I recently had an opportunity to visit Chitrakoot by Road as part of my official travels. The summary of the route followed is given below
Onward journey
Lucknow – Kanpur – Bindki – Banda – Chitrakoot
Return Journey
Chitrakoot – Banda – Fatehpur – Lalganj – Bachravan – Lucknow
The onward Journey was a blur of confusion. We started at 10 am on a Sunday morning in a jalopy old Tata Indica. The route to Kanpur has been well explained in Ghumakkar and needs no mention. Suffice it to say that there re still huge traffic jams at the entry point to the bridge leading upto the Ramadevi Chauraha. There is a flyover being built to directly connect NH 25 (Lucknow – Kanpur) to the NH 2 (Agra – Allahabad) in the air – Until this is built – beware of that road there huge lines of trucks and in this case the smaller the car, the better one can maneuver between these behemoths and be on our way. Anyways we cleared Kanpur by 12 pm and were well on our way to Fatehpur via NH 2 when the confusion started. We were told to take right turn to Bindki somewhere enroute to Fatehpur. The first turn led to a railway crossing which was permanently closed due to repairs and we were advised to go back to the highway and take a right further on. After proceeding on this for abut 30 minutes we grew a bit suspicious due to the lack of oncoming traffic. We were old that the bridge over the Yamuna was closed and were told to take a shortcut to Bindki. unfortunately a large number of trucks were taking the same shortcut and we proceeded at a snail’s pace and reached Bindki by 2 pm and not even halfway to Chitrakoot. We finally found the Banda Road and promised ourselves that from now on we would stick to the major roads. The Fatehpur – Banda State Highway was pretty good while the Banda – Chitrakoot NH 76 was a different story all together – very jarring drive indeed. There is a right turn about 3 kilometers before Karwi town to Chitrakoot Dham at a place called Bedi Puliya – Chitrakoot Dham is 4 km from this junction. We finally reached at 7.30 pm a full 3 hours behind schedule.
The return journey was more organized as our driver had made enquiries and decided to follow the route mentioned above. At Banda we were lucky to be pointed to a bypass to Fatehpur. The road from Fatehpur to Lalganj was again surprisingly good and so was the Lalganj – Bachravan route. At Bachravan we connected to the Rai Bareilly – Lucknow highway which of course is kept in pristine condition for reasons which are not too far to seek. The journey started at around 3 pm and we reached at about 9.30 pm.
All told the onward journey was 280 kms.
and the return Journey was 270 kms.
Travelng through congested traffic could be very frustrating. I experienced a similar journey from Delhi to Corbett Park. Despite an early morning start, an accident on the way delayed our progress and all hell broke loose when we reached Moradabad when the entire road for miles were crowded with trucks, horse carriages, cars and motor scooters. Several times our driver had to take shortcuts by cutting across the fields to get ahead with the Toyota Qualis we rented.
Yes Jerry really frustrating. Sorry about the maps though. First time I posted Maps on Ghumakkar and just couldn’t get the hang of it
Patrick
Road reviews are my favorite.
you can go to maps.google.com and then create a map , once done you can ’embedd’ that map here, just look on top right at google maps for a option like link/embedd.
Now , to read your Chitrakoot stuff !!
well there was an embed link on mapmyindia.com too but just couldn’t make it work – the pasted text appeared as such. anyways thanks for the tip will try Google maps next time.
It should work now.
The deal is that the stuff which you copy from mapmyindia or google-maps is sort of a code. Since the editor which you were using at Ghumakkar was a ‘Visual Editor’, it messes the code and starts to tread the messed-up code as simple text. I have changed that setting for you and now you would get more plain-vanilla editor, which in my opinion, works better.
Let me know if you run into this hassle next time. Either of mapmyindia or google-maps should work fine.
Thanks Nandan – that was nice of you.
Patrick
Excellent write up and thanks. We are considering Chitrakoot in March and trying to determine the best place to stay, etc. I want to stay at Vinod lodge but the phone numbers aren’t working. What pictures did you post, is that the Rahi Tourist place? Also is the train a viable way to get there from Varanasi? I’m concerned about leaving Chitrakoot Dham station too as we’d have to be there at 4am to get back to Delhi.
Nice article though, thanks so much.
yes LJ thats teh UP Tourism bungalow – Its pretty decent wih the new wing that has come up. – Haven’t been there recently though. Chitrakoot Dham station is a bit isolated – u will have to make transport arrangements in advance for early morning travel. No idea about varansi to chitrakoot. Best of Luck.
Bachhrawan, Lalganj, Dalmau, Saatmiiwe travlled from lucknow to chitrakoot via Bachhrawan, Lalganj, Dalmau, Saatmeel, Fatehpur,Baanda and Atarra. Total km was 285 and time taken was about 6 hours. Road conditions are OK except in patches between Lalganj to Fatehpur (about 25-30 km) and between Baanda to Atarra about (15-20km). For avoiding bad patchesof road, I have been advised to take Chitrakoot-Atarra-Baberu- Fatehpur-Lalganj -Bachhrawan-Lucknow route avoiding Atarra-Baanda and Fatehpur-Dalmau-Lalganjbad patch. I hope return route will be OK
The best way to go to Chitrakoot from Lucknow
Reach bachrawaan by car from Lucknow.
Take right turn from the flyover. 3-4 km roads are not in good condition. And after that move towards Lalganj. Now roads are in very good condition till fatehpur.
After that move towards NH232/335. Follow the diversion as per traffic. next 10 km roads are not good. After reaching Shah roads are in very good condition. Then move towards Tindwari following the state highway. and reach Banda. And move towards Attara and reach Chitrakoot. Road conditions are excellent now on
Hey Patrick, can we take your Chitrakoot return journey route while leaving from Lucknow? Basically I am asking is it good fro both ways travel. Thanks!