North East Odyssey: Part Six

Day Six (29.11.2021): Road trip from Bomdila to Kaziranga via Tezpur

We woke up early morning, got ready for the day, kept our luggage outside the room and went for breakfast. Done with the breakfast, luggage got loaded in the bus. Today was our last day in the chilled, rough yet spectacular Arunachal. One of the seven sisters got ticked in my bucket list. We were heading back to Assam through the same route, but we were going to Kaziranga. The journey began ascending on the convoluted roads with the river streams flowing on the right; and then descending through the convoluted roads of Tenga Valley. We crossed a couple of bridges over the river stream. We halted at the Nag Temple at 10 AM. Again, my handbag was wet, do not know how! I had already wrapped everything in plastic so no worries.

Nag Temple

There were two stair routes: the route with normal stairs was a longer one as compared to the route with steep stairs. We kept our shoes at the corner of the sitting platforms created for visitors. Then we climbed stairs to the main temple, there were temple bells hanging from the ceiling. The main section had a shivlinga, with a kalash on tripod stand pouring water droplets on it. There were two shiv pindis engulfed with snake(nag), behind the shivlinga.

There was a large seating area in front of the idol. Having worshipped the nag devta and shivlinga, we proceeded to the back side of the shrine. There were navgraha engraved on stones, few steps down the temple. 

The beauty of surrounding landscape and the river flowing through the valley were complimenting the serene atmosphere at the temple. Bhushan briefed us on the story of the temple. We also met a few army officials who had stopped here. Done with the worship, we got back to our bus and continued the journey.

We halted at Palchok for tea-break and washroom break at 11 AM. While the sun was quite shinning today, I kept my handbag and scarf on Maithili & Usha's seat to dry. Our girl gang had maggi party and there were talks of going to Borgos for spa. 

We drove further towards Bhalukpong. We halted at an amazing waterfall on the route. Today we started playing Antakshari and did not realize when the distance got covered in singing songs (old and new). 

We halted at the Bhalukpong Tourism Complex for lunch. We had a small walk post lunch in this lush green complex. We then continued our journey and reached Agnigarh at 04:15PM. The sun was in mood to say goodbye for the day.

Agnigarh

Agnigarh is a hillock located on the banks of river Brahmaputra in Tezpur. It is the site of the fortress which was built by Banasura to keep his daughter Usha in isolation. Bhushan briefed as on the whole story. There is a circular stairway leading up to the crest of the hill. The area was surrounded with green bushes. At the top, there is a two Storey viewing platform to watch the city and the river Brahmaputra over the Kaliabhomora bridge. The area was crowded with youngsters taking selfies. There was a fountain next to the viewing platform. There were sculptures depicting the story in bits and pieces like the statue of Chitralekha painting the portrait of Anirudha as per the description of Usha (which she saw in her dream), the war between Hari and Har, and so on. 

Rivers of blood flowed due to the war and so the city got its name as Tezpur (City of Blood). It was sunset by the time we covered the whole park. We had a washroom break and then drove towards Kaziranga.

As we crossed the Kaliabhomora bridge and drove towards our hotel in Kaziranga, the air seemed to be purer, the sky seemed to be clearer, giving us a cue that we were entering nature's abode. It took more than two hours' drive to reach the Hotel Dcourtyard Resort. Eight of us (myself, Krupali, Hiteshree, Shraddha, Mallika, Shreya, Shweta and Swati) kept our handbags at the reception and requested Bhushan for the Innova so that we could reach Borgos on time. Jayanta, the Innova driver, asked, "Kitne aadmi hai?". It was a ten minutes' drive to Borgos. More about it in another post. We came back around 10PM and had dinner. Our rooms were in the building behind the reception area. We got room no 207, luggage was already placed in our rooms. We went to our rooms and dozed off.

Read next: North East Odyssey: Part Seven