Bagdogra-Jaigaon road trip in West Bengal
After our Gokulashtami Pooja at Bangalore at night, we had to get up at 2.am to catch the early morning flight almost across the country to reach the small Bagdogra airport at 8.30 am.
I just observed the many cut outs of the chief minister of West Bengal welcoming us to Bagdogra.. After some excellent flavoured tea and breakfast at the Hotel Marina We were on the road again. Other than that even our driver said there wasn’t any great tourist attraction there.
The next thing that caught my attention was the many lottery shops in Jalpaiguri, which I had visited almost twenty tfive years ago. We remembered our train ride then as we passed the New Jalpiguri Railway Station.
We enjoyed our Drive next to Teesta River and the Jaldhaka main Canal, which was supposed to be artificially created. On the other side was the Bykampada forests.
Our next stop was at the Gojoldoba dam also called the Teesta Barrage. It was built to divert the Teesta river waters to West Bengal, instead of flowing to Bangladesh
I always thought that tea was grown on hill slopes so I was surprised to see many tea gardens on the plains. We passed many privately named tea estates like Oidlabari tea gardens, Goodriche and Duncan tea gardens.
There was even a town called Mal as we passed signboards saying Mal municipality or Mal park.
As we drove past the Jaldapara national park, there was no sign of any wild animals, and instead there were too many modern vehicles on the road.
Suddenly, there was a change of scenery as we spotted mountains and dark clouds in the distance.
Finally we reached the Indian border town of Jaigaon. We wondered why most of the buildings here had no proper paint or plaster or no walls either. Corrugated tin sheets seemed to be used in plenty. Suddenly we saw a blissful looking cow in a drain of dirty water. A signboard named ‘chemists and dragists’ made us smirk.
Suddenly we saw a whole lot of hardware and other spare parts stores and we realised that they must be catering to the needs of the neighboring country market. The crowds and the seeming disorganised untidy chaos, just got overwhelming and we were amazed at the different experiences that India can give us in just a matter of a 4 hour road trip.
I smiled as I imagined where our family was in the top eastern corner of the Indian map during this unique West Bengal road trip.
So in 2018 do notice these simple smiling moments.Have a smiling year!
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