH-76 we kept going into Jaipur city. After a while we suddenly realized that this couldn’t be the correct Highway so we asked and they told us to track back and get on to flyover to speed through Udaipur. We took the U-turn and as soon as we got to NH-76 Toll Highway going towards Ahmadabad, I better tell you that it is a "Driver’s Paradise" in India. The road was as smooth as butter and car was driving like as if we were flying. The black tarmac was laid with complete perfection for smoothness. After enjoying the highway’s sheer excellence complimenting the driving pleasure for about 1 Hr we took a stop for the dinner. It was "Chacha-Bhanja Dhabha" where we had Dal Fry, Alloo Paratha and some plain roti. Well not to forget, I must appreciate the quality of chai/tea that Dhabha offered us and each one of us obliged with two cups of it. It was around 2.15 AM and next stop had was beyond Chittorgarh.

I think after driving for another 1.5 Hr there was a sign board stating to follow straight path to Ajmer/Udaipur and a left going onto flyover to heading Ahmadabad. Since sign to Udaipur was straight we followed the path and landed up on the old single lane highway that runs through Ajmer city of Rajasthan. But after some distance 17 odd KMs we found it extremely difficult to drive on that single lane and asked one person how can we get on to four lane express highway. He told us to take a U-turn and head towards Naseerabad from where we would connect to NH-76. Well the lonely trail to Naseerabad was awesome with smooth black tarmac between the curves of small hills. It was sheer joy, driving that part. Finally we were up on Toll highway and got buzzing.

One thing you must know regarding this highway it has almost around 10 tolls from Delhi to Udaipur. So, be prepared to shell almost 500-600 Rs in toll itself. But, apart from Delhi-Jaipur highway the tolls charged are worth a pay as road conditions are superb but Delhi-Jaipur lacks it and I don’t feel it shall be a toll road at all. It seems as if they are charging money from the people to lay the road on the route. Pathetic!!!

Anyhow it was getting to 5 AM and I was feeling a bit sleepy so I asked my cousin to continue driving after exactly 500 KM of drive. Then I had a vodka shot and went to sleep for an hour and in the knap I was listening some struggling sounds of my cousins and friend and when I woke up the petrol in the tank was about to finish and I was like WOW!! ;)…We found one petrol pump and he was ready to fill the diesel in my petrol car :shocked: but timely we asked him to fill petrol . He tried his best to get it done but there was no petrol at that station. So we moved ahead beyond Chittorgarh bypass we finaly managed to get the tank filled. There we got the chance to take the first click of the trip.

After a 10-15 minutes around 7.15 AM we stopped for morning tea as per the plan. Again few more clicks there

After that I took the charge again to drive and Udaipur was around 80 KMs from there. My cousin had Nokia E72 with GPS which we tested for the first time when we were lost around Naseerabad and now it was the test for it. We wanted to reach Saheli Palace Hotel and as we set the drive to option in the GPS, believe me it made us stop exactly at the gate of the hotel which would have been easily take 30 minutes more if we had to ask and search for it. So finally we reached Udaipur, Hotel Saheli Palace, after 710 KM and 11 Hr 46 Minutes drive on 6th March, 2010 8:17 PM | Friday.

The Journey ahead-