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Typical colourful public carrier truck
One of literally hundreds, bumper to bumper in a traffic jam From Shillong we moved rapidly southward to Silcha, in Assam again. Well, rapidly is a bit of mistatement! Firstly we found that we couldn't get any shared jeep transport, and were at a loss how to procede until a helpful local took us to a suburb of Shillong where a private bus company had an office. After hanging around for awhile, we were finally on our way in a big bus. It wasn't long before we encountered massive traffic jams, as hundreds of lorries head up and down this narrow road, carrying all manner of goods and fuels. At times the drivers were just alseep by the side of their truck, they'd been haulted there so long!
In the later part of our downhill journey we were travelling through some reasonable jungle and some stunning rocky river gorge scenery,, but the bulk of the area seemd to be badly deforrested from repeated slash and burn agriculture. Much of the bamboo on the hillsides has died as a result of the 50year gregarious flowering cycle which happened in 2006. The bamboo produces egg-sized fruit which rats love and they breed up - leading to a predicted rat plague next year -
Jesus saves...
Most truck fronts carry religious icons...this owner is presumably Catholic... lucky I visited THIS year, as I've seen enough rats as it is.
We arrived in Silchar around 11.30pm - 13 hrs of travel. We eventually found a hotel and collapsed.
The next morning found us looking for the Silchar-Lumding train. This was the reason we'd come so far south, as we'd heard that this was one of the more scenic train journeys in India and Jay was keen to travel it. The train runs on narrow guage tracks and winds its way back up into the Cachar Hills to the hill-station town of Haflong, before heading back down to the Brahmaputra valley plain.
It may be true that it is scenic, if you can get an unimpeded view (as some locals do by riding on top of the carriages), but from the inside of a VERY crowded carriage, the scenery looked not much different from that of the bus trip of the previous day. I'm sure it would be spectacular however in the rainy season. The scenery was also marred by the massive engineering along the way, as a new standard gauge track is being built.
We chose not to stay in Haflong, as there is some fighting in
Another truck
This owner puts his faith in Lord Siva... the area. The local Dimasa people are running a separatist campaign - one of many in India's Northeast.
We did jump off the train however at Haflong and grab some food - the ubiquitous roti and dahl. I also found some Rollinia fruit for sale - a nice treat.
Another late night arrival saw us in Lumding, and 5am saw me being very ill ( probably the Haflong roti, since we'd all shared the fruit). However, I was well enough to explore the next morning, since I wanted to try to organise some private transport north towrds Tezpur with a side trip to "capture" a confluence. ( See www.confluence.org for what this means and entails). However, no private transport was to be found and I was energy-deficient, so decided that the next best thing would be to press on towards Tezpur. Bus tickets were purchased, we took an auto-rickshaw to the bus stand and got on the bus. The bus got about 2kms out of town and we found the only bridge north under repair and not being ready until the next day!
Finally we decided that we would have to take the train back to Guwahati, and head for
A misleading image
In the crowded carriage on the way to Haflong. This young lad later turned out to be the most spoilt child we've encountered so far! Tezpur the next day. I spent the middle of the day sleeping on my poncho on the railway station platform, while Ann and Jay just sat around.
The actual train ride to Guwahati, across the Brahmaputra plain, while on wooden hard seats was fast and uncrowded and a pleasant relief.
And so through illness and transport troubles and lack of time, I gave up on visiting the Latitude/Longitude confluence at 26N93E. It looked so easy from the perspective of Google Earth! And in fact with private transport and a couple of days, I'm sure it would be. It would seem to be in the middle of flat rice fields, judging from satellite images and what I've seen from the train...and this time of the year would be the best to visit it - the rainy season would see it very wet indeed, and transport then woud be even more difficult.
Observing villages on the plain as we speed along in the train has allowed us to see some common features.
Most houses/huts have some trees around them, maybe a few flowers , and a tank ( a small dam for water storage/bathing). The constuction will be timber with woven bamboo
Dead bamboo thickets
A result of mass flowering, the brown patches on the hillsides are dead bamboo areas walls, often neatly plastered with clay, though sometimes not. The roofs may be thatched or tin. Often there will be a conical haystack alongside...and sometimes a satellite TV dish on the roof!
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helen creagh
non-member comment
too good
You might have missed the confluence but wow ! what a trip. reminds me of heart of darkness - that intense. No new here. all fine . I follow your blog with interest but some of the others are worried for you! They think you would be much safer in Europe! Helen