RutzIndia.com offers six chauffeur-driven tour packages for Mumbai travellers: Maharashtra in 4 or 5 days from your door, Goa in 3, 4 or 5 days and Gujarat in 5 days from those states' airports. One car and chauffeur serve the whole trip; the fare is the larger of driven km or 250 km a day, times the per-km rate.
Two ways a Mumbai package starts
Mumbai is a peculiar starting point. The Deccan plateau begins barely 80 km inland, so the Maharashtra circuits climb straight out of the city and are driven from your front door. Goa and Gujarat are a different matter: each is 500 to 600 km away, which is a full day in a car and about an hour in a plane. For those four packages the car and chauffeur are waiting at Goa or Ahmedabad airport, and the circuit begins there.
That split is the single most useful thing to understand before you choose. If you want to leave from home with the bags in the boot and never see an airport, pick one of the two Maharashtra packages. If you want beaches or Gujarat's stepwells, fly, and let us meet you at the other end. Drive-all-the-way options exist and we explain them below, but they add two long days to the trip.
Pickups across Mumbai
Airports. Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International has Terminal 1 in Santacruz for some domestic flights and Terminal 2 in Sahar for international and most domestic departures; the airport's Wikipedia entry summarises which is which, but your airline's booking is the final word. Navi Mumbai's new airport now takes flights as well, and it is often the faster pickup if you live in Navi Mumbai, Panvel or Kharghar. Chauffeurs track flights, hold a name board and wait 60 minutes free after international arrivals, 30 after domestic. For the arrival alone, see our Mumbai airport taxi.
Stations. CSMT, Mumbai Central, Bandra Terminus, Dadar and Lokmanya Tilak Terminus at Kurla are all regular pickups. LTT in particular is easy to miss by car, so share the train number and coach.
Home or hotel. From South Mumbai the Atal Setu across the harbour now cuts much of the crawl to the Pune Expressway; from the western suburbs the chauffeur usually takes the Eastern Express Highway or the Sion–Panvel road instead. Local driving before or after a package is priced on the Mumbai car rental with driver page.
The two Maharashtra packages
Four days: Mumbai, Elephanta, Lonavala and Pune. Day one is Mumbai itself: the Gateway, Kala Ghoda's museum and Victorian Gothic, the Art Deco line of Marine Drive. The boat to Elephanta for the Shiva caves follows, then the Expressway climb to Lonavala, the Karla and Bhaja caves, and Pune for Shaniwar Wada and the Aga Khan Palace. The drives are short, roughly 83 km to Lonavala and 150 km from Pune back home, so it suits families with young children and anyone who dislikes long days in a car. Mumbai to Pune covers the Expressway leg by itself, and the Lonavala road guide has the ghat viewpoints.
Five days: Aurangabad, Ellora and Ajanta. This one is about two UNESCO sites that deserve a full day each. The first morning is the long run north-east to Aurangabad, officially Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, about 335 km and seven hours with a breakfast stop. Ellora's Kailasa temple fills the second day and the Ajanta caves the third, then you return across the plateau through Pune. The Ellora and Ajanta road guide explains the shuttle arrangement at Ajanta's gorge.
Closure days that decide the plan
Monuments around Mumbai close on different weekdays, and a package that ignores this loses a day. Elephanta's caves are shut on Mondays, as is Ajanta; Ellora is shut on Tuesdays. The Statue of Unity in Gujarat is also closed on Mondays for maintenance. Our itineraries are sequenced so none of these lands on the wrong day, which is why the desk sometimes nudges a start date by 24 hours. In Goa, the Anjuna flea market runs on Wednesdays and the Mapusa market is liveliest on Fridays, so the 3 and 4-day Goa trips place their north-coast mornings accordingly where they can.
The fly-in packages: Goa and Gujarat
Goa in 3, 4 or 5 days. Goa has two airports, Dabolim in the south-centre and Mopa (Manohar International) in the far north, and the car meets you at whichever your flight uses. Three days covers the northern beaches, Old Goa's Basilica and Se Cathedral, and Fontainhas in Panaji. Four adds a day south of the Zuari with Braganza House at Chandor and Palolem. Five adds Dudhsagar falls, reached by a forest jeep from the Mollem gate, plus a spice farm near Ponda and Divar island by ferry. The Goa tourism site lists events worth timing a trip around. If you would rather drive from Mumbai, the Mumbai to Goa taxi route is about 590 km and 11 hours, either down the Konkan coast or inland through Kolhapur; it makes sense only if you want the coast as part of the holiday. The Goa origin page has packages for people already there.
Gujarat in 5 days. This circuit begins at Ahmedabad airport: the Sabarmati Ashram, the old city's pols at dawn, the Adalaj stepwell, then Modhera and Rani ki Vav at Patan, and finally the Statue of Unity on the Narmada before returning to Ahmedabad. By road Mumbai to Ahmedabad is roughly 530 km on NH48 through Surat and Vadodara; a short flight or one of the fast day trains is easier. The seven-day version is on the Gujarat package, 7 days page, and the Statue of Unity road guide has the visitor details.
Monsoon, Ganpati and the Goa high season
Mumbai's monsoon runs from about June to September and changes everything. The Western Ghats around Lonavala are at their greenest then, and the four-day Maharashtra trip is lovely in the rain, though the Expressway ghat section slows in cloudbursts. Ajanta and Ellora are better from November to February when the heat on the plateau eases. Goa's season is November to February; Christmas, New Year and the pre-Lent carnival fill hotels and push rates up, while the monsoon brings closed beach shacks, rough seas and, usually, no Dudhsagar jeep trips until the rains ease. Ganesh Chaturthi in August or September makes Mumbai traffic very slow for about ten days; leaving the city during the immersion processions is best avoided. The Maharashtra tourism portal lists festival dates across the state.
Cars for Mumbai trips
A compact sedan such as a Swift Dzire, at Rs 72 per km, is right for a couple on any of these six packages. An Ertiga at Rs 84 per km takes three or four with luggage. For families, and especially for the five-day Aurangabad run, the Innova Crysta at Rs 114 per km is the comfortable choice; Innova Crysta on rent in Mumbai has the details. A Fortuner is Rs 168 per km, an E-Class Rs 330. Groups of 9 to 16 go in a Tempo Traveller at Rs 156 per km or a Force Urbania at Rs 200; the Mumbai Tempo Traveller page lists layouts. All classes are on the fleet page, and all cars are within four model years.
What the fare covers
The car fare on each card is worked out one way: take the itinerary's driving distance, compare it with 250 km for every day of the trip, bill the larger and multiply by the class's per-km rate. Short trips like the four-day Maharashtra circuit therefore bill the daily minimum, which is why a Lonavala morning costs the same as a longer drive. Driver night allowance is Rs 3,000 a night; tolls on the Expressway and the Samruddhi or Mumbai–Ahmedabad highways, Goa and Gujarat state permits and parking are charged at cost; 5% GST is added. Payment is by card or UPI through the booker, with a GST invoice for company bookings.
Short trips from Mumbai that are not packages
If three days is too many, a single outstation hire does the job: Mumbai to Shirdi for the Sai Baba temple, Mumbai to Nashik for the vineyards and Trimbakeshwar, or the Mahabaleshwar road guide for strawberry season. Travellers starting from Pune have their own Pune origin page, and Ahmedabad residents have theirs too. For everyday driving in the city, see the Mumbai taxi service.
How to book
Pick the package and car class on the web booker and the fare is fixed before you pay. For hotels, breakfasts, the Elephanta ferry, monument tickets and guides quoted together, write to the travel desk. Cancellation is free until 72 hours before pickup; after that it is 10% within 72 hours, 50% within 48 hours and 100% within 24 hours or for a no-show, as set out on the cancellation policy. Every other starting city is on the tour packages hub.
