Ritz's First Long Trip To Bangalore*Vellore*Chennai*Tirupati


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Finally a long trip with My Ritz LDI after its purchase of 3 years and 30000km !!

The trip started from Hyderabad on 21/6/2014 morning

Trip duration : 21/6 to 25/6/2014
Car used : Ritz LDI, 3 year 30000km old
Places visited : Bangalore,Vellore,Chennai,Tirupati
People on board : Hyderabad-Bangalore and Tirupati-Hyderabad 5 Adults(including my son aged 13y) + 2 Kids(my daughter aged 6 and my BIL son aged 1)
Bangalore-Vellore-Tirupati 7 Adults + 3 Kids

Without boring about the places much I am just giving the day wise visits

21/6/3014

Started from Hyderabad at 7.30am and reached Bangalore at 6pm which includes 2 hours break for breakfast,lunch etc.,
Excellent 4 lane road through out, Max speed 120kmph, average speed 90kmph
Too many tolls on the way which wasted our time instead I felt if somebody is travelling from Hyderabad straight to Bangalore they could have collected the toll in the beginning in one place with total amount, that could save some time.
Ritz was very stable as it is packed with 5 adults and 2 kids and luggage. Best to maintain a speed of 100kmph.

After reaching Bangalore, had a chance to have a meet with Anshuman along with my both the BILs and a friend in Bangalore. Figoian was supposed to join us, but could not due to some personal work.

22/6/2014

Plan was to go to Vellore starting in the morning itself, but due to kids and others getting ready late, we started around 11.30am.
Road was superb till Vellore and managed to reach by 4pm with 7 adults+3 kids on board.
Ritz took all of us without any strain and touched 110kmph easily.
By the time we reach our member Appu was waiting for us. Met us along with our member Pradeep_wheelz and had some snacks and tea. Straight away proceeded to the Golden Temple at Sripuram which is 10km away from Vellore and by the time we reach the crowd was more being a Sunday and the sudden information was Appu wanted to go to Chennai to attend our member bikerboy's daughters first birthday function in the evening. Then we quickly changed the plan and dropped the plan of darshan at temple. Appu took us to a hotel where we checked in for the day and I had some work at Chennai too, so decided that my self and Appu will travel to Chennai in the evening.
Appu drove my Ritz till Chennai and we could manage to reach in 2 hours(135km) and hope Appu will write about my Ritz experience in my Ritz ownership thread. In between we were travelling there was a call from bikerboy with a instant invitation for me to join his daughters birthday party.
We met our members Sethumurugan, Cooldhaya, Octyvin, Karma at the function. Fininished our dinner and reached Appus room around 11pm. The climate in chennai was very humid and sultry, so I could not sleep in his room and at 1am I decided that well go to a hotel and sleep as I need to drive next day to Vellore and Tirupati. At 1am Appu my self searched for a hotel on the mobile net and found a hotel near to his place and luckily they responded and told there is room available. I took my car and switched on GPS and managed to reach the hotel in 10 minutes and settled down for a sleep. I was really an excellent hotel. Thanks appu for all the help without any kind of irritation at 1am.

23/6/2014

Picked Appu from his room at 9am and proceeded to Ambattur where I had my official work. Finished by 10.30am and proceed to Ponamalai where Appu bike was lying. Finished Breakfast together and I left to Vellore and Appu to his office.

I got a message from Figoian on previous night that he is in chennai suddenly to meet some relatives and he will also start back to Bangalore next day morning. since the route was same I was looking for the Figos on my way back to vellore and spotted one or two but they were some body else. Surprisingly at one of the Toll plaza I could see Figoians Figo with "Automotiveindia" sticker. After bit of a chase and honking we both stopped at a tea stall, it was really a surprising meet for us. We had a tea and chit chatted for few minutes and started our trip again.

I managed to reach Vellore by 1.30pm, vacated the hotel and took all my family members and proceed to Golden temple where only my darshan was pending, finished it quickly, had quick lunch at Saravana Bhavan, little shopping and started towards Tirupati around 4 pm. Though it was 100km distance, due to the double road and heavy traffic we could reach Tirumala hills by 9pm.
To our shock the VIP letter I bought for Tirumala accomodation and dharshan become invalid as I need to report with the letter by 2pm if I had to do the break darshan by next morning. So tried for a room till 11.30pm and there was no chance and decided to proceed to Tirupati and settled down in cottage by 1am.

24/6/2014

Started back to Tirumala hills by 8am and we were in special darshan(Rs.300) queue by 10am. As the crowd was more, we could finish our darshan and came out by 4.30pm which was really hectic with kids. As we were completely exhausted for the day, reached back to our accommodation at Tirupati.

25/6/2014

Started from Tirupati at 7.30am towards Hyderabad. Route was via kodur-kadapa-mydukur-kurnool-Hyderabad.

Till Kadapa road was good double road, but with lot of turnings and heavy traffic. After Kadapa till kurnool the 4 laning was being done so it was really painful as some times keep on the left of divider and some times to the right and a last 10km stretch is with full of stones. So tirupati-kurnool 300km took us 8hrs with 1 hr break.
From Kurnool again back on the road of Bangalore-Hyderabad which was 360km and we managed to finish it within 4 hours and reached back to Hyderabad by 8pm. There ends our trip which was bit hectic due to the people on board and bad roads stretch between Tirupati and Kurnool.

Since I was driving most of the time, could not take more pics, hence attaching very few pics here.

Total kilometers travelled : 2000
Total Tolls paid : Hyderabad-Bangalore, Tirupati-Hyderabad Rs. 872/-. Bangalore-Vellore-Chennai-Vellore Rs.330/-
Total fuel : 120Lts
Average FE achieved(100% AC on) : 16.66 which is not very bad as car was full packed with maximum weight all the time.

Happy to meet all the TAI friends at Bangalore,Vellore,Chennai,on highway(Figoian) and my hearty thanks to Appu who looked after the things in Vellore, drove me to Chennai, helped me finding a hotel in midnight, drove me till Ponamalai.

Now see few pics took from my Lumia 620[:)] Hope you enjoyed this short trip report from me.
 

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Re: Ritz first long trip to Bangalore*Vellore*Chennai*Tirupati

Congratulations for the maiden long trip with your Ritz [clap]

Pictures are excellent.

"Only thing : I felt sad for the car, if it can speak it would have screamed for help with 10 people on board". [confused] - just joked.

Thank you RK for sharing
 
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Re: Ritz first long trip to Bangalore*Vellore*Chennai*Tirupati

Thank you Ram Sir. Yes it was overloaded, but believe me since it was Ritz it could take so many people and never ever given us any trouble and we were gliding with same turbo power of Fiat DDIS under the hood. It is really a great car with great engine.
 
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I was waiting for your TL eagerly.And it is good to hear that you had reached your home safely.

Yes, Ritz is really a good car. And I'll write about my experience in your ownership thread soon.

And I'm sure, that you will never forget this trip in your life[;)]

Plan for another trip to Vellore alone. So that, you can leisurely visit the Golden temple and some other places in Vellore(Including my House)[;)]

BTW, Happy meeting you Gurrala Ji. Hope to see you again soon[:)]
 
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Congratulations for completing the trip.
10 people on board ! (even though with 3 kids). How did 7 adult managed to sit in it?

Tight schedule! Happy that you completed without any problem.
 
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Congratualtions for your maiden long trip. Good to see that somany TAI-gers help each other. I'm proud to be a part of this forum.

I need to thank you Gurrala. I asked about road condition from Vellore to Kurnool to our AppU. Appu told me that he has not used this route.

Actally I planned to get my Honda City via this route after taking the delivery. Based on your experiecnce I'm rejecting this route now. Thanks Gurrala.

If you could post the pics of rough road condition, it will help me and others.


Aha...! My 100th Posting.[:D]
 
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Congrats on completing your long trip safely. FE was decent but I expected it to be 18+
Yes Anshuman the FE must look bit less for the DDIS engine, but keep in mind that the car was loaded with 5 adults+2kids and 7 adults+3kids in various stretches and the family luggage filled in the boot. Maintained good speeds of 110/120 in all good roads. The bad roads for almost 300km. So in spite of all this the FE is 16.6kmpl with 100% AC ON all the time.
I was waiting for your TL eagerly.And it is good to hear that you had reached your home safely.
Plan for another trip to Vellore alone. So that, you can leisurely visit the Golden temple and some other places in Vellore(Including my House)[;)]
Yes Appu, it was bit a tight schedule and we come there for sure in future

Congratulations for completing the trip.
10 people on board ! (even though with 3 kids). How did 7 adult managed to sit in it?
7 adults in a ritz ???[surprise] must have been a little tight. congrats on your maiden long trip.
Appus, SR thank you. Yes with the head room and the space in co passenger allowed us to do this. It was unavoidable. It is like my self driving, my one BIL with my daughter in his lap and my son in co passenger, 4 on the rear seat with 2 babies on their lap. This was from Bangalore-Vellore(200km) with a break for the night and again from vellore-tirupati(100km) and even to Tirumala ghat road up and down. Ritz steers quite comfortable with its great powerful engine.

Congratualtions for your maiden long trip. Good to see that somany TAI-gers help each other. I'm proud to be a part of this forum.

I need to thank you Gurrala. I asked about road condition from Vellore to Kurnool to our AppU. Appu told me that he has not used this route.

Actally I planned to get my Honda City via this route after taking the delivery. Based on your experiecnce I'm rejecting this route now. Thanks Gurrala.

If you could post the pics of rough road condition, it will help me and others.
]
Yes, I am really glad that TAI members are really excellent all across the country. I had wonderful time with them every time and received excellent support all the time either it is Delhi,Mumbai,Bangalore,Chennai,Vellore,Kochi,Vizag,Hyderabad. This is the beauty of TAI community.

Yes Ghandi, best that you avoided that route. From vellore till Tirupati, Kadapa the roads okay but with lot of turns and heavy lorry traffic. From Kadapa till Kurnool the 4 laning going on so it is really painful to drive when a new road is being constructed as you cannot guess the patches and sudden lane changes and it is more horrible in nights. Oh I couldn't take any pics in that stretch as I was driving solely negotiating all this mess.
 
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Congratulations Gurallaji for your maiden long trip [clap] . Pics are really nice and your ritz looks superb with those blackened rims.

But one thing i saw you loaded 10 people (including 2 babies [shock] ) in your Ritz. My humble request is "please never overload your car. It is not only bad for the car but also not safe at all". IMO you could have booked a Cab.
 
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Thank you DJD. Yes it was very hectic with so many people and I really got tired of driving carefully. Yes I have decided that I will never drive again like that and this could be my first and last long trip(500+km) with so many on board. After coming back I felt seriously that I could have opted train for this trip and hire the vehicle wherever required.
 
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^^ Well it happens and this is how you learn. Next time plan with 4-5 people max and be happy. :)

I remember old days, where we used to fit 7 people in our santro. That makes me chuckle every time i think about that.
 
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^^Yes, buddy it was hectic but we need some memories like this to remember for long time !!

There is a difference driving in a straight 4 lane road and a double road with twists and turns. A straight road will give you comfortable drive, but it could be life less and the other one might be bit painful but you are in action all the time and will be happy after you finish the drive. So my experience is something like that[:)]
 

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