In short it was a road trip from Pune to Delhi and to elongate it was a mesmerising, lively, interesting and a journey well travelled.
Now to begin with, we started at around mid afternoon from Pune towards Mumbai. The sun was bright as it could be but within an hour of our exciting road trip there were huge dark clouds welcoming us on Mumbai-Pune expressway. The droplets blinded the window panes which made us to halt for another few minutes to avoid our front glass breaking from the pebble-like droplets. Anyhow we struddled across and reached Mumbai around 21 hours IST.
The next day we left from Mumbai and within 3 hours reached Daman and Diu which was humid and sandy. ![Photo of Western highway via road 10/13 by Ish]()
The beach was around 14 kms inside the main highway, so we decided to continue our journey towards Ahmedabad. The city Ahmedabad was around 7 hours from Daman Diu. Without taking any stop we continued driving towards Ahmedabad. We reached the city around 17 hours. The Roads of NH 8 were broad and well metalled. The only strange thing was the numerous tolls we encountered after every 20 minutes of travel in the state. Besides making broad trading highway, the Modi govt really took a miss of the several toll plazas that were established at every 4-5 miles of the way. Anyhow we strudded across the state cursing each toll of total 11 tolls that we witnessed across the state. The highest toll amount that we paid along the whole journey.* grunts*
The sun was at its full course of spreading the twilight hues, we stopped for a bite at Dominoes and continued driving. We planned to reach Udaipur and call it a day off to catch up with our energy. We rolled pass the highway for another 4 hours to reach Udaipur. The weather was beautiful in the Udaipur city. We managed to Book a hotel online just few minutes before we checked in.
To our amazement, we were upgraded from a normal to a premium suite being their 100th goibibo customers. This being finally the best gift of the day, we were all grins. ![Photo of Western highway via road 11/13 by Ish]()
The next day we were early birds and left the hotel to explore the city in search of the local food. We headed towards the Fateh sagar lake the centric tourist attraction. But to our surprise the markets were all shut and we were told they open not before 11 hrs IST. Helpless us we clicked few selfies and paved our way towards the City palace amidst the city bazaar. It was built over a period of nearly 400 years being contributed by several kings of the dynasty, starting by the Maharana Udai Singh II as the capital of the Sisodia Rajput clan in 1559.
Standing tall and magnificent with wonderful paintings, arms and amunitions, it stood the test of time representing glorious history.We grabbed a bite there in one of the restaurants inside the palace. We then said our final goodbyes and checked out from Ramada and left on our another destination Ajmer which was 4 hours from Udaipur.We drove endlessly towards Ajmer and reached there by afternoon. We directly headed towards the Dargah which was again situated among the well thronged bazaar. We paid our respect to the Dargah shareef, dropped out letters to baba, laid out chaadddar in the Dargah and paid the khadim. It was a blessing to be able to visit the shrine. The only thing that hurt me was the security and the ill management of the people there. At the entrance you could spot male and female police guards abusing each other and pushing people inside and outside. Anyways we left the place as early as we could and drove another 2 hours to reach Jaipur. The climate was a bliss, though the road from Ajmer to Jaipur is a little broken and bumpy via NH 79. I managed to take a shot from the car of the setting sun's beautiful cast on the sky. ![Photo of Western highway via road 13/13 by Ish]()
Reaching Jaipur, we stopped to grab some food consisting of daal baati and churma at a local restaurant at raja park and continued driving another 7 hours to reach Delhi. The fretting part was when this 7 hours turned into a 10 hours journey with trucks and big canters thronging the NH8. National Highway 8 is a 4-lane National Highway in India. According to estimates, it is the busiest highway in the subcontinent. Travelling this highway after 18 hours should be a big no if you wish to save your time. We finally reached our place Delhi concluding the road trip of western highway to reach the North.
Reaching Jaipur, we stopped to grab some food consisting of daal baati and churma at a local restaurant at raja park and continued driving another 7 hours to reach Delhi. The fretting part was when this 7 hours turned into a 10 hours journey with trucks and big canters thronging the NH8. National Highway 8 is a 4-lane National Highway in India. According to estimates, it is the busiest highway in the subcontinent. Travelling this highway after 18 hours should be a big no if you wish to save your time. We finally reached our place Delhi concluding the road trip of western highway to reach the North.
