My mom did not have great experience from 7 day long trip to South India last year. She actually does not like travelling long stretches for many days that too in car. But my father is crazy about driving and travelling. So I took midway by choosing a place where we dont have to move around a lot but still it will be lot of fun.
Factors considered were -
- Less movement for sightseeing
- Driving distance not more than 8 hours
- Good road condition
So we decided Beach. In 2012, Anjana and I had gone to Malpe and were amused by its finest golden sand & flat beach.
So it was grand, A GRAND FAMILY TRIP
Ohhhh okk my bad, forgot to introduce you to guests of this trip - Originally it was 9 members namely My mom, dad, Anjana, Ashwini(my elder bro), Lovely(bro’s wife), Shubh (my nephew), Logan & Victor (my two Labradors now about 11 months old) and myself. So we decided to take both cars Linea and A-star. However, we had new addition in guest list after a lot of convincing done by me (using saaam, daaam, danddd, bheddd). Additions were Aparna (my cousin elder sis) Tushar (her husband), Little (my cousin younger bro. Little only by name otherwise he goes beyond 6 ft) and Shalu (Tushar’s sister). So now were a total of 13 members with addition of a new car Duster of Jizs(Tushar, I also call him Jizs).
So considering a family of this magnitude with people from almost all age groups and living organism from two different species (excuse me in case I missed a few species stuck to living bodies invisible to naked eye), we decided to visit Malpe due to its family friendly beaches and lazed around mood.
Malpe Beach - a place worth visiting
Malpe comes under coastal belt of Karnataka and practically first ideal beach destination if you start moving from South to North. It is about 420 kms from Bangalore and about 60 kms from nearest airport city Mangalore. It is about 5 kms from Udupi town and about 10 kms from Manipal town. Malpe’s beach can beat Goa any day if not for the nightlife and developed tourist facilities in Goa. Malpe town is practically a fishing village (you literally feel it with the strong stench when you enter the town). with hardly any choice of accommodation. There are just 2-3 organised resorts and nothing else beyond that. So if you want a cheaper stay option, you either have to go to Udupi town or Manipal town, both easily manageable in 5-15 mins time if you have your own car.
Bangalore to Malpe Route
We left Bangalore on 3rd October (Friday) around 3.30 PM from Kanakpura Road. Took NICE ring road to Tumkur road (about Rs 90 per car). After we exited at Tumkur road, immediately entered the toll road after paying Rs 20. You have to take a the exit towards Mangalore highway before Neelamangala junction (there are enough signboards). As soon as you take left, you will see the new 4 lane toll road starting again. We tanked up both Linea and A-star on HP petrol bunk and moved further towards 1st toll plaza on this road. We stopped to be joined by Duster right after toll plaza. Moreover, we wanted to feast on the mouth watering mutton masala cooked by my mom. Soon all non-veggies were overloading themselves with rice and mutton whereas veggies with paneer. We started at around 5.45pm from there after everybody was satisfied with quantity dumped in the tummy.
Road till Hassan is just amazing and we zoomed past the stretch with not much pain. Now there are two ways to go to Malpe from Hassan onwards. One is you keep going straight on highway to Mangalore and then take right to Malpe. This route remains in terrible condition due to excessive rains in Shiradi Ghat section. Even trucks scrape their bottom, leave alone cars like Linea and A-star. Government is planning some tunnel based road in future but that is too far away. The other route is via Belthangady which mostly passes through divider less but low traffic road. We stuck to latter.
So you have to take right from Hassan town towards Belur. Hassan to Belur is divider less but wide road where you can easily race at above 100. However, be careful of sudden dividers raised on sharp curves which could become fatal if you miss them at night while taking pass from other vehicle (my dad faced it in Linea). I was leading the troop with A-star followed by Linea by my dad and Duster by Jizs.
From Belur take left towards Belthangady via Mudigere. This road is also good with narrower road but manageable as there is hardly any traffic. People started loosing patience as it was getting night and we were also concerned about dinner. 20 mins past Mudigere, you will hit Ghat stretch which will be welcomed by big iron barricade(open all times). Just before this barricade, you have shops which are open till late in the night and you can find decent food and other supplies (except fuel). We finished our dinner there and moved further up the deep dark forest in the ghat section. We stopped in middle of ghat at around 11.30PM in the night because Bhabhi(bro’s wife) has motion sickness which aggravates on curvy road. But the youth gang saw this time as opportunity and we clicked some Ramsay Brothers type horror pictures in the middle of road and Jungle with no lights or vehicle around.
From Belthangady, we took road to Moodbidri and further on to Karkala. You will find some and only rough patch of entire journey between Belthangady & Moodbidri. 15 mins past Karkala you have take left towards Manipal again welcomed by good stretch of road throughout. We reached Manipal around 2.15AM and retired in our home stay at Parnakuti Homestay.
Our Homestay - Parnakuti Homestay in Manipal (or say Malpe or Udupi also)
Parnakuti Homestay is located in Manipal. The owner bought a single storey property and built 2 floors above it. They have stay options from 3BHK, 2BHK, 1BHK, etc. We found the house and the rooms very spacious with almost all amenities available. They have a full fledged gas stove based kitchen on first floor which can be used by anybody there. In every house also they have kept cooking arrangements on induction cooker. Best part is they allow pets as they have all kind of pets present in their home stay like dogs, cats, birds, turtles, rabbit, etc. So you have an in-house zoo right there.
Next morning everybody got up by 10.00 and we left for beach by 11.00. We stopped at a small AC south-indian eatery on the way where they also allowed us to take Logan and Victor in the restaurant. 13 of us ate like world is going to end and this is the last meal. We ate Vadas, idli, dosa, onion dosa, puri bhaji, etc and guess what, how much was the bill - only Rs 720. It cant get any better and we all thanked the restaurant guy for his great food.
Oh We reached the Beach
Finally we reached THE MALPE BEACH. As soon as Logan and Victor saw the water, they went crazy and ran like sky’s going to fall. I was still in car so Jizs and Bro ran for rescue getting them back in command. We chose a point to camp and water lovers went for dip.
Even if you go 100 meters ahead in water at Malpe, still water will rise only upto your chest level. Other than a few occasional tides, you can comfortably stand and enjoy water. Also, there is no reverse current which is the most dangerous reason for maximum sea related accidents.
It was field day for Logan and Victor
We all formed a gang in water and we appointed special edition ‘BOUNCERS’ - Logan and Victor. They chased many tourists away by their rambo-mambo dance and run on the beach. I had bad time running after them chasing them not to chase others. They were not chasing any person but the objects on shore lying here and there. But everybody who fell in the line of their charge thought they were going after them and so it was almost stampede like situation on beach with people hiding, carrying, lapping their kids away from the two uncontrolled monsters. Somehow we got hold of them and then they started chasing tides in the sea. Labradors are natural swimmers still we were scared that they may get tired and start drowning. So Anjana and I used to hold them in water and in the process they scratched (inadvertently) us at various places.
Marley & Me
After about half an hour of swimming, I got them out of water and a scene from movie “Marley & Me” danced in front of my eyes. Victor after coming out of water immediately started rotating at same place while sniffing the ground and by the time I could have realised, he released a full load of shit barely 3 ft away from water. I felt so embarrassed while my mom(sitting near our camping site) watched all this. We are brahmins where any stuff like shit, pee were used to be treated with cow-dung or lot of cleaning in ancient days. We may have moved on but you cant change the foundation of a culture. I found disposed paper plates on beachside with which I picked up all the shit and threw it far away from beach. Try imaging my brahmin mom watching her loved younger brahmin son picking up dog’s shit in soiled paper plate(dont know what was it used for) and running like crazy away from the beach and then not even washing his hands with soap or something.
Water and The Gang
Unaware of all this our gang was enjoying the water with people trying all sort of strokes possible. Bhabhi who swam in river before this showed her swimming marvel by some fron stroke while swimming pool trained Jizs tried his hand backstroke which always made him taste salt. Best part was my sis flexing her swimming muscles was followed continuously by Jizs in case her swimming skills had given way to water. When Little used to swim, everybody else used to turn back because his gigantic body splashed water more than a Bosch car wash can do. Bro was playing safe and so he did not try any swimming while Anjana was showing off her way to sleep(her favorite job) even in water by floating on her back. Shalu was lost in all this and was continuously trying to locate herself in water. Babu and Bapu (I call my Dad Bapu) were on the shallow end playing in just knee deep water. Mom adopted wait and watch policy to form strategy for entering water.
Malpe Beach has this one more interesting thing. You can take fresh water bath in one of the various pay & use bathrooms which is not commonly found on Indian Beaches. We all got fresh by 6.00PM and then we started the culinary journey.
Malpe Beach - a paradise for sea-food lovers
Right at the beach, you have multiple stalls for sea food especially fish. We got fried Pomfret for Rs 35 each(impossible price), Bangda for Rs 20 each, crabs for Rs 40 each and so on. We left no part of stomach untouched with fish and sea food. Vegetarians resorted to soybean chilly, veg chily, fried rice and noodles.
Finally we called it a day. Everybody was off to sleep. Victor got loose motions, it seems he drank too much sea water. We were carrying their medicine which came handy.
St Mary’s Island - A must visit from Malpe
Next day morning all of got early and by 8.00, we were at Gandhi Statue on Malpe Beach. Reason was we had to go to St Mary’s island by boat which charges Rs 150 per person to and fro. We had special arrangement made with one boat operator and so he gave us freedom of spending as much time as we ant at Island. The ride lasted for about 10-12 mins and there we were. I really had tough time getting Logan and Victor off and on the boat as boat had some structural design issue and there was no clear port. We were carrying elaborate breakfast with us which we enjoyed for next 45 mins. After that, 5 of us along with Logan and Victor started island exploration. Island has some strange formation of rocks(must be volcanic rock ages ago) and it had those long grasses right from movie Jurasic Park 2. But exploration was worth and we enjoyed the place till 12.00Noon. Later we returned to Malpe Beach where we played Volleyball in water for sometime. It was time to say good bye to our Duster friends as they had to catch up with work on Monday morning. Sis, Jizs, Little and Shalu left around 3.30 PM directly for Bangalore taking same route.
We enjoyed till evening repeating the ritual of eating fish and sea food. Everybody retired by 10.00 to sleep.
The sad part begins - We are going back
Next morning, I could sense a feeling of sadness on everybody’s face as we were going back leaving behind the blue water, golden beach and unending supply of inexpensive sea-food. But as every journey has to come to an end, ours was not an exception. We started back at around 11.00AM and with few lunch and tea stops, we managed to reach Bangalore by 10.00PM (owing to crazy traffic in Bangalore city due to incessant rains).
This would be an unforgettable trip not only because of the destination but because of the participants as every single of them were adding extra flavour to the trip. If you travel, try travelling in a big family group(which is now very rare to be seen) and watch your fun increase many folds in the same destination. Thanks to all the fun mates - Sis, Jizs, Giant Little, Shalu, Bro, Bhabhi, Babu, Dad, Mom, Anjana and of course our two Mambo masters - Logan and Victor.
One thing which I missed here was that the entire group complexion turned to brown to dark to black as nobody was carrying sunscreen(sunscreen will also turn tan here) and as if we really cared about our changing color. Only two of us were not going to face racism - Victor because even deepest darkness will get shy in front of him and Logan because he is the bright boy. All for now, over and out
Quick Facts
Bangalore to Malpe - 420kms
Time - 10 hours (with breaks)
Road - 4 lane till Hassan and good roads from Hassan till Malpe
Route - Bangalore-Hassan-Belur-Belthangady-Moodbidri-Karkala-Malpe
Weather - Pleasant to Hot
Best time to go - October till March
Hotels - You will easily get something from 500-3000 in places like Udupi, Manipal, etc
Ideal number of days to spend - 2-3 full days are more than enough
Food to try - Try seafood on local stalls right at beach
Adventure - You can enjoy one of the many water sports (which we did not) like Jet scooter, paragliding, etc
Must carry - Anti Tan lotion else you will understand the meaning of racial discrimination after you are back from Malpe
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