I went on a small unplanned low-budget solo trip - here's my experience through photos

Jun 14, 2025

It was 12 15 AM on a Wednesday. RCB had finally won the IPL after 18 long years and there was absolute pandemonium on the streets and the skies. I stayed up so that I could watch the entire trophy presentation of this final piece of closure that my fellow Bangaloreans had yearned for so many years that it became a nation-wide self-deprecating joke and slogan of “ESCN” or “Ee saala cup namde”.

I felt like going out on a short drive to live the atmosphere a little more but I also dreaded losing more sleep because I had a flight to catch in exactly 5 hours and 30 minutes with the next day being a proper working day

4 trains, 6 buses and 4 autorickshaw ride across 2 days - none of them being pre-planned or pre-booked.

A small solo trip had been on my mind for a while now. I’ve travelled solo before - I keep telling people, a little haughtily, that I’ve been on 2 “semi-solo” Eurotrips where I was by myself for at least a third of these 2 trips.

That seemed like a long time ago and at a different phase of life.

Marriage has made me far more sorted in my life, more focused, generally happier, more tidy (thanks to my wife’s brute force) and I daresay more productive?

I still travel a lot, maybe a little less adventurously, largely with my wife (I can’t stand large groups where you’re as good or as fast as the group) and I do enjoy them. However, quite understandably, I have to pay heed to some of her asks - she wants to have trips fairly planned, doesn’t mind adventure but wants some basic convenience at the same time and most definitely wants clean places to eat at. I thank the lord every time when she doesn’t insist on too many "Insta-worthy photos” (she is not too active on Instagram) and doesn’t insist on some exotic and pocket-emptying “property” aka hotel/resort.

Also, marriage, in general, for all it’s positive spillovers on me, does lead to both your personalities/way-of-life converging into one, at least to some extent, without which it would become impossible to co-exist.

For the same reason, it’s important to get some space in life, where you get a chance to connect with your own older ways of doing things without being preoccupied with work or running your household.

I’ve been dreaming of such a week, where I could travel for a few days where I can just be a traveller, across small town-India and derive joy from the unplanned nature of experience. All the hours spent on the bus or a train, where I’m not occupied watching my phone or some movie but living in the moment and observing people around me or looking out of the window at the curving train making a turn or the thatched houses or green fields that I keep passing.

So my wife was about to go on a trip to Malaysia with her 2 friends from b-school for a week or so (one of them lived in Malaysia) and that’s when I started day-dreaming about this plan.

Where can I go, given the existing weather?

How can I make it unplanned yet not wasteful?

I finally doubled down on a 5-6 day trip that started from Palakkad (in northern Kerala) and ended at Mangalore/Udupi where I would cover the hills and beaches of northern Kerala and Mangalore+Udupi.

Beyond my own connection with coastal Karnataka, thanks to 4 years that I had spent there during my engineering days, I also thought it would be the perfect weather to hit this location. The glorious onset of monsoon and the beautiful lush green scenery beneath the thick cloud cover would almost have an healing effect on me.

Unfortunately for me, my small little dream hit a small roadblock because there was some important pieces of work at office for which I had to shave of 2 days from my trip. So I had to cut some places from the trip and had to skip the idea to start the trip from Palakkad and would go to Mangalore directly and have day trips from there.

I was still determined to make the most of the remaining days I had available. I preferred going by train on Tuesday night but did not want to miss the long awaited IPL final where RCB could finally make amends after 18 years of failure and disappointment. So I booked an early morning flight ticket on Monday night without booking a return ticket.

I didn’t choose this region necessarily for a trip down nostalgia lane (I studied at NITK Surathkal for ~4 years) but more of a chance to connect with my roots and some of my core values at a region I’m fond of and is amongst the most underrated destinations for travel and tourism in India.

My roots belonged to an upbringing that never went on a 3 AC coach or a flight till I was 23-24 years old. My roots belonged to going on rickety buses from one place to another and not have the convenience of cabs. My roots belonged to being frugal as much as possible. My roots belonged to doing things on-the-go rather than having set plans.

I landed in Mangalore in the midst of some rain where the flight cuts through thick clouds on a slightly scary landing at a table top runway. Many years ago I was in the Mangalore region, interning at MRPL in May 2010, when an Air India plane overshot the runway, leading to mass casualties. As I write this blog, I feel a terrible dejavu, where another Air India plane crashed in Ahmedabad, just after taking off, with almost no survivors. A truly gut-wrenching juxtaposition of seemingly similar accidents.

It had rained heavily in the past 2 weeks - unfortunately for me, that landing was the only time when I experienced that gloomy yet glorious monsoon and there was plentiful sunshine over the next 3 days.

Here is what I covered in those 3-4 days and I try to convey them through photos

Mangalore has far more skyscrapers now and there are many under construction. Every city is inevitably growing bigger and noisier although none will be as messily done as Bangalore

The first thing I did after landing was walk down the airport road, catch a bus to Jyoti circle and indulge myself with Mangalore buns

Wednesday turned out to be a total WFH (work from hotel) day for me but I ended the day with 2 top notch pubs - Froth on Top and Liquid Lounge - both of which are amongst the top 10 pubs I’ve ever been to. The food here is just so good. I went here again the next day and had one of the best biriyani’s I’ve ever had.

I messaged a good friend Raviraj Nayak, who I had not met for 13 years after college and who I knew still worked in Mangalore at MRPL. Luckily he was free to meet for breakfast and we met a Anmol Restaurant and had killer Mangalore buns, goli bhajji and a surprisingly awesome Mysore masala dosa.

I booked a train ticket just the night before and hopped on to a train to Kanhangod station in northern Kerala. The train was full of families, students and people travelling for work.

I like peeking into houses and people that pass by while I'm on a train journey. How would their lives and daily routine be like? How does the house look like? Do they have a car or a front yard?

Konkan railway is absolutely a national treasure where you hug beaches and cut through mountains

I twas forced to save my phone battery (I didn’t carry a thing with me, not even a bottle of water) and in that time, I tried my best to live and the moment and absorb the surroundings. This pic is from a bus journey in a super rickety bus from Kanhangod to Bekal where I observed how the people in the Malabar coast live their daily lives

Fishermen patiently waiting for their catch

I couldn’t recommend going to Bekal any more strongly - it has history from the 14th century, it was old but well-maintained, and had beautiful empty beaches close by. I only wish I could have stayed there till sunset but that was at least 3-4 hours away. So what do I do instead? It was a hot day and my return train to Mangalore was a good 3 hours away

So I just looked up maps and figured what else I could do and I spotted 2 places called Payyanur and Ettikulam father south in Kerala, just north of Kannur. I booked 2 more train tickets and headed to these places and oh boy, was it so worth it. Ettikulam has this hill called Ezhimala that had a beautiful vantage point with a view of the Arabian sea and the long Malabar cost. From there, I took a bus to Payyanur where I hired a Kayak to row my way through the backwaters to pristine mangroves.

Kayaking alone, especially if you don’t want to be slow, can be a physically labourious exercise and the unexpected act of water that seeps into the boat and wets your pyjama and buttocks, makes it even harder.

I got of the Kayak, tried drying myself and my wallet, had a hot cup of milky Malabar tea from a stall run by a mother-daughter duo. I took a rickshaw to the railway station, during which I got stares from a lot of passers-by, because I was holding out two 200 rupee notes (all the cash I had) for it to dry out.

My phone’s battery was about to run out, I was hungry, all I had were 2 semi-dry Rs 200 notes in my wallet, my train was delayed by 1.5 hours and I still had irritating wet innerwear. Some experience huh?

Thankfully, I got another train, on the spot, which I gladly took, and found myself heading towards Mangalore again and I finally reached there by 9 30, after finally successfully drying myself after an hour on the door of the train - staring largely at darkness or faintly lit houses that passed by.

This was from Bekal fort. This guy, when not serving much needed lime soda, was painting with water colours on the side. So cool and heartening!

It was a long day and I survived all day just on cut fruits, salted peanuts, tea and salt lime soda (northern Kerala is not the easiest place to find trustworthy food) so I was starving and I headed to my old favourite Liquid Lounge and gobbled an entire biriyani with a mug on the side, listening to kick-ass 90s rock music.

The next day, I finished some work, which delayed my plan a little, had breakfast at hotel Navdeep, visited the local Kotak Bank to extract cash (my ATM card works ONLY at a Kotak Bank ATM!) and took another bus to Karkala, spent 45 minutes at Karala bus stop patiently and finally took a bus to the temple-town Sringeri.

I’m glad I chose the path of taking a bus and not the expensive and apparently more convenient choice of hiring a car to drive because the roads were narrow with blind turns up the mountains with the lush green foothills of the Kudremukh range visible from the window.

Apparently, one needs to wear traditional India attire to be allowed into the inner section of the temple but no one gave me that memo. So I covered whatever I could, took a drip at the pristine and cool fast-flowing water of the Tunga river, (which later becomes the mighty Tungabhadra), bided my time for 30 minutes before the having a very late lunch at the popular Holla’s Maruti Tiffin and took another bus to Agumbe, the wettest region of south India.

While I didn’t experience a single drop of rain at Agumbe, I did see a pretty and hazy sunset and then took another bus to Udupi where I passed by many towns including Manipal.

At Udupi, I had limited time, so I immediately headed to the Udupi Krishna Matha, offered a quick prayer and headed to have a snack at the old jaunt called Mitra Samaj and had some amazing food including (more) Mangalore buns and “Jackfruit Mulka” for the first time and then hit another roadside stall to have some tangy Bhel Puri or “Churmuri”.

I then headed to Udupi railway station which was teeming with students with their luggage. Train A came and left and a a third of the platform emptied. I had booked a seat in a not-so-frugal fashion on the Vande Bharat Express train that starts from Goa and ends at Mangalore (The only train where I was getting a confirmed seat) and I expected most of the crowd would also be getting onto it alongside me.

What happened next will be a core memory for me - I was the ONLY one who boarded that train and everyone on the platform was staring at me and must have been thinking “who the hell pays Rs 600 for a train ticket to Mangalore where a bus could take you there at Rs 100?”.

I experienced this new age Vande Bharat train for the first time, had another meal that was served on the train and rushed to my nearby hotel room as soon as I reached the Mangalore Central station.

I was supposed to go on a trek to Bandaje falls (located in the middle of the Kudremukh range of the Western Ghats) on Saturday but the trek couldn’t materialize for which I was later thankful for - the non-stop travel, the lack of sleep, the kayaking and the heat had made me a little tired. I needed to chill a little.

Had this super heavy but sublime dish called Jackfruit Gatti for breakfast alongside a ghee roast masala dosa.

After watching Tom Cruise’s possible farewell to the MI series alone at a cinema for the first time ever, I had the best Gadbad ice cream ever at Ideal Ice Cream Parlour (NOT Pabbas!)

I took a bus to beautiful Kapu beach, walked a little on the beach in the hot afternoon and then took another bus to head back NITK beach - a place that holds fond memories for me.

Unfortunately, both, the NITK beach lighthouse and the NITK beach gate itself was closed so I walked to and from the Surathkal beach entrance and had one the best egg Maggi I’ve ever had there.

I didn’t enter the premises of my alma mater this time around. I find their strictness that I experienced the last time around to be a turn off. You have to treat alumni a little better and not treat them as suspects, all in the name of safety.

I also find that the campus had changed drastically the last time I went, there are just SO many new buildings and it’s a little saddening to the the ATB and the main building completely deserted while brand new “lecture complexes” have sprung up.

It didn't help that the soul of the campus, the students, were also on their summer leave

I finally booked my return ticket to Bangalore by flight later that Saturday night and had just enough time for a late meal at Froth on Top before boarding my flight.

I landed in Bangalore at the same time when my wife was back from Malaysia and I knew she would crave for local food because the food at S-E Asia doesn’t suit her well.

We hit the brand new CTR at Terminal 2 and I’m thankful to say that it did not disappoint!

Over the next few days, people asked my how the trip was and my reply was overwhelmingly positive.

I did things my way, travelled to places lesser explored and most importantly, lived in the moment and absorbed my surroundings which is such a stress buster!

Yes, there was a few things that didn’t go as per my expectations but that room for surprise was a part of the plan - you win some, you lose some.

If you are married, it’s okay to go for solo escapades and give yourself the space and time that you much deserve and need in life - away from work and the running your household. It might just give you that bit of rejuvenation that you were so desperately seeking.

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