Day 1

Plans for this tour were being drafted from our Elephanta caves trip. After rigorous planning by Baba and Mr. Prakash Date the tour was finalized and bookings carried out. Date was fixed as 16^th of April 2010.

Day 1:

We started of from our place at 04:15 am. We had arranged for a vehicle for journey to airport. It was supposed to arrive at 04:30 am but it arrived a good half an hour late. We picked up Mr. Vishnu Tekwani on the way and later picked up Mr. and Mrs. Waghvare from Mulund.

Journey in the wee hours of Mumbai was pleasant and traffic nil. So we were ruling the roads. In next half an hour we reached the airport. Once we reached the airport we were joined by Date family and Mr. Suresh Parab. Greetings were exchanged and we proceeded towards the check in. After going through the security procedures and the regular airport formalities we reached the gate. From here we were taken to our plane by a bus. Everyone was excited as we had hardly done journey by an airplane.

Once in the airplane, we got to our seats and were waiting for the plane to take off. But it was not to be. We were anticipating at every announcement that it would be the call for take off. Every time we were disappointed. It may be because of our impatience but the wait seemed never ending. Added to it a Bengali couple who claimed to be claustrophobic was creating a lot of chaos. They were just quarreling with the flight attendants to open the hatch of the plane. The plane was a good hour late by now. It was disappointing. They were saying that it is always the planes going to Kolkata that are delayed! Meanwhile the pilot had announced that we would be taking off in 5 minutes. This announcement cooled off the things for sometime but that couple was just not ready to stop it. They were quarelling with attendants even after the flight had taken off.

Once in the sir we could see the slums surrounding the Mumbai airport. There was also sea and buildings that could be seen. The weather was nice. Day was sunny enough. We could see clouds and pieces of land peeking in between them. After watching this for around half an hour we could see nothing more other than the clouds. A journey of two and half hours took us to Netaji Subhash Chandra Basu Airport in Kolkata. Over here we had a halt of 40 minutes. During this halt we roamed around in airport and also took some snaps. We tried to convince the flight attendant to let us have a sneak peek in the cockpit. He agreed but only when we reach Guwahati airport. We were excited about it now. Once the plane took off from Kolkata we celebrated Mayuri Date’s birthday. Had a nice cake and also gave a piece to the flight attendant. He was damn surprised. Later on he even celebrated her birthday again by arranging a cake and making her stand on the seat itself! It was fun. After around 50 minutes in air we landed in Guwahati. Over here we went into the cockpit. The machines instruments and the devices were damn confusing. Every other machine had a LED light and was making some strange noise. There were radar displays and many other machines. We talked to the pilot name Steven. He seemed to be a jolly good guy and had pictures taken with us. We made him feel like celebrity. After finishing with this all we boarded a bus again to take us to the airport. After picking up our baggage we proceeded towards the car park. Over here we met Mr. Jitu. He was our driver cum guide cum tour manager. Actually he was nothing of it. He was the owner of the vehicle i.e. winger. But his driver was on holiday. He was coming for the first time to Shillong with us and hardly knew any roads.

After loading our baggage on the vehicle we moved on towards Guwahati city. Over here we did some shopping in a store called “Silkalay”. We went to the Kamakhya Temple but there was a huge line and the next line was to be started at 03:30 pm so we decided to offer our prayers from a distance and move on. So after praying for a nice and memorable journey we move out. There were lots of goats and pigeons around the temple. There is a ritual of sacrificing the goat to the deity. We even saw a young goat being taken for sacrifice. After witnessing all this we moved on towards our next destination Shillong-Capital of Meghalaya.

The road was not so good but we all were cool with it. There was chatting going on, laughing, joking all in all everyone was having a lot of fun. Once in the afternoon we decided that we won’t wait for lunch any where rather will proceed to Shillong directly. In this part of the world sun rises at around 04:30 in the morning and sets at around 5:30-06:00pm. At 07:00 pm in the evening it becomes pitch dark over here. The weather was pleasant with a light drizzle. We were enjoying the journey along the mountains and valleys. We stopped for tea in the evening at a small store. While everyone else was having tea and coffee I and Mayuri were having roti and chapati. From here Shillong was another hour and half away. Shadows were getting elongated and we were driving through the small villages and tea plantations.

It was around 07:30 pm when we reached Shillong city. Over here it was pitch dark now and most of the shops were shutting down. We decided that we would have our lunch first and then move on to the hotel. So it took us another half an hour to find a nice decent restaurant. After having dinner there we moved on to our hotel. Name of our hotel was Bonnie Guest House.

We reached at the hotel at around 09:00 pm. It took us some time to park our vehicle then we were allotted rooms. Over here our room allotment was such that three rooms were made available in the first wing while the other single room was in the other wing of the building. This was not good as we were in a new unknown city and it would be more secure being together. So we some how persuaded the guy and he gave a luxury apartment in the same wing. Everything was thus settled and we called it a day.