To the place I belong…
Country roads, take me home
Today is the last day of our incredible journey across India, which we started 38 days ago on 30th Sep 2022. We have mixed feelings today - excited to get back home to our families but sad this journey will end today.
We started from Madikkeri at 7.30 am, after having breakfast at Club Mahindra. Since many people had cautioned us about bad roads travelling to Kerala, we pondered over several options - in the end decided to take Virajpet - Iritty - Mattanur - Panoor - Vadakara to Calicut.
After Virjapet on Madikkeri-Virajpet, it is very curvy mountainous road making driving bit difficult. Add to that, the narrow road has sharp edges and we were worried the edges may damage “Panchali’s” tyres. Besides, it was dense forest on both sides.
We crossed the border into Kerala at 9.30 am at Iritty and stopped at the first “thattukada” and ordered “5 chai without” to mark our entry to our home state! From Attari border to Kerala border!
Soon we started seeing signature Kerala style - political parties flags and football fan clubs flex boards cheering their favourite team in the upcoming Qatar WC. We merged into NH66 at Kunjippally for our final drive to Kochi.
We continued on NH66 to Vatakara and to Calicut, where we stopped for lunch at Ambhika hotel. We ordered their speciality dish “Samudra Sadya” or loosely translated “Sea feast”. it is a non-vegetarian Sadya with 18 seafood dishes. It was yummy and well worth the drive to the city. The menu is too long to be given here (Instead a photo is posted for the foodies delight).
Back on the road at 1.15 pm, we continue on NH66 upto Ponnani and thereafter we are on some of the most difficult sections of our entire 38 day journey. The sky was cloudy and it was threatening to rain any minute and soon the rains arrived.
Add to this road work and diversion on NH66 due to road widening made this the least enjoyable drive for the next four hours until we merged into NH966a Container Road at Cheranellore.
Fulltankers touched down at Kochi at 7.00 pm.
Photos of welcome at home of fulltankers Zac and CK.
End of an incredible journey! We covered 18 States, 2 UT and travelled 12,456 kms and paid Rs.9,500/- as toll, plus 1100+ litres of diesel and 30+ litres of Ad-blue. All well worth it.
Words cannot describe it. Many dream of making road trips, but few can make it happen. We did it and we thank you for your wishes, prayers, encouragement and following us through our journey.
Signing off for now (till the next time)
#fulltankers
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