Road Trip To India’s Grape City – Nashik!

Here’s how our last trip of the decade turned out to be – a road trip to India’s Grape City – Nashik! (Image courtesy: Internet)

Normally winters make great travel plans as you rush to utilise a bucket of unlapsed leaves. However, thanks to our wedding, our vacation plans for 2019 have always been for a toss!

Juggling the permutations and combinations, we finally decided on a quick weekend getaway and developed into an out-of-the-box plan to NASHIK!

Just as you frown reading the destination name, here is a quick glimpse of all we extracted from this not-at-all-planned road trip. We were happy to discover this beautiful city just-in-time before the crowd hits the place!

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Also do not miss our blog on 15 reasons why you should plan India travel in 2021!!

Day 1: Sula Wines

Long drives are my favorite and my birthday just gave me a reason to indulge in my favorite. Starting off at 8 am, we were all geared up for a day trip to Sula Vineyards at Nashik. The 4.5 hours’ journey from Pune was amazing! Open-air, minimal traffic, and a perfect scenic highway (except for the 4 toll booths mid-way) was a dream long drive.

Our stomachs gave in and we took a break at Parivar Hotel, Narayangaon, a small eating joint to have a unique dish called Kadi Wada. So, our usual Batata Wada dipped in piping hot Kadi with fried green chilies and Pav on side describes this dish to the best.

Drenched in fullness, we took around 2.5hrs further to reach our hotel booked at Nashik.

We left for Sula Wines at around 4 pm after taking a quick nap at our room at IBIS.

SULA Wines at Nashik

Sula was 30mins from our hotel at IBIS, Satpur. The roads were filled with kaccha raastas and grass all around. However, as you approach the gate with the sun symbol to welcome you along, all you feel is sweet anticipation. The entry-fee is ₹200 pax and is redeemable at the eateries inside the premises.

Entering SULA, I realized, the vineyard has a color-filled atmosphere and is bliss for all the photographers! We had fun clicking a few of our own photos.

Wine tasting session

After the photoshoot, we headed for the 30 mins Wine Tour and Tasting Session. The price for the session was ₹400pax (₹200 for touring and ₹200 for tasting)

The staff explained the Vinification process in detail and we had a great time tasting the 6 wines offered to us.

Post the high-rated sessions, we gorged our favorite over-priced snacks comprising French fries and Pizza at the eateries.

A few more pictures and we had covered the vast lush polished land area of SULA to be cherished and remembered by 7 pm.

(Learn more of the upcoming SULAFEST 2020)

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Heading back to the lovely lighted city of Nashik, a budget-friendly sea-food serving restaurant, Radhakrishnan which served a variety of tasty seafood in pocket-prices sorted our dinner plan.

We gorged upon the Prawns and Bombay Duck and dug into their Mutton Thali with awww! While eating we discussed exploring this unexplored beautiful grape city further the next morning. We decided to include Trimbakeshwar temple in our itinerary before checking out of Nashik.

Day 2: Trimbakeshwar Temple

After enjoying a well-spread buffet breakfast, we left for Trimbakeshwar Temple which falls 24 kms from IBIS, Satpur.

The roads were in good condition. So we enjoyed our temple ride and reached the destination in half an hour.

The temple is famous for its Jyotirlinga, but is way too crowded for people like us who want to make a move within an hour or two.

We opted for a fast-track entry for Rs. 200 pax. But, it was still crowded as there were hundreds of like-minded others who had skipped the regular line for this fast track one.

The temple was enormous and carved with perfection but we got no time to enjoy the sculpture due to the crowds. We ended up dragging and pulling ourselves to get a glimpse of Lord Shiva.

(ProTip- Visit Trimbakeshwar only when you have enough time to relish the artefacts)

Departing this lovely city, on our way back we had Nashik’s famous Rajas Lassi and had our dose of Sitafal Lassi priced at ₹50 for half a glass. We rejoiced our last few moments at Nashik as we bid goodbyes to each other by 1 pm to meet HOME!!

Get Set Packing Girls to enjoy a Road trip to India’s grape city!

 Here’s another suggestion for a long weekend plan – Murudehswar in Karnataka!