This post covers our journey cycling across north-east India towards Myanmar in January. Our route included the states of West Bengal, Assam, Nagaland and Manipur.

SUMMARY

Having spent six weeks in India prior to entering Nepal, we were already well-accustomed to the country and its ‘ways’. Whilst India may not be designed for cycle touring, it is a fantastic country to explore by bike if you overlook the incessant horns and pollution. If you’re planning to bring your bike to India, check out our summary from our India ‘Part Two’ blog for some advice on cycling here.

STORY

After the fast, flat and dusty last few days in Nepal, we made it to the border. The eastern Mechingar Nepalese border seemed to be as chaotic yet fluid as the Bhimdatta border in the west; thousands of people coming and going with officials making very infrequent, superficial checks. So lax in fact we nearly accidentally slipped out the country until we were pointed to the immigration office. As it happens, we learnt this is exactly what our friend Emil had done when we bumped into him at the Indian immigration office. He’d had to make two trips along the Mechi bridge which divides the two countries to get his stamp out of Nepal. He got to enjoy the reintroduction to Indian driving styles twice.

The degradation in driving standards when re-entering India was more apparent than the improvement when entering Nepal. The horns, the wayward tuk-tuks, the driving on the wrong side was all back with a vengeance. We were soon back in the flow of things though. With Emil to bolster our crew, we rolled out towards Siliguri as quick as we could - there was a Subway footlong with our name on it.

The newly built roads were dreamy compared to the Nepal roads the previous few weeks. The majority of the area in the northeast Indian states is also pan flat. We took advantage of this and did some big days before we hit the hills in the states of Nagaland and Manipur. We reached Guwahati (480km) in 5 days. Beck even did her first century (100 miles/160km). We didn’t stop for long as frankly there wasn’t a huge amount to see but also our presence seemed to attract a lot of attention in the non-tourist states of India. Beck had a string of punctures during this time which reminded us of how quickly a crowd forms in India. Even a puncture on a quiet stretch of motorway gathered a crowd within minutes. Stopping in a town centre to pop to the shop brought the traffic to a standstill and lead to a scooter-cyclist collision. Extreme crowd pulling.

In the blur of dust, motorways and heat I began thinking about my strange affection for the trucks of India and Nepal. Although I’d had a few close calls with them, they are far more interesting to share the road with than the austere trucks of Europe. The trucks of the sub-continent are highly individualised and richly decorated to reflect the character of the driver. Presumably no driver is a shrinking violet as every truck is a gaudy mix of chrome, tassels and brightly hand-painted murals. Some are a bit jarring to the reality of a 20 tonne truck; yin and yang symbols painted on the rear differential. Sports logos painted on the bonnet; a favourite was a Nike swoosh with the slogan ‘Just do it’ painted on the bonnet. Presumably talking about their attitude to overtaking. ’Mirror, signal, then maybe do it’ looks less cool I guess.

After a rest day in Guwahati we headed into the hills. The roads were getting far quieter by this point and there were some nice stretches through forested areas. We even found a nice wild campsite on a quiet stretch of river. Making a campfire - literally our first on the entire trip - Beck managed to make bread from scratch in a basic metal pan, AND it was edible. Although, poor Emil woke in the night with food poisoning so not all good (we blamed the wild berries we were given from strangers). Being good friends we left Emil to puke his guts up in a low-end hotel in the nondescript town of Dimapur the following day.

Shortly after Dimapur the road began to kick up to Kohima. We had now crossed into Nagaland. This area was home to the Naga people, descendants of the infamous head-hunting tribes that once lived in the forests here. The people here ethnically and in there attitude are quite distinct from the rest of India, some even want full autonomy. As a result, it was quite difficult to travel to this area until recently. Thankfully for us they’ve opened up and dropped the need for permits. It seemed as though they wanted to renew all their roads in an effort to impress the new tourists they’ve embraced. Unfortunately it looks as though they ran out of money shortly after stripping all the original road surface off. Give it another year and this is going to be an incredible place to cycle.

The sandy climbs were tough and slow but we were compensated by the friendliness of the locals. When my rear hub decided to pack in, we pulled into a cafe where the owner offered his hands and tools to perform open-heart surgery on the bearings. We also stayed in a number of churches on our way to the Myanmar border. American and British missionaries converted much of the area to Christianity in the nineteenth century. I sensed the pastors knew that we weren’t Christian but they welcomed us in for food and a bed for the night anyway. One pastor who was affectionally known as ‘aunty’ insisted on reading us a passage before we left:

“The LORD is your keeper; the LORD is the shade on your right hand. The sun will not strike you by day nor the moon by night. But the road surface isn’t great ahead and there aren’t many places to stop and eat…”

Psalm 121:6

I made that last bit up but the road down from Kohima to Imphal was gnarly, with long sections of dust and moments of no visibility as trucks flew past. We persevered as we knew we had a decent Warmshowers rest waiting for us in Imphal.

Family man Gobi hosted a local cycling club from an outhouse on his land, which was to be our home for the night. Warmshowers guests are also usually invited out on their club rides but unfortunately we were there on the wrong day. However, Gobi kindly drove us around to get beer, and have local food and tea at a cafe. On our tour he also explained how Manipur is often on alert from the threat from bordering tribes and anti-government protests. In some cases a curfew is imposed which coincided with one of his previous guests once meaning they had to stay for a week. Luckily we avoided this as we were excited to be heading into Myanmar the following day.

We cycled back out of valleys floor which Imphal sits in and back into the hills, heading for Moreh- the final border village. This border region is heavily militarised with camps situated on every pass. Each had their own checkpoint where the guards pointlessly write down all passport details in a standard lined paper pad which no one will ever look at again. Alarmingly the lone guard on the final checkpoint before reaching Moreh said we “could go no further”. A block on all road traffic had been made due to anti-Bangladesh immigration protests scheduled for that day, which explained why the roads had been so quiet. Luckily, however, the border guard made a phone call to another army official sitting in a watchtower nearby and we were waved through.

Arriving in Moreh in good time we had the rest of the afternoon to relax. Strangely there was one fairly upmarket hotel in what was otherwise a very basic, dusty Indian village. We decided to treat ourselves. We were almost again disappointed when the hotel owner said it was technically shut due to the curfew…but he’d let us stay if we were discreet.

We walked down the desolate Moreh streets in search of food and headed into a basic roadside restaurant, the only one with its door slightly ajar. Successfully conveying we didn’t want to eat dog we toasted to what we though would be our last day in India. The rest of the day was spent washing the dust of everything we own and giving the bikes a once over. By the evening Beck was starting to complain of food poisoning-type symptoms. Incredibly bad luck since neither of us had been ill in over 2 months in India or Nepal. Turns out everyone who told us it was inevitable was right.

By the next morning it was pretty evident we weren’t going anywhere. Finding some basic antibiotics in the town, all we could do was sit it out. This lasted for 3 days in total, giving Emil time to catch up with us once again after we’d abandoned him in a similar condition. The following day we rolled into Myanmar as a trio once more... M

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Current Stats (as of 02.02.19)

Total days cycled: 162/244
Total rest days: 82
Total distance completed: 10,181 Km
Total punctures: Becky 12 - Matt 0

April 2019
- Apr 14, 2019 'Mingalaba' from Myanmar Apr 14, 2019