Cloud Kingdoms & the Living Root Bridges

Meghalaya means abode of clouds, and Sohra takes eleven metres of rain a year, so we come in the dry months and still pack a shell. The Khasi grow bridges out of living ficus…

Length: 11 days, 10 nights
From: ₹2,68,000 per person
Pace: Balanced
Stops: 6
Best months: November to April

The route

6 stops over 11 days

Guwahati
Shillong
Cherrapunji
Mawlynnong
Dawki
Kaziranga

The double-decker root bridge at Nongriat, grown from ficus
Mawphlang’s sacred grove, where nothing may be removed
The Umngot at Shnongpdeng, clear down to the stones
Nohkalikai, a single 340-metre plunge into jade water
Greater one-horned rhino in Kaziranga’s grasslands at dawn

Day by day

What actually happens

Length: 11 days
Stops: 6
Pace: Balanced
From: ₹2,68,000

1

Guwahati

Arrive Guwahati

Arrival at Lokpriya Gopinath Bordoloi International, forty minutes from town. Once you have slept, Kamakhya temple on Nilachal hill in the late afternoon, a Shakti pitha of red hibiscus, vermilion and long queues, then an hour on the Brahmaputra as the light goes. The river is nine kilometres wide here in flood, and dolphins surface occasionally near Umananda.

Night: Vivanta Guwahati
2B L D

Shillong

Up to Shillong

The Shillong road climbs steadily for a hundred kilometres, with a stop at Umiam Lake where the pines come down to the water. Shillong sits at 1,500 metres and was the summer capital of Assam under the British; the Ward’s Lake gardens and the old Pinewood still say so. Lunch is jadoh, pork with red rice, at a Khasi eating house near Police Bazar.

Night: Ri Kynjai, Umiam Lake
3B L

Shillong

Mawphlang sacred grove and Laitlum

Mawphlang’s sacred grove first, twenty-five kilometres out: seventy-eight hectares of untouched forest where the Khasi make offerings to Labasa and you may not carry so much as a leaf out. The floor is knee-deep in moss and orchids grow on everything. Afternoon at Laitlum, a grass amphitheatre with a footpath dropping into the Rilang gorge. Evening free in Laitumkhrah.

Night: Ri Kynjai, Umiam Lake
4B D

Cherrapunji

South to Sohra and Nohkalikai

Only fifty-five kilometres south, but the plateau changes: the trees stop, the grass goes short, and the Bangladesh plain appears three thousand feet below with nothing in between. Nohkalikai falls drops 340 metres into a pool the colour of jade. Then the Arwah caves, limestone with fossils in the ceiling, and Thangkharang park for the Khoh Ramhah rock.

Night: Polo Orchid Resort, Sohra
5B L

Cherrapunji

The double-decker root bridge

The hard day, and worth being honest about: 3,500 concrete steps down to Nongriat and 3,500 back, roughly six hours in all, with two wire suspension bridges over the Umshiang on the way. At the bottom, the double-decker root bridge, two tiers of ficus elastica roots trained across the river over perhaps 150 years. Swim in the pool below. Start at half past six.

Night: Polo Orchid Resort, Sohra
6B L D

Dawki

Riwai, Mawlynnong and the Umngot

East along the border road. Mawlynnong bills itself as Asia’s cleanest village and is very nearly worth the traffic; the single root bridge at Riwai, ten minutes away, is the better reason to stop. Then down to the Umngot at Shnongpdeng, where the water is clear enough that the boats appear to float on air. Sleep in a river camp on the sand.

Night: Pioneer Adventure Camp, Shnongpdeng
7B L

Guwahati

River morning, then Guwahati

On the river at half past six, when the Umngot is glass and the light is low: an hour in a wooden boat, with kayaks and a rope bridge if you want them. Then the long road back, five hours via Dawki and Shillong, with lunch at Jowai. Guwahati by evening, and a plate of masor tenga, sour fish curry with tomato and elephant apple.

Night: Vivanta Guwahati
8B L D

Kaziranga

East to Kaziranga

Four and a half hours east on NH27 through Nagaon, tea estates thickening on both sides. Check in, eat, and take the afternoon jeep into the Kohora central range: elephant grass above your head, then it opens onto a beel where rhino stand in water to the shoulder. Also hog deer, wild buffalo with the widest horns of any bovine, and swamp francolin.

Night: Diphlu River Lodge, Kaziranga
9B L D

Kaziranga

Bagori dawn and Agoratoli dusk

Dawn in the western Bagori range, where rhino density is highest and the mist lifts off the beels at six. Back for breakfast, then birding: Kaziranga holds Bengal florican, greater adjutant and, on the Brahmaputra sandbars, river lapwing. Afternoon in the eastern Agoratoli range, quieter and better for pelican and grey-headed fishing eagle. Tiger are here in numbers but seldom seen.

Night: Diphlu River Lodge, Kaziranga
10B L D

Kaziranga

Tea gardens and a Mishing village

A different Assam today. Morning in a working tea estate at Hathikuli, which is organic, with the factory floor and a proper tasting of orthodox second flush. Afternoon in a Mishing village on stilts by the river, where rice beer is brewed at home and the loom sits in the front room. Last light on the Diphlu from the deck.

Night: Diphlu River Lodge, Kaziranga
11B

Kaziranga to Guwahati

Last safari and departure

Departure day. One more early jeep if your flight is late enough, since the six o’clock light is the best of the trip, then breakfast and the drive back to Guwahati, four and a half hours to the airport. Our representative helps with check-in for your Delhi or Kolkata connection. Assam tea goes in the bag; the customs form is straightforward.

Night: Departure day, no overnight