Day 1: Saturday - 8th December, 2012
Mumbai-Guwahati-Shillong
Typically, for a week long adventure trip my packing begins a week earlier. This, however, doesn't mean that it ends early. Several rounds of packing and unpacking go in are done before a final, settled look appears on the luggage. Friday night was spent rolling around in the bed impatiently waiting for the 0330hrs alarm to go off.
Our flight to Guwahati (via Kolkata and Agartala) was at 0815hrs from the Santacruz domestic airport. Mayank picked me from my home at 0500hrs. We reached the airport by 0600hrs. Ajay and Pradeep joined us there and we completed the check-in formalities. Praful and Deepak had already left on an earlier flight from Mumbai. Arun and Nandit were the luckiest with a later flight from Kolkata. We all were to meet at the Guwahati airport by 1400hrs. The flight was mostly without incident. However, Ajay's in-flight breakfast, Mayank's bongbandhu-prem at Kolkata and Vodafone Bangladesh's network in Agartala compensated for the lack of entertainment.
Everyone met at the Guwahati Airport at the scheduled time. Praful had caught up with a former colleague at Guwahati who gave us a few pointers for our trip. We checked around for the cabs to Shillong and finalised a Winger at the Meghalaya Tourism office. The ticket for the journey till Shillong (Police Bazaar - Town Centre) was Rs350 per seat which worked out to be Rs2800 for the entire vehicle. They also offered to drop us to our hotel for free (a further 3-4 km ride). We booked it straight away.
The vehicle was comfortable with ample space for the luggage. We took a break for lunch after Jalukbari at a place called Shankar Dhaba. There was an item on the menu called 'Motor Masala' which we were keen to try out. On enquiring it just turned out to be 'Mutter Masala'. Our group was split with 4 guys being vegetarians and 4 being non-vegetarians. We ordered accordingly. The food at the dhaba, though not bad, was nothing to write home about. We were introduced to the bigger lime that was to be a common feature of our future meals during the trip.
We left the place by 1600hrs which gave us a mere hour of sunlight with sunset at 1700hrs, a fact that us Mumbaikars found a bit difficult to come to terms with initially. Most of the journey was completed in darkness. We took a tea break at Nongpoh. The road from Guwahati to Shillong can be rated as bad with some stretches being at best average. Our driver was a bit of a mad-hatter variety and scared us with a few close calls.
The road bettered after we crossed the Barapani Lake to again shrink after entering the Shillong city. This was something I wasn't prepared for. I had spent a few months going through the maps and had completely over-estimated the roads and under-estimated the local topography. The narrow, winding hill roads of Shillong were fun to check-out.
After reaching the Police Bazaar (hereafter mentioned as PB) area, the driver took us to the SSBT parking bay and demanded a further Rs 300 to drop us to our hotel. We flatly refused to do so and explained in simplest terms the deal we had at the airport. He consulted with a few other drivers before agreeing to take us there for a small chai-paani tip. We agreed to this.
After leaving the PB area we made our way to our hotel. Actually it was a guest house; the Hill Top Chateau. This is a brilliant property located ahead of Laban in the Lumparing area. The road leading to the place is isolated with forested areas on both sides. It was almost 2000hrs by the time we were on the road and obviously pitch dark except for the cab's headlights. Our driver, in a fit of devilish humour, switched off the headlights for a couple of seconds, scaring us out of our wits.
We reached the Hill Top Chateau in five more minutes. Our hosts, Ms. Aishwarya and Mr. Dean, were ready at the entrance to greet us. We were spellbound after looking at the place we got. The property had three rooms: red, green and blue. The red room has an attached dining room. All the rooms were almost equals in size and decor, with a closet, TV and geyser in each of the rooms. The hosts stayed on the floor above the rooms. We were allowed to access the gallery of the house by our hosts. The way to the gallery went through their living room which was spectacularly done. The Hill Top Chateau, true to its name, is located at some elevation above the rest of Shillong city which makes for a spectacular view any time of the day. We spent some time at the gallery before eventually realising that we were better off inside the house rather than out in the cold.
Our dinner and breakfast arrangements were done by the hosts themselves. We had yet to finalise the transport for the next day site-seeing. Our hosts checked with the cabbies they knew, but eventually we decided to use their Eeco, provided we all could fit in. We finalised the route before dinner: Shillong to Thadlaskein (Lake) and return via Nartiang (Durga Temple and Monoliths), lunch on the way followed by checking out the archery at Shillong and some shopping. We accepted a price of Rs3000 for the trip and something extra if we get time to cover more spots.
After dinner at 2100hrs, which is quite late by Shillong time, we went off to sleep to put an end to our first day of the trip.
Originally posted in Indiamike
All photos by Mayank Sharma.
- Kapil Pilankar
Mumbai-Guwahati-Shillong
Typically, for a week long adventure trip my packing begins a week earlier. This, however, doesn't mean that it ends early. Several rounds of packing and unpacking go in are done before a final, settled look appears on the luggage. Friday night was spent rolling around in the bed impatiently waiting for the 0330hrs alarm to go off.
Our flight to Guwahati (via Kolkata and Agartala) was at 0815hrs from the Santacruz domestic airport. Mayank picked me from my home at 0500hrs. We reached the airport by 0600hrs. Ajay and Pradeep joined us there and we completed the check-in formalities. Praful and Deepak had already left on an earlier flight from Mumbai. Arun and Nandit were the luckiest with a later flight from Kolkata. We all were to meet at the Guwahati airport by 1400hrs. The flight was mostly without incident. However, Ajay's in-flight breakfast, Mayank's bongbandhu-prem at Kolkata and Vodafone Bangladesh's network in Agartala compensated for the lack of entertainment.
Everyone met at the Guwahati Airport at the scheduled time. Praful had caught up with a former colleague at Guwahati who gave us a few pointers for our trip. We checked around for the cabs to Shillong and finalised a Winger at the Meghalaya Tourism office. The ticket for the journey till Shillong (Police Bazaar - Town Centre) was Rs350 per seat which worked out to be Rs2800 for the entire vehicle. They also offered to drop us to our hotel for free (a further 3-4 km ride). We booked it straight away.
The vehicle was comfortable with ample space for the luggage. We took a break for lunch after Jalukbari at a place called Shankar Dhaba. There was an item on the menu called 'Motor Masala' which we were keen to try out. On enquiring it just turned out to be 'Mutter Masala'. Our group was split with 4 guys being vegetarians and 4 being non-vegetarians. We ordered accordingly. The food at the dhaba, though not bad, was nothing to write home about. We were introduced to the bigger lime that was to be a common feature of our future meals during the trip.
We left the place by 1600hrs which gave us a mere hour of sunlight with sunset at 1700hrs, a fact that us Mumbaikars found a bit difficult to come to terms with initially. Most of the journey was completed in darkness. We took a tea break at Nongpoh. The road from Guwahati to Shillong can be rated as bad with some stretches being at best average. Our driver was a bit of a mad-hatter variety and scared us with a few close calls.
The road bettered after we crossed the Barapani Lake to again shrink after entering the Shillong city. This was something I wasn't prepared for. I had spent a few months going through the maps and had completely over-estimated the roads and under-estimated the local topography. The narrow, winding hill roads of Shillong were fun to check-out.
After reaching the Police Bazaar (hereafter mentioned as PB) area, the driver took us to the SSBT parking bay and demanded a further Rs 300 to drop us to our hotel. We flatly refused to do so and explained in simplest terms the deal we had at the airport. He consulted with a few other drivers before agreeing to take us there for a small chai-paani tip. We agreed to this.
After leaving the PB area we made our way to our hotel. Actually it was a guest house; the Hill Top Chateau. This is a brilliant property located ahead of Laban in the Lumparing area. The road leading to the place is isolated with forested areas on both sides. It was almost 2000hrs by the time we were on the road and obviously pitch dark except for the cab's headlights. Our driver, in a fit of devilish humour, switched off the headlights for a couple of seconds, scaring us out of our wits.
We reached the Hill Top Chateau in five more minutes. Our hosts, Ms. Aishwarya and Mr. Dean, were ready at the entrance to greet us. We were spellbound after looking at the place we got. The property had three rooms: red, green and blue. The red room has an attached dining room. All the rooms were almost equals in size and decor, with a closet, TV and geyser in each of the rooms. The hosts stayed on the floor above the rooms. We were allowed to access the gallery of the house by our hosts. The way to the gallery went through their living room which was spectacularly done. The Hill Top Chateau, true to its name, is located at some elevation above the rest of Shillong city which makes for a spectacular view any time of the day. We spent some time at the gallery before eventually realising that we were better off inside the house rather than out in the cold.
Shillong City as seen from the Hill Top Chateau
The group at the Hill Top Chateau with 'some' Shillong in the background
L-R: Mayank, me, Deepak, Praful, Ajay, Nandit, Arun, Pradeep
Our dinner and breakfast arrangements were done by the hosts themselves. We had yet to finalise the transport for the next day site-seeing. Our hosts checked with the cabbies they knew, but eventually we decided to use their Eeco, provided we all could fit in. We finalised the route before dinner: Shillong to Thadlaskein (Lake) and return via Nartiang (Durga Temple and Monoliths), lunch on the way followed by checking out the archery at Shillong and some shopping. We accepted a price of Rs3000 for the trip and something extra if we get time to cover more spots.
After dinner at 2100hrs, which is quite late by Shillong time, we went off to sleep to put an end to our first day of the trip.
Originally posted in Indiamike
All photos by Mayank Sharma.
- Kapil Pilankar
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