Trek Day 3

By 4:30 AM I felt too chill and I pushed myself to wake up to get some early morning photos. Once I got out of the tent I felt better and warmer. I went to the top of the tank which is only 30m away from our tents. The sky was bright and the clouds were down the valley. All our trek route was on the other hill of Aizawl and hence the clouds keeps closing the valley and looked like a white blanket in the valley. I saw few more shooting stars in the early morning and captured few of them in photos. Thoughts about Diwali came through my mind. Now I could listen only to my heart beats and the gentle cold breeze. By 5:00 AM the sun rose and spread its golden yellow light all over the place.

When I came back to the tents, Kavitha was also found to be roaming around the tents. By 6 AM everyone woke up and exchanged Diwali wishes. We had nice tea and breakfast before we started to trek. We were required to carry our lunches. They were mostly Pooris and sometimes fried rice. By 8 AM we started trek and we were climbing up the hill. I started at last and pushed myself to pickup speed. Climbing up in the mornings with nice trail is awesome. The trek route was a jeep track. The route was slippery due to the morning dew. After sometime we reached the grasslands. The top of the peak had a watch tower and we were down the final small stretch. I dropped my backpack and went along with Chucks our guide. He took a winding route instead of climbing directly up and showed the older campsite and a small stream which originated there. He was mentioning that the campsite was moved because of less water availability at the top of peak.

The peak was awesome and the valley was covered with clouds. We were able to peek only for a brief time whenever the clouds moved away. There was a river running between the hills. It had another mizo story. In ancient times there was a fight between good and bad wills and the bad won the war. The good will were required to give the portion of the hill to bad and hence they split the hill and made river as the boundary. We took lot of photos on top and Moses was giving titanic pose with Mansi. Gautam and me started capturing few macros of butterfly.

We were required to walk down the hilltop to reach the third day campsite. It is all the way down. There were few wooden benches on the way down the top and gave some good views. It reminded me the views of Ombattu Gudda, a famous destination for trekkers in western ghats. Once we climbed down the grasslands, we entered the thick jungle with bamboo and teak. We were following the jeep track in the jungle. We were greeted by lot of school and college students who were climbing the hill. Some were tired and asking how long to reach the top.By 11:30 we reached a model village which had models of houses. There was a open air auditorium in front of the village and there were cement benches bordering the central flat structure.

The ancient mizos houses can be divided into several groups. The village chief is considered very high of the society and had the biggest house in village. Only village chiefs house is supposed to have windows. There is another big place where the boys and few of the elders stay together called Zwalbuck. It is the place the boys learn good habits and learn from the elders. All the houses are maximum 20mx20m size and had every essentials in that place. A small fireplace for kitchen, a small place to sleep made of the same bamboo. The houses were supported by teak. Each house had some small cages for birds.

We finished our lunch and started down the hill again. There was a small village and me and Gautam rested in front of a home and were waiting for others to join. The guides came from down and pushed us to continue downhill. The village was beautiful and each house had a small flower garden well maintained. We went through the village before we hit the jeep track.

The track was going down which stretched the calf muscles and knees. The professor from Gujarat was very happy in his shift to slippers. I was walking along with Bhagat. There were few deviations and the front group took a wrong path down the hill before they realised it as wrong route. They trekked back up the hill and took the right deviation. Sandeep Da was enjoying saying he had paisa vasool for the day!!!. I found a cap on the route and it was inviting me to take it up. It was army cap and already torn and adjusted by a safety pin. Someone in my group said it was Manasi's. I thought of giving it back to her once I reach the campsite. I thought that she was ahead of me and dropped the cap. I was surprised to see her back of the group and noway she could drop the cap. I asked about her whether it belonged to her. She was trying to grab the cap physically which I didnt. This small instance lead to funny incidences in later part of the trek and the great last day when I realised the power of Brotherhood.

We reached the campsite around 4:45 and was greeted by the campleader and the chief cook. The chief cook was from Assam and very nice guy. The campsite was in the middle of the bamboo jungle. The whole place was carefully cleared and made for temporary stay.

Mizoram Trek Days

Trek Day 1

I gradually picked up my speed and was crossing one by one. It was a plain road trek for the first day except last stretch of 250 metres which took to the campsite. Some part of the trek route can be seen from the youth hostel. The photo of the first day campsite is enlarged and it is the wall paper of the Mizoram YHAI main hall. The photo was taken by one of our guide Moses. Moses was a multi talented guy. In the whole trek , the person who carried heavy bag was Abhijit from Maharashtra. His wife and his two sons were there and very nice family. While I was crossing Suman Pai (another Bangalorean) I was enquiring about her travel to Ridhil lake. She was very much happy in visiting that lovely lake. The road was running along the slope of a uphill stretch and can view the valley in which a river was flowing. The other side of the valley was a hill and it was giving very nice view.
I crossed our Sandip Da and Bikas and was searching for Sudanshu who was leading all the time. I crossed him and stopped for a while. After sometime there was a small waterfall on the road. It was the time to take bath. The water was very cold and the water was falling from about 5 metres high. It gave a good massage and the water was chill. I couldnt stand there not more than 10 minutes. After taking few snaps I started trek again. None took bath there and were giving a sigh at me. After 500 meters, there was a deviation to a jeep track and there was YHAI banner welcoming us. It was around 4 PM when I reached the campsite. The jeep track had been cleared for the trek. Since there was rain till the day before, it was wet and slippery at some places. There were leeches ofcourse. We were welcomed by the camp leader with juice and hot tea. The camp site was covered almost three sites by the hill and it was at the bottom. The campsite was protected by the hills and allover the border, salt was sprinkled to prevent our dear leeches. There was a stream which cut the campsite from the toilets. There was a small bridge to cross it.
The people were already preparing for our dinner. Ours was the biggest group of 56 people. Each tent was alloted for 6 persons. One by one people arrived and chatting in groups. After sometime all the guides motivated all to do some activities. We played Anthakshari for some time and the guides sung some mizo songs as well. Then as a exercise we were playing the rhyme "Make a melody in my heart, Make a melody in my dreams, To the King of Kings" "Thumbs up, Thumbs down, elbow up, knees bent, turn up, tongues out" all in action.
Later we were served Rice and Rotis as Dinner. After dinner me, Luv Singh and Sri Krishna went back on the trail to view the water falls. Both were excited to come the next day to the waterfalls to have a bath in that beautiful small waterfall. It was only 9 PM when we went to sleep

Trek Day 2

By 5:30 the sun was up and by 6 AM it was already bright. Luv Singh joined to the waterfall and we couldnt spot Krishna. We went to the falls again and took bath. It was chill but refreshing. Krishna was seen disappointed of missing the waterfall. As I promised, I took him to the waterfalls and he was very happy. Again had a bath in the waterfalls and came back to the campsite. Sudanshu was wondering how many times I take bath. There was hot tea and it made a good to start. We were served Bread Jam with bananas. We were required to carry Pooris for lunch. Krishna offered to carry more pooris for me since I didnt had a tiffin box.
The second day trek route consisted of climb up and the cave exploration. We started trek at back of the campsite and climbed up the hill to reach the main road. We were taken through some small jeep tracks all along the road. There was a small stream which was flowing and as I took bath in a small water fall. All along the path there were leeches. After that we were climbing up in a jeep track.
At one point there was a deviation the right side took to a another hill. The left side was taking up the hill. I took the left side by intuition and I couldnt see the person before me. Also it was a small trail. It joined a jeep trail where I waited for the person behind. Our trek members came one by one and Biplap was showing his torn shoe. I offered my shoes and it was bit large for him. On following the jeep trail we reached the main road again.
We had lunch on reaching the road. After lunch, we were following the main road to the Ailwang village. We gave few chocolates to the children in the village. The village was small and few people enquired about us. We followed to the top of village and a water tank. The campsite was near to the water tank. We were welcomed by the camp leader with Tea and hot bondas. After everyone reached the campsite, we were taken to the cave.
The cave have a story. The cave was considered as evil by the mizos at old time. The first person who explored the cave had lost his hair when he came out of the cave and later died mysteriously in few days. After the cave was explored by a group of trekkers from Maharashtra, the cave have become a tourist attraction.
It was around 4 PM when we reached the cave entrance. The entrance to the cave was several steps down the main road. There was a water tank in front of the cave. Ladies and children were taken first inside the cave. I was the person in front of Sandip, Bikas and Sudanshu. The water was flowing underneath the cave. The whole cave is made up of fissure due to earth movement. All the rocks had limestone settlement all along the way. Most part of the cave where there was water underneath was overlaid with wood. Still we were made wet as water was dripping at lot of places.
The progress inside the cave was very slow. We saw several times the guides moving front and back of the cave. The cave path was small and tricky at some places where we were required to crawl, climb and chimney climbs. Abhijit the family guy was just behind his family and he was explaining how the women and children crossed the cave. At some places of the cave, the guides went under the rock gaps and gave grip to people. The children were almost carried by the guides at most of the places. Some places we were required to squeeze ourselves to get between the rock gaps. There was a tricky climb where Chauhan was waiting for the guide. I went ahead and showed the technic to climb up. Later our group was able to cross few hurdles with less help from the guides. There were lot of crabs in water stream flowing beneath us and bats over our heads inside the cave.
In treks, when a person requires help in finding the route, it is always better to move in front of the person and show how to approach the path. At some places in the cave we were waiting for more than 30 minutes. It was pitch dark all over the cave. The last stretch of the trek was very deep beneath and it required chimney climb. Some people were mentioning that the last stretch was stinky. People who reached front were taking photos when we were coming out of the cave. Everyone was excited after reaching the exit of the cave. The total length of the cave was 119 metres and people were wondering how fast we reached through road between entrance and exit rather through cave.
The whole body was muddy and I wanted to take bath before I get to dinner. I wanted to wait for the guides so that they know some place in village to take bath. But our Kochi Gautham gave me idea of going back to the entrance of the cave. We went to the entrance climbing down the steps. We had a nice bath and joined the last persons who were taking photos from the point where the deviation to the cave started. Sandip da was making comments about my bath.
After reaching campsite and finishing dinner, I went to the watertank which was above the campsite. I found Biplap, Abhijit from Pune, Kavitha, Sanjay and Chauhan chatting there. I meanwhile got a call from my colleague. Later I sent Diwali wishes for the next day. Me and Kavitha were watching the sky lying on the chill water tank. There were lot of shooting stars and I didnt had that many wishes for each shooting star.
I decided to comeback again in the morning to speak to my sisters and amma to wish them Diwali. It was getting cold by each minute and I came back to tent to sleep. Each person was given two blankets due to the chill weather.

Mizoram - Continued

After reaching Aizawl I had haircut and a rough shave without shaving cream. We took a cab to hostel. Lot of people from other places had arrived by this time. Meanwhile one of Bangalorean Suman Pai went to Ridhil. I felt 550 km travel for a lake is too much. But there are no other places to spend time. I had a nice bath and food and got introduced to other trekkers. Sandip and Bikas from Kolkatta were very sweet and nice. Few other people Biplap, Lav Singh, Sanjay also got introduced. I was getting bored as it was like a picnic.

Next day we planned to visit Aizawl and do some shopping. After tea we all went for a walking and took some good photos. Still it was 7:30. Time passes very slow in mizo as we got up early at 5 and have nothing to do. Am still not out of that routine.
Me and Biplap went to browsing center to check mails and spent an hour. Then we went to state museum and almost all trekkers were there. Later went to a restaurant David's Kitchen to try mizo dishes. Vegetarians had a tough time in finding the dish and the bamboo shoot curry was with a different taste and couldnt eat fully.

After that our journey to Aizawl Taj Mahal begun. Biplap left us and only we four Me,Sandip,Bikas and Sudanshu went there. Sudanshu collected details about that and took a bus to Bangkawn (All the mizo names are difficult to remember and pronounce, so plz bear with the names). From there we were bargaining for taxi for 50 Rs to reach Taj mahal. None came and so we started walking the hill. It was a climb up and it was about 2.5 kms. Sandip was giving comments allover the time and in the middle we got a bus which drop to a place nearby. We all reached and it was again 500 m walk to Taj Mahal.




Some brief introduction about Taj Mahal. The actual name is Paradise and mizo by affection started calling Taj Mahal. It is a memorial for a dear wife and his son. The husband runs institutions. It looked like a poor Tajmahal as it can never be matche to Taj Mahal. But his determination of building a memorial for his dead wife and son shows his kindness or wealth? It was two storied structure. The basement had the wife and son rested and the first floor the belongings of them. It is not a excellent structure but the view towards the mountains is awesome. We took few photos and we saw some school students visiting this place very often.

After our disappointed trip to Aizawl Taj Mahal we went to Aizawl hiring a cab. We skipped the Millenium mall because Sudanshu wasnt interested and were roaming here and there before we caught bus to hostel. We had a small briefing about the trek and the camp leader was explaining about the cave and the trek path. After dinnner to kill time we again went for a walk and got introduced to Cawitha from Bangalore. YHAI manager informed that there would be kickboxing places in Aizawl but as outsider, people might change their attention to us and wouldnt be safe. So we skipped the kick boxing stuff.

Mizoram looked like western ghats for me. Weather is much similar and few days were really hot. Bamboo and Plantain were found everywhere. All over Mizoram it was amazingly calm and peace. Most of the places women work and very few shops had men working. Mizo is a open society and they give equal status to women. I found few condom disposal dustbins inside a college, which surprised me. There are lot of HIV patients in Mizoram. They are well educated but not in English. They are very clean and I have seen people washing the floor even at night. There is quite lot of traffic in Aizawl but they dont honk like other places in India. Women smoke in public and there are dustbins allover the place. Even small villages have dustbins and people throw their garbage only there. Same is the case for urinals. There are lot of public toilets and people use them. Each house have facility for rainwater storage. Even Mizoram receives lot of rain and because of the terrain there is scarcity of water. So people have really big rain water tanks infront of their house. They love music and are highly fashioned. There are lot of yamaha bikes too. Its very difficult to spot old people. Do they look young or they die early ? People are relatively short compared to other Indians.

Morning we deposited extra luggage in hostel and started to trek. We were flagged off by Chief Secretary of Mizoram. We were taken by 2 mini buses and we were taken to places like state NCC training camp and university to spend time.

Basically the trek route on first day is very less distance so the YHAI made itinerary including all these. Finally by noon we reached a bridge where we started trekking. We had lunch at the bridge and the river was small and the current was strong. The guides didnt allowed to get inside the river. All our guides are college students who volunteers for treks. Few of their names are Zira, Puiya, Moses.



I started trek as the last man and picked up my speed. I was in slippers as usual and people were questioning about leeches and my stability with slippers.

Mizoram Trek-YHAI

My first trek to North India/North East India was decided based on the holidays which I can take. After discussion with manager and family, I finalized the dates on November 1 to 8 which fall on Diwali weekend. Also one more CTCian Priyanka was there in the trek which made me bit comfortable. After buying lot of winter clothes I was eagerly waiting for the day to start.
Finally the day came and Priyanka dropped from trek. Now this is the turn to start alone, similar to my first trek with CTC. Yeah I could remember my first trek with CTC was about to happen with my colleague Sathish. But he had an accident on the way and he dropped out. I synched with another Bangalorean Sudanshu and met him at airport. He was nice and hungry at the airport. We were reluctant to buy anything as everything was costly. The flight delay added to it more. Finally Sudanshu got a sandwich and ate. We reached Kolkota around 11:30 PM and were left at the lounge since the dormitory wasnt available.

Joyma Kolkatta

We decided to go to Dakshineswar temple in morning. So we were beginning to wander the 100 m lounge several times. The lounge was a bit cold and I tried to get sleep in the bench but couldnt. We were waiting for 4:30 to get out of the airport to have a view of Kolkotta city and the temple. We hired a cab for Rs100 from airport to temple and we reached the gate around 5 AM. The city hasnt woke up and we went inside the temple. We were required to dump our luggages and after a bit hesitation we deposited them to a shop where they pushed us to buy pooja items for Rs 150. The pooja items consisted of a coconut, few hibiscus flowers, incense sticks and a small flat ones red in color as prashad. We went inside the main complex and waited in a queue which was growing as time went.
Meanwhile my heart wanted to see the river and my body followed. The river was flowing beside the temple complex and reddish in color. It looked to me that river was flowing to full from one side of bank to other. Wanted to take bath but there were no change clothes and dropped the idea. There were several people taking bath in the river and coming directly to the temple. There were some people singing Bhajans. We were waiting for 6 AM to get gates opened. The queue was growing longer and longer. Finally the gate opened and few people were taking short cuts to have darshan and went off. We were allowed after the first Pooja was over and the bhajan people completed their bhajans. The early morning bhajan and the words "joyma joyma" still rings in my heart. We were required to catch flight at 9:15 AM and was bit hurried. Finally we got dharshan by 6:45 and saw other shrines in the complex. The other shrines were 10 lingas where people are allowed to touch and do Poojas. This custom is not there in South India. Visiting a temple early morning with lot of things like bhajan, dedicated people, the smell of incense sticks and the flowers is a thing to experience.
We took our luggages and had few photos in front of the temple. We took bus to airport which costed Rs14. We then finished the checkin and security. The security guy was a mallu and asked me whether I have seen Rajini's latest movie Endiran. I said no and keep on wondering about movies to watch, which I'mnt doing. We were trying to get some details about Mizoram from flight passengers and waiting to board the flight. I asked for a window seat to take some photos from air. But after boarding the flight I was surprised to see that only less than 30 persons were travelling and a small flight. My batteries died off once I got into the flight and couldnt take any photos. I could see the long runnig rivers and the winding roads. After we (Me and Sudanshu) got down from flight we were waiting for a YHAI to pick us from airport. But we couldnt find none and we took a taxi to YHAI for Rs700, which we found was very costly.


The airport was small and beautiful and people were found to be already in very relaxed mood. On the road to hostel, I found the terrain and the weather much similar to western ghats. The houses were small and mostly made of bamboo. People reside mostly near to roads and it was a nicely built road by Border Road Organization(BRO). The whole mizoram have lot of maruti 800 and no wonder Aizawl is called as city of Maruti. People dont speak english and speak Mizo which borrowed its written script from English.

We were welcomed by YHAI Mizoram state secretary Mr Sailo and the President. We were the first to report and they were giving suggestions around Mizoram to view. We had 3 days to spend before we start trekking. They were suggesting to go to Ridhil lake. This lake is supposedly sacred for ancient Mizos, where they believed all souls will reach this lake after death on their journey after death. Also this lake is in Myanmar and we can cross the border without a Passport.It is about 225 KM from Aizawl. YHAI booked everything for our journey and Mr Sailo was very helpful.
We were required to take a bus to Champai by 5 PM.

The buses , bus stand and people were small but with the whole bus had lot of luggages like lorry. By 5 PM the sunset and it was pitch dark by 6 PM. The sunrises very early around 5:30 AM and sets very early around 5 PM which is much different from south India. People are so polite and religious. Since we had a long day and less food we were sleep most of the time. The bus was very slow and the roads were very bad which I was comparing them to the jeep trails in south India to these main roads. We had a stop at a small town. We were trying to get some vegetarian food but none. We suppressed our hunger with bananas and biscuits. On the whole journey, I was expecting mizo songs played in the bus. But the front door was closed and only the driver and people in the front cabin could hear them. The beat in the songs were good. Mizo people smoke very much and a pungent smell which comes out of smoke is unbearable.

Champai and Ridhil Lake

Ah what a long first day. We reached Champai town at 5 AM and it was bright sun. We were welcomed by Professor who is a friend of YHAI president. He was very nice and explaining about Mizo, Champai and in general. He booked us hotel and the cab to Ridhil. Champai is a small town famous for its largest rice field in Mizoram. The view from our hotel room was excellent. We had a view of the rice fields and the Myanmar mountains. The river is the border between India and Myanmar. He took us to his home and his wife served us hot tea. Their youngest son joined us to Ridhil lake. The professor felt sorry not to join us as he needs to attend church twice since it was sunday. Yeah Sunday the whole mizoram is on holiday. You dont get any shops opened, no buses and not even petrol pumps. It is a day for the people to relax, pray and spend with family


Everyone had difficulty in understanding English. We reached the border and the permissions were taken care by Professor and we didnt had much trouble in crossing the border. We had few vada like food in Myanmar and hot coffee. We went to visit the Professor's relative who lives in the Myanmar side. Then we went to Ridhil lake. The lake was surrounded by mountains and very calm. The whole of Mizoram had the same calmness and nice feel good thing. I jumped inside the lake and had a good swim. We took few photos and a small booze. The driver bought alcohol in Myanmar as it is banned in Mizoram.
We reached back to Champai around 12 and were very hungry. We ordered rice and dhaal and waited for it. We had a nice lunch and slept till professor came back to take for a Champai trip. He took to few high places where we can get a clear view of Champai. He took us to his college where he works and introduced to a Oriyan, Maths professor. The Maths professsor is working for more than 15 years in Mizoram and was delighted to find a Oriyan person after a long time.
Later the Professor dropped us back to the hotel and assured of sending us the next day Monday through TATA Sumo cab as it is bit faster than buses. We tried to find something interesting in Champai on sunday but all closed. We found only one restaurant and had nice coffee. We met our Maths Professor and he took us to his home and we spoke about IT and our work. His wife and children were in Orissa and he is working in Mizoram. After returning,We had dinner and slept early.

Back To Aizawl
The next day started with TATA SUMO journey. The driver was warned of no smoking by our Professor and he obeyed it. The driver was praying before we started our journey to Aizawl. People here are so religious and God fearing. The journey was bit crampy but not bad. We had breakfast at a restaurant on the way. The food dishes were smelling with a burnt rice smell. This smell is not because of burnt rice but because of a vegetable which looks like tomato in shape but have a very pungent smell. We were finding difficult to eat with leafy boiled vegetables. Mizoram is not a place for veggies. Anyone who wants to have reduce weight can try a mizoram trip.
On the way our driver was driving fast and playing good mizo and english songs. Their culture is much embedded with music, fashion, religion and family. The driver hit another sumo and was required to remove the broken part and tie it back to sumo. Neither he or the other driver quaralled and they settled very easily. They didnt even settled the loss in money which cannot be found in south India.