900km
In front of a hospital:
Traffic everywhere on Saturday made sure we(ashvinm, Sundeep and me) are on Mysore road only by 10:30pm. Reaching Gundelpet at 1:45am, we park in front of a hospital! There is a compromise to be made with mosquitos trying to get into the car and we needing ventilation: the mosquitos win and we decide to move on to Kalpetta at 2:35am. We somehow miss the deviation after Gundelpet and are on the road towards Ooty(which is in bad shape), realizing this only when we see JLR Bandipur; coming back, we take the nice, smooth road towards Kerala.

4am, the rain and the night:
It is 4am: a light drizzle, a black smooth road, an yellow line, green forests, lit by the orange headlight; the drive has been wonderful. Previously we had a glimpse of two elephants standing in the forest on the left of the road and a big deer standing right next to the road on the right side. The temperature has been gradually dropping and it is now hovering between 21ºC and 21.5ºC(yes, my car tells temperature).
As we approach Kalpetta I find both the guys sleeping soundly, and other early risers moving around the town, it is 5:05am when we checkin at Everglades hotel(which has a 24hr checkout time).

Down the mountain, a view of the clouds:
Waking up at 10:30am, we have masala dosas at the hotel restaurant: the masala is missing and it is not crisp, a copy-paste error! We start towards Calicut stopping at the beginning of the ghat section to enjoy the view: there are mountains in the distance and the valley below with clouds hanging somewhere in between, we can see where the current road leads as we look down; the clouds start moving up the mountain we are on, slowly rising and dissappearing, the valley is now clear, we were there at just the right time for the event.
The road down is pretty smooth, with nice gradients for the curves, some cemented, while some other parts of the road are being repaired.

Up the coast:
We drive through Calicut, taking some road that goes towards the beach; we reach a marine drive sort of road; there is no beach, but rocks, a neat walkway between the road and the sea with grass and benches to sit on; a dilapated pier is visible at a distance with the pillars jutting out of the water, but without the platform it once supported, looking strange. There are people whiling away time, sitting there with umbrellas, the temperature 31ºC; as we leave, a family arrives for a picnic.
We drive up the NH towards towards Thalassery and the Muzhappilangad drive-in beach; we have not checked up on tide timings(do we ever!) and the waves are coming up to the entrance of the beach(there was a nice 50-60ft beach the last time), so no driving this time.

Back up:
We head back towards Kalpetta through Mananthavady. The drive up the ghats is very good, all curvy and neat, with greenery all around, everything enhanced under the magic of the rains. We stop for a break, somewhere up the road.
Coming back to Kalpetta, we have dinner at the Woodland restaurant, later retiring for the day.

The sky and the forest:
Today, we wake up at 4am and it is around 4:55am by the time we are in the car after checking out of the hotel. It has rained heavily overnight but it is drizzling now. We maintain a very good speed through the towns and the forests, knowing very well the good condition of the roads, following the clearly visible yellow/white lines on the road.
The drive in the forests is wonderful here just before sunrise: the view almost like a circle, the road below and the forest curving up from both sides, almost trying to claim back the space, the sky visible as a patch, a dark shade of blue forming the top, like an inverted road in the air, dividing the forest above, all this in the rain.
We have breakfast at Lokaruchi, reaching this place at 9.

The trip meter reads 900km.