Visited in August 2017
We landed in Guwahati at 7:45 pm through Indigo airline from Delhi. The next task was booking the cab as our hotel (Hotel Rains Inn) which was pre-booked was around 27km away from Airport. We reached hotel at 9:10 pm and after a smooth check-in, we relaxed and ordered dinner from hotel restaurant as the same was open till 10:15pm. The food was yum and definitely worth ordering.
Day 1: With the excitement of exploring a new city we waked up and got ready. Since buffet breakfast was included in room booking, we had the same in hotel and after having a delicious breakfast we booked the cab for visiting famous ancient temple, Kamakhya Temple.
The temple is on hills, we reached the place by cab and after 10 minutes of walk we were at the stairs of the temple. One has to go through some stairs for reaching temple entry gate.
Since the temple is visited by large number of devotees hence there is a huge line for darshan. We opted for a darshan with Panda as I visited the shrine with my elderly parents (senior citizen) and special darshan ticket counter was closed when we reached the temple premises at around 11am.
After completing our ritual we proceeded towards our next destination Uma Nanda Temple. At all shakti peetha temple, the goddess shakti is accompanied by her consort Lord Bhairava, and for Kamakhya, Uma Nanda is Bhairav. Uma Nanda temple is situated on an island and one has to go through ferry for reaching temple, but due to rains and increase in water level, no ferries was operating. Hence we could not visit the temple and decided to get back to our hotel. It was around 1 pm when we reached back to our hotel.
Since there was no other place we wanted to visit in Guwahati, hence we booked a cab for Cherrapunji. We started from Guwahati at 3pm and reached Cherrrapunji at 8pm covering around 184km. We visited Umiam lake on the way to Cheerapunji.
Umiam or Barapani lake is huge and serene.
Day 2: Cherrapunji did kept its name of, place with second highest rainfall as it did welcomed us with rains and it rained till night and till morning and till our stay in Cherrapunji.
Our itinerary was pretty clear, in the morning I wanted to trek Double Decker Living Route Bridge, one of the beautiful sight in Cherrapunji.
But trekking to this natural wonder is not easy as one has to go approx 3000 steps down, cross bridges (iron bridge, single decker bridge) and climb some stairs to reach the site and the same is to be followed again to get back.
The trek requires physical strength, hence it is not advisable for old people. We did the trek in 5 hours started at 8:30 am and reached back at 1:30pm. We started the trek when it was raining moderately and when we came back it was sunny which helped us to witness various waterfalls, which was magical.
After reaching back we had light snacks and tea before proceeding further as we didn’t had breakfast.
Soon we got into our car and proceeded for next destination Nohkalikai Waterfalls but before that we had lunch as it was almost 2 pm. The famous waterfall was 7km away from our present location.
We were lucky enough to reach the site 4-5 minutes before as after 4-5 minutes the waterfall was not visible due to thick fog all over the valley.
There are eateries at this point although I didn’t explored it much so can’t comment what all is available here to eat. Since there was not much to do and the site was also not visible hence we proceeded towards our next destination Mawlynnong which got the recognition as Asia’s Cleanest Village.
Mawlynnong is 81 km away from Cherrapunji, we reached the place at around 7:30 pm and transferred to our bamboo cottage which was pre-booked. Since it was dark so we didn’t explored the place much and soon it started raining so we remained in our cottage. We retired to our beds after enjoying tasty home made dinner (rice, bhindi and aalu ki sabzi, dal, chutni, salad) by the guest house owner.
Day 3: The next day we got up and explored nearby place along with tree house which is guest house property. Tree house gives view of Bangladesh as per guest house board.
Soon we had break fast and proceeded towards Single Root Bridge which was just 5 minutes away from the place we were currently present.
A little climb is required for visiting this amazing site, the place looks beautiful with nice water flow and natural bridge. The attraction allows ticket entry, one has to purchase ticket of INR 10 to visit the site.
The next site on our list was Dawki River and Tamabil Border which is 32km away from Mawlynnong bridge. We firstly visited border (India Bangladesh border), explored the place and bought a pickle which was yummy from a Bangladeshi vendor.
After that we went back to Dawki river which fell on our way when we were headed to Tamabil border (approx 3 km before).
It started raining when we reached the spot hence we waited and did boating once the rain stopped.
Boating at this place was amazing as we could see various small but natural waterfalls due to rains. One could easily see Bangladesh from the river shore as river Dawki flows in both the countries.
Dawki looks more beautiful and almost transparent in winters, that is, in January.
Now it was time to say good bye to this corner of world and proceed towards last leg of our trip, that is, Guwahati from where we have our return flight booked. It took 6 hours for us to reach Guwahati as the same is 177 km away from Dawki river. We had lunch in between in a small but beautiful town, its nice to see diversity in India even in small towns of different states. We reached Guwahati at around 6:30pm.
Next day we left our hotel early morning to catch the flight, the hotel was just half km from the airport. We landed in Delhi at around 11:45am.
How to reach:
By Air: Guwahati airport is well connected with all the major cities of India and a few international cities.
Shillong doesn’t have an airport within the city. The nearest airport to the hill station is the Umroi Airport near Barapani, which is about 25 kilometres away. This has limited connectivity with other cities
By Rail: Guwahati Railway Station is the major railway station of Guwahati. Kamakhya Junction is the second largest station of the city. Guwahati is well connected with all the major cities of the country.
The closest railway station from Shillong is in Guwahati.
By Road: Guwahati is very well connected with the adjoining cities and states through bus service.