Delhi to Nainital by car:300 km on NH-9, the plains, then the climb

The route is NH-9 the whole way to the foot of the hills. It leaves Delhi through Ghaziabad, runs through Hapur to the Ganga crossing at Garhmukteshwar, and carries on across Rohilkhand through Moradabad and Rampur to Haldwani. Our distance page puts the run at 300 km and six to seven hours, and the travel-by-car page breaks it into five legs: Delhi to Ghaziabad in half an hour, Ghaziabad to Moradabad in the best part of three, Moradabad to Rampur in half an hour, Rampur to Haldwani in an hour and a half, and Haldwani to Nainital in another hour and a half for 35 km.

Those last two numbers are the whole point. The plains legs cover 265 km in about five hours; the hill leg covers 35 km in an hour and a half. They are different kinds of driving, and the drive is planned around the difference. On the plains the enemy is traffic, which is why we leave Delhi before six and why the breakfast halt is a short one. On the hill the enemy is the road itself, which is why Haldwani is where you eat, fuel and buy water, and why the climb is done with a rested driver and a full tank.

The road is good the whole way to Haldwani: four-lane, flat and well kept, with three FASTag plazas and a run of dhabas that know the Nainital trade. The hill section is two-lane and looked after, but it is a mountain road with hairpins stacked one above the other, and it wants to be driven as one. There is no expressway on this corridor and no shortcut worth the name; NH-9 via Moradabad is both the shortest route and the fastest.

Delhi to Nainital distance and route page

Three plazas, ₹270 one-way for a car: ₹85 at Ghaziabad, ₹120 at Moradabad and ₹65 at Rampur, all FASTag, all before Haldwani. There are no tolls on the hill road. A round trip is therefore ₹540 in tolls for a sedan, more for an SUV, and our drivers settle them on the car’s tag so they appear on the bill at actual rather than as a surcharge; any state or parking charges are at actual in the same way.

On timing, the answer is before six. NH-9 carries the truck traffic of western UP, and it thickens through the middle of the day; a half past five start puts you through Ghaziabad before the city is moving, across the Ganga by half past seven and past Moradabad by nine, which is the hour the highway starts to fill. Leave at eight and the same road takes an hour longer at the Delhi end and another at Moradabad, and you reach the climb in the afternoon when the buses are coming down. On a Friday or the eve of a long weekend, when half of Delhi seems to be heading for the hills, the difference is larger still.

The other reason for the early start is daylight on the hill. The climb is easy at noon and tedious at dusk, and in winter the town can be under fog by late afternoon. Our drivers plan the day so that the car is in Nainital with the whole afternoon ahead: the boats, the Mall Road and the sunset from Naina Peak, rather than a hotel check-in in the dark.

Delhi to Nainital toll cost, plaza by plaza

Nainital is 300 km, and outstation cabs bill a 300 km per day minimum, so this is one of the corridors where the distance and the minimum are the same number and nothing is wasted. The one-way fare is the rate card on 300 km: a sedan at ₹11/km, an Ertiga or similar SUV at ₹15, an Innova Crysta at ₹18 and a 12-seater Tempo Traveller at ₹23. Fuel and the driver are inside those figures; the ₹270 of tolls each way for a car and the parking in Nainital are paid at actual. The fare box below does the arithmetic for each vehicle.

A two-day round trip with the same car and driver is the greater of twice the one-way fare or two days at the 300 km minimum, and on this route they come to the same thing. That is the usual weekend: up on Saturday morning, the lake in the afternoon, back on Sunday after a morning at Bhimtal or Naukuchiatal. A third day, for the lakes and Snow View properly, or for Corbett on the way home, adds 300 km at the vehicle’s rate; the driver’s night-halt allowance is extra at actual.

On the choice of car, the travel-by-car page recommends an SUV or an Innova, and for the climb that is good advice: the extra torque tells on the hairpins, and an Innova Crysta with six aboard works out cheaper per head than two sedans. For two or three people with light luggage a sedan is perfectly good; it is the road that is slow, not the car. One-way is the right booking if you are returning by train from Kathgodam; the round trip is right for everything else, and it is the cheaper way to see Bhimtal, because the same driver takes you there on the way down.

Delhi to Nainital one-way cab