Pune to Chikhaldara-Part 1

"Ganapati Bappa Morya", said we all in chorus as always we do (it is a spontaneous must!) when we embark on a long drive, but our first stop was not a tea-tapari as always...

We- Chi. Ahan (age 15 months at the time of tour), Mummy, Ujwal and yours truly, finally started at around 4.15pm (October 20, 2011) from our home in our Fiatank (Palio 1.2 NV ELX), not before exceeding our target by a whopping 4 hours!! And the first stop ,which normally is at a good tea-tapari, this time was rather un-usual -it was at Sony world, Aundh to conclude a much-debated DSLR buy - a Sony Alpha 35 SLT:-)

After spending about 40 odd mins there, we beat city-traffic to come out of city limits and started cruising along the fantastic Pune-Aurangabad Highway. This was the first time that we had left home after 6pm for a long trip, and this was going to be a really long trip and that too on a rather busy highway…So, I was kind of thrilled and khote kashala bolu, a little concerned too (night highway-driving), but off-course did not show off or talked about it..Probably, Ujwal also was feeling the same way and behaving too in the same way - teri-bhi-chup-meri-bhi-chup:-) Actually about a couple of years ago, we had a similar situation wherein we left Kolhapur at around 7pm and reached Pune at around 12..But the difference as compared to this trip was, we had travelled on Pune-Kolhapur-Pune route a couple of times earlier. And also there were Mummy, Abhi and Dhanu (Mr./Ms. Bro-in-law) with us. I think going this time with Ahan in tow made such feelings to arise!!

The turn-downs were as usual the Tollbooths and a major traffic-jam at some really long river-bridge somewhere after Ranjangaon, at about 20:00. We were indeed surprised to digest it at these hours...

Reached the Smile-stone at 20:28. Ahan was still awake and enjoying the trucks and buses en-route. We had our dabba there. A note- the hotel people really give a damn to those travelers who carry tiffin along. We were made to sit in the open area- outside the main hall, as our fault was that we had our dabba with us... surely, it was going to be the last time that we stopped at this Restaurant:-) It was a little cold out there, but was manageable. Ahan, who was enjoying the break thankfully ate some of his dabba. We also had tea after finishing dabba, which I had prepared at home - not that I like to carry self-made tea on trips, but this time, it was more of a compulsion - so as not to waste the left-over milk at home, as we were off to long vacation:-)

 

One plus point was that Ahan really enjoyed the Goose and Emus' who are kept in a zoo-like arrangement over there..

I also saw the Prasanna's Multi-axle Merc bus to Nagpur, which takes dinner-stop at this hotel.. it reminded me that, during my numerous trips to Nagpur by this bus during Ujwal's stay at Nagpur (pre/post delivery period), during the dinner-stop, I used to see many of cars stopping at this restaurant - I used to wonder will it happen ever that I will also stop at this place at this time en-route to Nagpur - and this was that day!! I wanted to go, meet the drivers of the bus for a casual chat (I know most of the drivers now by face) and also to enquire about the accident involving the very same bus from albeit on Nagpur to Pune, which took place about a couple of months back, but decided against it as we were getting late.

Before, we left, received call from Rahiman - a dear friend and classmate till 10th who is settled now at Middle-east- I happened to speak to him after a gap of about good 12-15 years..Incidently he met my sis Pallavi on FB, who shared my no. and told him that we are on our way to Nagpur - FB chi kimaya, baki kai!! I could not speak in details, again cos' we were getting late, but mentioned to him that I will call him back for a detailed chat... Before leaving, called up the Hotel Classic Inn, Aurangabad and informed that we are getting late - I had found out this hotel on net that day morning itself and after some research, zeroed in for our overnight stay (they had accepted telebooking).

Left Smile Stone at about 9.30pm. I saw that the Prasanna Merc was ready to leave as well.. After about a couple of kms, there was she - trailing us wanting to overtake.. Gave her a long run for her big money for a good distance before finally letting her to overtake, as I did not want to take risk of speeding very high at night hours with family in...

Ahan slept immediately after we left and I think Ujwal and Mummy too after about some time. The road was good, the atmosphere was good too and offcourse the music too with Jagjit Singh for company!! - indeed enjoyed the experience.. Reached Aurangabad at around 23:40. Saw much more traffic on roads at these hours that I had anticipated.. And did not face any issues to find the hotel and finally we were in the hotel room at about 23:51. Ahan was still asleep.. After Ahan's sleeping arrangements were done, the first thing Ujwal (the photo buff in our home) did was to put the Camera-battery for charging..:-)

So, till now the distance covered on odo was 258kms in about 5 ½ hours - when we go to Dapoli, we cover about 220 kms in a day. These days with Ahan in toe, we usually take 8/9 hours to reach!! Again for the records, the most efficient drive was in 4 ½ hours, about 3 years ago, which included a lunch-break of 30 odd mins!!)...

A uniqueness with this drive till Aurngabad was that we just took a single stop during the whole journey - when we make day trips, we have atleast 3/4 stops – khana-peena (Peshal Chai, offcourse J) stops, photography stops etc., as fortunately Ujwal and myself agree (among those finger-countable things J) to the motto - enjoying the journey is as important as reaching the destination:-) And with Ahan now, he also enjoys such stops, however a rule that we usually follow is we do not take any stop, if he is asleep- he can not stay so, normally if the car is stationery for more than 5 mins or so..(one recent example was during return-trip from Dapoli a couple of months ago, when Ahan had exhausted himself like anything after playing and playing non-stop with scant respect to sleep, he slept immediately as soon as we left Dapoli..we were driving, driving and driving, till he woke up just before Mapro (after Mahabaleshwar) – it was a non-stop, in truest sense drive for about 3.5 hours till then..he must have had mercy on us that he woke up at the right time, near Mapro J And we do not remember when we had driven such non-stop in entire driving history of us of about 65K kms!!)

So the experience till now was memorable..The next stop was Jalgaon where my cousin-sis (Anjutai) stays. We decided to leave at about 5am the next morning. We woke up at about 4.30am and then after taking bath - I also took L, I must have been in sleep-induced comma or something akin to that to do so:-), we started again at about 6:35. Ahan babu was asleep, as he was when we reached:-) And not to forget, Ujwal had taken the first photograph from camera (of Mummy) before we left the room!!

Again we saw, the Morning-walkers were already on the road.. asked a group of elderly ladies about directions to Jalna road. It was pretty close to the Hotel, reached there within 5/7 mins.. Did a tank-full at the decent pump that was there on Jalna road within City limits itself- this is when Ahan woke up, as we had stopped there. And with sleep completed neatly, he was fresh as a morning cup of special chai... After we left, We actually started searching for a decent chai-tapari, but could not locate one..finally after driving about for an hour or so, came across a decent-looking hotel, so decided to upgrade our tea-break to a snacks break. This hotel near Fulambri turned to be a great choice – somebody had aptly said- sabra ka phal meetha hota hainJ We had ekdum sahi Pohe, Idlis and lai bhari special chaha:-) Actually more than that we liked it for Ahan, as he had whale of a good time with the big garden, empty spaces to walk around there. The hotel prop. was a friendly young chap and Ahan went to his arms without any fuss - from the time he has started recognizing faces around, he does this with very chosen few-- yet to decode this phenomenon J ... And that chap too was more than happy to play with Ahan - it did help us to finish breakfast a little early. Ahan also had his breakfast of Laadu etc... And this is where for the first-time we shot many photos using the new camera, the results were impressive...

We left after spending about 40/45 mins over there. The road was ok ok types - single lane with potholes as usual..Saw the famous Ajintha caves passing by on our left. I was looking for the restaurant that Saurabh and I had visited when we had done Jalgaon-Ajintha bike trip - about 8/9 years ago..we both had gone to Jalgaon to attend Shirish (Baba Bhole's) marriage. But could not pinpoint one, although a couple of similar restaurants were seen passing by.. Just as when we came nearer to Jalgaon, the road was turning busier with traffic. Interestingly saw a lot of cars and bikes parked near a factory kind of structure on our left, when Jalgaon was about 20/30 kms away. As we crossed it, we could not gather the reason, but we faintly saw a flex with Phataka-photos..Later on Bhauji clarified, its indeed a Phataka-factory, which sells those at a discount, hence there was rush..And that fellow’s factory had been actually raided by the Tax-snoops recently itself…

We reached Jalgaon at around 11:01, odo -426. Thanks to Ujwal's sharp memory, we did not find any issues in reaching Anjutai's home - we had been to her home enroute Nagpur-Pune, about 3 years back, but we had then reached Jalgaon at around 21.30 ..(had started at about 10.30 from Nagpur, well that’s a candidate for another travelogue....)

We had very good time with Anjutai, Bhauji (who had specially come early to home that day), Omkar- son and yes Jimmy the Doberman...initially thought, Ahan will be scared to see such a big bhu-bhu around with her a lot bigger bhu-bhu (barking), but he was at peace, giving us peace of mind..Had a great and tudumb potbhar jewan..Ahan also took his bath and lunch neatly (pinnacle of peace of mind!!)..

And when I spoke with Bhauji about further route via Edlabad in MP that we had planned to travel to Chikhaldara, he strongly advised against it due to the fact that during the last leg of the journey, we would have been crossing tribal villages in MP at nightly hours and these people are known to misguide travelers - he himself had very bad experience of this phenomenon a few years back. He instead suggested the route 'Jalgaon-Bhusawal-Khamgaon-Shegaon-Akot-Paratwada-Chikhaldara'. Also he immediately called up his regular Driver to enquire about best route to Chikhaldara and he also suggested the same route and also advised against the Edlabad route.

This was indeed a turning point, a negative one rather, as we were highly excited about the Edlabad route due to 2 reasons - a chance to wander around in hitherto (for us) un-explored MP region and the last leg of about 80 kms would have been a drive via deep forest... In the hindsight, we should have reached Jalgaon early and left for further journey before noon...But we had missed this opportunity now..So we decided to take this new route..(but this will remain as a dream and some or other day, we are going to make it happen!) We left Anjutai's home at around 15:00 and marched over to Jalgaon MIDC to see the new Rubber-processing factory that Bhauji had setup (he has now total of 4 small/medium factories in the MIDC)...This factory visit was a good one - reminded me of the Industrial training visits during my B.Tech. (yes during those days, we had more than double such visits as compared to a BE fellow from say Pune varsity!!) days. And this where Ahan had his first close brush with truck, his favorite vehicle on planet Earth, (it had come to the factory to pickup finished products),. He enjoyed the close-up photography sessions with this truck:-)

We left the factory at around 15:30 and started for Bhusawal...It was a kind of 'reverse' déjà-vu experience to see the tea-tapari where I had met my friend Umya (Umesh Varade from BATU), Bhusawal Thermal station etc (cos' we had traveled the same highway in reverse direction during Nagpur-Jalgaon trip..). The highway was in far better shape this time..The traffic was also not much heavy..Just after Bhusawal, we passed by the left turn heading towards Edlabad - another sigh:-(

Ahan had not slept for a second during his Jalgaon-stay. So he slept pretty soon when we started, but not after watching many trucks traveling around...

Abhi and Dhanu (Mr. & Ms. Bro-in-law) alongwith Kaka-Kaku (Dhanu's parents) and Dhaval (her brother) have left Nagpur at about 17.30 for Chikhaldara in Kaka's brand new Chevy Spark..We were slightly worried for them as leaving so late would mean reaching Chikhaldara late night..And I was told about the spiraling ghat to Chikhaldara from Paratwada, which is supposed to be very difficult to maneuver…

After Ahan slept, Ujwal started looking at Maharashtra Road atlas (we always carry it with us on such long trips, except offcourse to Dapoli) to check the route. She had noticed that there is a shortcut, which would have resulted in avoiding going to Khamgaon all the way to reach Akot. So we said lets check on Bing  maps and took a brief stop at the junction just outside Malkapur where there is a diversion, which takes you inside the city. (By the way one more diversion here- when searched on net, I did observe that the distance from Pune to Chikhaldara (using same route) was mentioned as different on multiple sites!! And by far, I have found the directions/distances mentioned on Bing maps to be close to reality are useful! Microsoft scores here!!). We had to stop there, as if the other route was to be taken, we would have gone from Malkapur city. As usual found at such places, there were a lot of Chai-taparis around.. As car was stationery, Ahan also had woke up, just like he almost always does when we take a stop while he is sleeping.. I took him along and reached a decent looking tapari.. The owner when requested for Special chai, immediately asked - chai me shakkar kam hi chahiye na... ..When I asked him why this question, he nonchalantly said - aamchyakadalya lokana sakhar jara jast ch lagte, mhanun vicharle (local customers require rather extra sugar in tea, hence this question)..He had recognized somehow that I do not belong to local people - I had hardly spoken a couple of words –only those while placing order for tea, thats all.. And Palio was parked on the other side of the road so no chance to see the number-plate too (I had to cross the road to visit his tapari..) And this tea was really really very special in taste- we all (including Ahan!) liked it very much....

About maps - we had to login to those sites by taking out the TP (an IBMer's slang for a ThinkPad laptop!) and using Tata Photon.. quite a time consuming exercise.. and unnecessary too, but we got to know about this much later when Abhi - the most tech-savvy among us (and yours truly enjoys being at the bottom in the scale!!), educated us that Ujwal's E5 has inbuilt Nokia maps - but it was when we met at Chikhaldara!! And the kind of tech-savyy she is, she did use it during our return trip!!

After some lookup, we decided not to follow the short-cut and proceeded along the pre-decided route. We crossed Nandura at about 19:30 and were soon at the famous Maruti (Hanuman ji) temple at our left. This is to my understanding one of its kind of a Maruti temple. The really big Maruti idol (murtee) is really daunting and has got a unique aura. There was proper lighting arrangements done, which was giving a good view… Ahan woke up immediately as we stopped there for a dekko and he really liked the murtee..he desperately wanted to see it as closely as possible, but due to paucity of time, we decided to move on quickly…

So there we entered Khamgaon (there is a diversion again – taking a right turn takes you to bypass, thus avoiding the city travel).. The city was bigger than I had expected. It was lively at that point of time as we were plying on the main road.. Asked for the road-directions to Shegaon. This road was better again as I had thought about - must be because it was leading to Shegaon!! We reached Shegaon at about 20:30. Again a night-journey had started in altogether different backdrop.. Shegaon was also relative bigger. While we did not exactly cross the famous Gajanan Maharaj temple, we made a promise to come back there again specially for a Darshan... We did cross the Railway station building - hundreds of time I must have been to Shegaon Rly station during journey to-from Nagpur, but this was the first time that I was on the other side of the table (platform!)...

As it was a dinner time, we inquired many about the nice restaurant (actually had saw many Dhaba restaurants on outskirts of Shegaon, but we made a mistake of not stopping there) and came to know about 3 options - 2 proper restaurants and another was the mess at the Devsthan, which was ruled out as we were late already...And while we were told that the other 2 restaurants are nice ones, those were actually nothing but a little bigger tapri-look-alikes.. Also as we were getting truly late, we decided to skip the dinner and give priority to reach Chikhaldara at the earliest... Actually we were not feeling quite hungry at that point of time, but we had this in mind that Shegaon being the last known place enroute, better to grab something there itself..

Enquired to Akot road and started this next phase..  Just as we took this road, there we saw a Check post where a person in civil dress stopped us.. Was wondering how come such check-post in this part of the world and that too it was working at such late hours.. A person approached to me with a notebook in hand and started asking a few questions - kuthun aalat, kuthe chalale, regularly ha road use karta ka (came from where, going where, whether frequent traveler on this road etc.) When I asked the purpose behind, he smiled and told that they are doing a survey of road-users about feasibility of converting the road till Akot into a 4 lane:-) It was a pleasant surprise - how come someone from a Govt. dept (should be PWD, I guess) makes and effort to actually understand user's (customer's) opinion...Strongly felt there should be some connection with Pune's own metro project - where to my knowledge efforts are made to understand every Punekar's opinion about to have the Metro underground or Elevated, to keeping to its true tradition, these discussions are going round and round and round!!!

Immediately after we crossed this check post, the biggest shock was awaiting us.. The road was in such a bad shape that to use the cliche, we were wondering whether to call it a road itself:-( A just-about two lane stretch of about 25 kms, which was lonely like anything, with just a couple of very small towns in between...Rest of the time, it was fields/trees all around with just darkness, which was getting pierced by upper-headlights of the Palio! The only company was of the potholes, of varied sizes and shapes...really frustrating to drive at just about 30-40 kmph continuously, always choosing which pothole is best to be embraced:-) ...I was more worried as, because of upsize from 165/80/R13 to 175/70/R13 I have observed that the ground clearance has become slightly lower.. Now I had got the link to the raison d'etre of that Checkpost:-) finally after about an hour or so, there came a T-section and we took left and did enjoy a sense of freedom!! This was the first of its kind experience for the Palio as well and she did an excellent job in absorbing all these shocks, I would say:-)

The new road was wider and was with just a few potholes, and yes with relatively higher traffic-density- I guess this was the road that was coming from Akola.. Finally we reached Akot at around 21:50. Akot also seemed to be a big city, roads busy at this time too...A thought came to my mind, like Khamgaon/ Akot, there are so many places in our own Maharashtra about which we know so little, that you get such surprises!! Asked a couple of times for the directions towards Paratwada..We really had to make our way through sharp-turning bylanes to reach out to this road.

Abhi and team had reached Paratwada till this time. I am sure, had not we come across such a bad road, we would have caught up with them and traveled together for further stretch..

The road till Paratwada also not that good to write about, but as we had just seen the worstest possible, probably we were relaxed and more open!! By the way, once we reached Akot, we had again suddenly started appreciating the surroundings!!! It was a pleasant weather, the road also carried almost no traffic...

Thanks to bharpet khana, courtesy Anjutai, we were not feeling hungry at all. And Ahan also had slept nicely, catching the sleep quota lost during day-time.. We reached Paratwada at about 10:15. Abhi had reached Chikhaldara till this time.. Ujwal had tried a couple of times in between to call Abhi to check the progress during the Ghat. Eventhough Dhanu was answering the call, Abhi finally had replied that he will call once they reaches Chikhaldara, as he was getting disturbed with the talk over phone while driving... This again raised my curiosity with the Chikhaldara ghat…I was told that the Ghat is very very dangerous to drive with its slope and turns etc…

Finally started climbing up the so-called dreaded Chikhaldara Ghat... Mummy and Ujwal have awaken completely now, when we started climbing the ghat, did not ask why although:-) As we were traveling, I did not find it as dangerous or complex at all as it was told to me. To draw a comparison, I think, it was akin to the Ambenali Ghat, which falls between Poladpur to Mahabaleshwar, especially like the stretch just before you reach Mahabaleshwar, albeit with a little narrower road. It was a enjoyable experience.. We were hoping to meet some of our 4-legged Jungle-friends while we were climbing the ghat, but they were absent. Again, this was a first time that we were crossing any Ghat at such odd hours.

Sorry, but can not control but to give a heads-up on a couple of exceptions here -  whenever we go to Dapoli, we make sure that we depart at such a time that whichever road we take, we would have crossed the corresponding ghat well-before night comes calling.. a exception was that once about 4 years ago during Winter, we started from Pune at about 5.30 pm and we were at Greengate restaurant sipping hot cuppa tea at about 7pm. And being winter, it was already dark..We had reached Mangaon at about 8.30pm.

And the grand-daddy of such experiences was that, once during batchlorehud we (Anish-the only married amongst us at that time, Mandar, Ajya and myself) were chatting on a Saturday night at about 9.30pm at the Bank of Maha. katta (Mayur colony) and on-the-fly there was this plan to go to Harihareshwar and Diweagar right now....By the time we had our dinner, did small preparations and started off on 2 bikes, it was about 00.00 hours:-) We reached Harihareshar at about 6.00 (remember at that time the shortcut from Mangaon was not of good quality, hence we went via Goregaon). We started for Pune at about 3pm and reached home at about 9pm. It was 4 of us on 2 bikes!!

Another gem of a experience was that alongwith Atul and his friend (3 of us on 2 bikes), we had left for Dapoli at about 4pm. Unfortunately that friend's bike had flat tyre after about 20 odd kms ahead of Bhor. Atul and his friend took that tyre out - I was complete novice to automobiles then- almost as I am today,except that now I can drive a bike and car..They went back to Bhor get it fixed. This caused us to be at the Tapari-point - the highest point in Varandha ghat, from where descend commences, at about 00.00 hours, and thus entered the day, which was a birthday of Atul's friend. So there were we - the friend had some candles with him (but no matchsticks!!) and Atul's mother had given him cake as a part of the 'shidori (travel-time snacks). Those of you who have gone via Varandha ghat would know that there is temple at this Tapari-point. Fortunately there was a diya alighting at the temple. And we celebrated the birthday - sung Happy Birthday song and ate Cakes with candles on- a candlelight celebrations, that I will never forget of:-) We had finally reached Dapoli at about 6.30am!!

So this was a deja-vu again, however important differences being, the family was bigger this time, and the road was the one, on which I was plying for the first time in life.... On each of numerous sharp-turns, I expected to bump off a Jungle-friend, but in vein... That was not our day (actually night!) Eventhough there were no 4-legged friends, we enjoyed this stretch..Again we were expectedly all alone throughout the ghat stretch-in fact right from the tile we left Akot, we were mostly alone on the road.. Soon we reached Chikhaldara market area at around 23.10…there was some activities on the road at such odd hours like small group of persons sitting around ‘shekoti (small wood-fire)’ etc.

Had to woke up the attendant at the Chikhaldara Entry-checkpost to pay the entry-tax and get the gate opened. As Abhi had mentioned, that fellow was on a ‘high’ on high altitude of Chikhaldara!! With nobody seen around at this place, I had no option but to ask him for the directions towards the resort. He did obliged.. The road-signs indicating the resort location were few and during the last stretch they were just absent..And nobody found around to ask, we just continued to drive for good amount of time till finally saw the gates of the resort on our left... Reached the MTDC resort at about 11.30am.. This resort is also little away and also at a higher plateau from Chikhaldara main town/market (reminded me of how we had seen Pelling divided into Upper/Middle and Lower Pelling!).

As soon as Palio was parked and we started taking luggage out, Ahan woke up, and was looking here and there, must be wondering where the hell we have brought him. For records, he woke up with all batteries charged and played with his Mama-Mami till about 1.30 (I had slept before this time)..

So finally the chorum was complete.. Abhi and team had reached at about 10.30pm and taken possession of our rooms. All were awake there waiting for us to join them. The Resort-rooms were big and nice. And the temperature really did not do justice to the Hill-station tag of the place, but we were offcourse not complaining of this fact:-) After getting freshened up, we had some of the dabba, thanks to Kaku to whom we had requested to bring it along for Ahan.. Actually it was so big, that evenafter Ahan's whole family had it, the food was still remainingJ Ironically, Ahan did not touch it at all..he was just busy playing in that big room-must be his way to rewind after a winding and long car-journey...

I was feeling a bit tired with such a long journey, but certainly not to the point that the next thing I wanted to do is to just hit the bed. This Jalgaon to Chikhaldara stretch was one of its kind of experience, and may be I was still soaking in... We were driving since about 6.30 am and barring the break at Jalgaon of 4 hours (from 11.30 till 15.30pm), we were continuously on road till the Palio was parked at the Resort at 23:30.. In these 13 hours we had covered 458 kms... Beating down the famed Chikhaldara ghat at such crazy hours was certainly the icing on the cake!! Thanks to the Fiatank, which supported us in all letters and spirit (actually letters and petrol!!), the drive was safe & comfortable and nobody was complaining of any body aches whatsoever even after such a long journey....

Most importantly, Ahan has co-operated us a big time:-) and it was nice to see that he was ekdum fit and fine at the end of this journey- his 2^nd experience of traveling more than 220 kms/day (a typical Dapoli-trip), in a span of 2 consecutive days. And on that night, this fact has made our day J

A brief summary, which may be useful for those of you thinking to visit Chikhaldara:-
1) Ghar to Aurangabad: 258 kms
2) Aurangabad to Jalgaon: 171 kms
- via Sillod, Ajantha caves.
- Road condition is average.
- Not many Petrol pumps enroute.
3) Jalgaon to Khamgaon: 141 kms
- via Bhusawal, Malkapur, Nandura.
- Dont forget to stop at Hanuman Mandir at Nandura (LHS).
- Take left to enter Khamgaon city (Right turn is bypass towards Akola)
- Being a NH6 stretch, good road conditions and may Petrol pumps.
4) Khamgaon to Akot: 78 kms
- via Shegaon.
- Take left turn near Shegaon ST Stand towards Shegaon.
- Road condition is fine till Shegaon. But not very good ahead.
- Petrol pumps at Khamgaon and Shegaon
5) Akot to Chikhaldara: 95 kms
- via Paratwada, from where it is 50 kms ahead.
- Road condition is average.
- Last about 25 kms is a Ghat stretch with Narrow roads and sharp turns.
- Petrol pump at Akot
6) Total Pune to Chikhaldara: 743 kms
- via Aurangabad-Jalgaon-Khamgaon-Akot-Paratwada

Pune to Chikhaldara via Jalgaon-Burhanpur is about 584 kms (Bing maps). Here the last 80-100 kms are through forest with a couple of Forest checkposts on the way. After about 5 pm and till about 8am, these posts close the traffic for every 3 hrs. Thus, it may happen that you reach the checkpost and suppose find the Gate is closed, you need to wait for maximum of 3 hours.

If you need additional details to plan this trip, just drop me a comment:-)