The dates -26/27/28 Sept 2009. We left Pune at 7-30 AM and took the route Chandni Chowk-Bhugaon-Pirangut-Paud-Mulshi, stopped by breakfast at Quick Bite on the way. If you miss this point, you will not get anything to eat for a long long way. This is the only good restaurant on the way and is on the right side of the road, after you pass Mulshi and Palasdhari.
After refreshing ourselves with some excellent batata wada, pohe and tea, we resumed our journey onto Diveagar via Tamhini ghat. The ghat is beautiful in the rains, but extremely lonely. There is not a single place where you can get any help, in case something goes wrong. No tyre repairs, no snack joints, no shops at all. Once we covered the Tamhini Ghat, there was a really sharp left turn going towards Mangaon via Nizampur. If you miss this, you will keep going straight towards Kolad and increase a few kms to your journey. Through this ride, the ghats as well as the approach roads to Mulshi were very bad roads, so our speed remained around 30-40 with hardly any chance to shift the car into 4th gear.
Once we had descended the ghat, we got a blacktop on the way to Mangaon. It was a few kms long 60 ft wide road and was newly laid. At Mangaon, we took a left turn to merge with NH17 and then took a right turn towards Morba within a 0.5 kms distance. The Morba ghat roads were well laid out and the ride was excellent. We reached our destination at 12-45 PM (5 hrs 15 mins drive)
We had booked at Ambience Cottages, Diveagar. The surroundings were fantastic with all coconut trees, supari trees, and banana trees all around. The cottage itself was small, but kept well. The bathrooms left a lot to be desired and could have been far cleaner. The food wasn’t so great, so we decided to venture and find some other places to eat. Evenings were at the Diveagar beach, which was fantastic and very clean.
The next day, we took the coastal route and went all the way to Shrivardhan (18 kms) and then onwards to Harihareshwar (18 kms) via the coast. We stopped several times enroute to enjoy the scenic beauty. After the temple visit, we headed back to Diveagar for lunch at Suvarna Ganesh Khanaval. The food here was also just about OK. Evening dinners were at Suhas Bapat eatery and food there was just fantastic with everything steaming hot and modaks to top the meal.
On our way back, we decided to take an alternative route. We left Diveagar at 9-30 AM, and then after reaching Mangaon at 10-45 , continued on NH 17 towards Mumbai. After we passed Kolad, there was a road on the right going towards Pali. We took that and reached Khopoli and onwards to Lonavala at around 12-45 (2 hours flat). The road was good. After lunch at Lonavala, we returned back to Pune at around 2-45 ( Exactly the same time, but we had ended up covering 45 kms more distance). The journey was a lot more enjoyable though with good roads.