4 days cycle touring into the hills of Meghalaya(Guwahati -Shillong-Mawphlang-Sohra)

8:15Am we restarted our journey from Jorabat. As planned we had to have our breakfast in Nongpoh. But ahead of us was the uphills till Sangbangla. That stretch of the route was named as Hill Warriors in Strava.

But by the time we reached Nongpoh we realised that the whole town was celebrating Republic Day.

So no restaurants were open in the town.

We continued our journey till spotted a small road side dhaba.

They offered us whatever they had as due to the higher demand on that day they found hard to meet all the orders.

2PM we reached Umsning. We were stopped all along by curious people to ask where we were going and what was the cause. But people found hard to buy our answer that we were riding for fun.

330Pm we reached Umium lake. We were hungry by now and gulped everything available there at the tea stall.

545PM we reached our homestay in Shillong. It was a nice property in front of St.Anthony's College. We quickly unloaded our bikes and headed to Munchies at Don Bosco Square.

At 930PM I got a call from a local cyclist who owns cycle shop in Shillong. With his kind assistance I got my rear tyre replaced with a new imported one.

Day 2

11 AM we check out from our home stay with some encouraging words from our host. Replacing bags on our bikes we headed towards Mawphlang.

1130AM and we I meet with my second puncture . Luckily I had the spare tube with me. Without wasting time worked on replacing the same. This would have been discouraging for some as on two consecutive days we were facing the same problem. But we had planned it too long to be discouraged by such minor setbacks.

On the way we decided to withdraw some cash at the ATM an the interior places would hardly have any card accepted. As we stopped near the ATM at Eastern Air Command we were surprised to be surrounded by inquisitive kids from school. The were asking us all sorts of questions related to our bikes and what we were carrying in our bags and about my hamlet mounted camera. But it was fun answering to kids as they never judge.

After a hundred meters from the ATM the road splits into three. To the left was Cherapunjee ,right in the middle was to Mawsynram and on the right was to Elephant falls. We had to take the Mawsynram road. This was a new road for both of us.

As we moves in through the road we were stunned by the beautiful valley with clear blue sky. The weather was great with good visibility and occasional cloud covers.

The traffic was very light and this helped as the roads were narrower than on the Cherapunjee road.

As we were moving inward the population density was getting thinner. Beautiful faces smiling at us wherever we spot someone. This was very heart warming. I had been driving around in Meghalaya for a long time but such kind of friendly interactions have never occurred.

Restaurants or eateries were sparse on the road. Just before reaching the Mawphlang town when we spotted a small eatery we didn't take a chance but decided to refill our sounding bellies.

All along the way we were looking for a liquor shop so when we spotted as signboard in Mawphlang town directing towards as narrow lane we decided to take the small detour and grab a booze. With loaded bellies and liquor in stock we now were the two happiest people riding down the Mawsynram highway.

We crossed another junction on the road. Ahead straight was towards the Sacred Grove and down to the right goes to Mawsynram. Pritam was confused and he inquired to the few people there,but I was confident as I did a thorough study of the map and the route was clear in my mind. The road was a constant downhill and was getting narrower as we moved. But there were hardly any traffic so we zoomed down the hill with excitement. On our left was the Sacred Grove up on the hill and the valley down to our right.

Soon as the afternoon was getting cold the place turned into a no men land. I knew we were on the right track but what i didn't know was how far we had to go because the Farm we were visiting was off the road. There was no network to check the map. So we decided to walk up to the Khasi Heritage village to confirm the address from people up there.

When we reached up in the village, there was no one. Not a single soul was visible to us.

After much effort Pritam found a single person who with much of language barrier confirmed that we were on the right track down the Mawsynram highway. So we once again rode back to the highway.

After another 15 minutes of riding down the highway we reached a small settlement area. As we were visually scanning through the valley with the huts in the backdrop I spot a sign or relief. A familiar kind of cluster that I checked on the internet.

430 Pm and finally we were there at the Farm. To our surprise a young voice with a welcoming tone was calling us from the farm.

"You were there at the Air force this afternoon right? I saw you. You guys were cycling from Shillong."

Those were the words of Imri, the youngest son of the farm owner James.

We crossed the shallow stream and entered the most beautiful place that I have ever seen. The evening came down fast as we were sharing stories with other guests and our new friend Imri.

As the night came down tiredness caught us together with the cold temperature. My attic was the most comfortable place to be in and I fell asleep in no time.

Day 3

I woke up to a fresh new day with energy. The attic was very comfortable and I had a sound sleep. But when I stepped out to take a stroll outside I realized it was -2 degree Celsius outside and frost had built up everywhere.

It was a clear weather and the visibility was great. So we freshened up and went to the dining hall for the breakfast. But just as we were having our breakfast the weather changed drastically and it started raining heavily. That was the least we were expecting as we were heading towards the David Scott trail.

As the rain slowed down we decided to take risk and head towards the trail. We were not prepared for the kind of weather as we were not expecting rain at that season.

With some last minute route briefing from James we decided to hike uphill towards the Sacred Grove and catch the trail from there.

The uphill hike was a short cut to the Sacred Grove rather than riding uphill to the Khasi Heritage village. But the trail was not suitable for the rains. That too with our cycles. We However decided to follow the trail and continued our uphill hike.

The rocky trail was too slippery for us to get a proper grip.

As we reached the top of the hill we could see the Sacred Grove on our right.

As per the map we now had to keep moving ahead with the forest on our right.

As we were crossing past a football field we realized that we reached the Khasi Heritage Village.

We made some new friends there too.

They were there for a family feast in the woods. We shared our story with them as they were eager to know about why we were cycling out there in the cold.

From there an asphalt road lead us to the village from where the trail had an entry.

Slippery grass and rocks welcomed us into the trail. After a few hundred meters into and the scene changed drastically as we looked down and across the valley with the Umium river flowing down below. It was mesmerizing and we were stunned for a while just looking around.

This was the route built in 1826 and the trail was built with stones roughly laid. It was meant for horses and not cycles and that we realised on moving a few hundred meters down. My front suspension started to lock up automatically with a cranky sound. So I had to soften the suspension, play it to the max and then lock it out manually to save it from breaking down.

With every hairpin turns the road narrowed down with the slippery rocks beneath our tyres. The road was scary as a single loose grip could end us up down into the rockey Umium river below. But courage comes magically with the adrenaline rush. And instead of slowing down we paddled faster down the slopes. It was first of a kind experience for us into some unknown trails with blind corners and steep slopes. Lips singing hard rock songs and heart beating like boom box we were on cloud nine.

As we were reaching closer to the Umium river we could now see the suspension bridge above the river. This bridge was the latest addition to the trail which came after the old bridge was washed away by the flood.

This bridge too was in rickety condition with floor planks missing in many parts. On the other side of the bridge we met two young boys. Both were students

and after some little regular chit chat with the guys we proceeded with the trail.

As we proceed we has the river flowing on the right hand side. The trail is now a comfortable one with mostly grassy and leading downhill. We comfortably rode down soon reaching the point where the trail ended in a rocky stream. Many hikers were there who seemed to have came from the reverse side. We stopped and clicked some pictures in the stream with our bikes. The water was cold and we had no intentions to get wet there. So after having some biscuits that we carried from Zorum Villa(thanks to out survival instict to pick food from the odd places) we proceeded towards the other side of the stream.

The terrain completely changed as we changed side. Its less rocky compared to the other side of the stream but was slushy at the beginning. Carefully negotiating the slush and the mud we again headed uphill from where we could see where we came from.

This was a steep uphill so when we met a group of hikers that were heading our way we were almost climbing at the same pace. so to maintain the gap and silence we decided to fall back for a while while and let them pass the uphill section for we knew we will over speed them them in the downhill section of the trail.

the decision seemed to be fruitful one, as instead of struggling to keep up with the trail and the distraction by other hikers we got time to enjoy the serene beauty of the landscape that engulfed us. It was mesmerizing. we stood there with no words uttering from our mouth, we sang ourselves with the music of the valley.

The trail slowly opened up to cleared landscape. We saw the hikers there busy snacking so we took the opportunity to increase the gap and rode fast the downhill section that led us to a village.

But the village was quite empty as obvious that most of them were day workers either working in the farm or in the query, the later seemed more of a possibility though. A few young guys there didnt understood English or Hindi or any language that I knew. The map was clear about the route( the map that was handed to us at the entry) but the confusion erupted as we saw another route that led to farming land. We decided to stick to the map though the other route seemed more obvious to be leading to main road. However we were comforted finally again by another group of hikers that were entering from the other side.

So with confidence we rode with joy as the new landscape showed its beauty. The terrain was plain and rocky.

This trail had an old arch bridge that was even marked on the map. we crossed that and reached a pass. There was a road running right above it. it was there that confusion erupted. the train beyond that went downhill into forest. We climbed up to find any details of the road above. But there was no vehicular movement there. We had three ways to go from there, to continue with the trail into the forest, to climb up to the road above and ride and the other option was to climb up the road and ride the other way as we dint know which way led to where.

We knew we had few hours before sunset to find out way out. so we continued to ride towards the forest along the trail. Only fear that we had was that if it was a wrong route and we had to return we would have to ride uphill to reach this point. But soon the fear disappeared as the forest enchanted us in its beauty.

The trail again opened up to a plain land . By then we could some vehicular sounds. We followed the sounds and reached a stone query. The workers there could speak english and told us that we were at Ladmawphlang and that the main road is a few kilometers from there and asked us to continue with the trail.