Charmadi Ghat

The deepest and remotest of Karnataka’s ghat roads, climbing 817 m through unbroken rainforest across 12 hairpins on a single-lane road that sees almost no tourist traffic.

The ghat begins at Charmadi village and climbs immediately into dense evergreen forest, the 12 numbered hairpins spread out with long climbs between corners. Genuinely narrow (two trucks cannot pass), it is part of NH73 linking Mangalore to Tumkuru; heavy vehicles avoid it for the lower Shiradi Ghat. Above the trees the ridge opens westward toward the coast, the summit at Kottigehara at 970 m.