NorthEast India Feb 2025: Day 8

 Day 8: Tezpur to Guwahati 

Apparently there was 5.1 scale earthquake at 2.25am about 60km from us, half-way to Guwahati.  

Viji and Saradha were woken up by the bed shaking.  I had been up every hour during the night to clear my nose but didn’t notice the earthquake. 


First stop from Tezpur was the => Maha Mrityunjay Sivan temple. 


Instead of a gopuram there was a huge Shiva Lingam shaped building.  Look at the size of people at the base to get idea of scale. 



Not so crowded on the day after Shiva Raatri but Police were there, prepared for a bigger crowd.  


Devotees could pour their milk into a vessel and it was conveyed to drip onto the Shiva Lingam. A faster flow would allow it to reach the top of the Lingam but with slow flow it was just dripping on to the border. 



Some interesting murals on the walls and ceiling. Unfortunately I got stopped from taking photos all round so only a selection here: 







Lunch at Makhan Bhagwan on the main GS (Guwahati-Shillong) Road in Guwahati town, which is basically a sweets shop like Gupta Sweets.  We all went for the standard Thali and I found it a bit spicy - no doubt due to my sore throat.  We didn’t even look at the sweets…


Took a private ferry to Umanandha Temple on Peacock Island. 


On the way we saw what looked like an abandoned / stopped cable car service. 


However some research (=> link) shows it only opened in 2020 and is closed on 2nd and 4th Thursdays. Why...??


The Umanandha temple (=> link ) has been there since 1694 on Peacock Island in the Brahmaputra river.  There were 100 steps to climb to reach the temple.  



Some very interesting ceramic tiles = dating back to 1694 or the rebuilding after 1897 earthquake??






We had to inch our way down 2 flights of stairs in the main sanctum to get to the main Shivalingam. Impressive size and some parts of granite were actually visible. Allowed to kneel down and take blessings unhurriedly.  Being the day after Shiva Raatri I guess we were lucky with minimal crowd. 


Didn’t see any Vaishnavite statues (as the link above claims) except for a Hanuman temple at a lower level that the main premises: 


This was more impressive than the Maa Kamakhya temple (for me..!)


Finally to the hotel at 5pm for an early 6am departure to the airport tomorrow. 


End of this travelogue …


An interesting 8 days, only somewhat marred by getting a head cold / sore throat at the end. 

Many thanks to Viji and Saradha who arranged everything and allowed us to tag along. 


Travel tip: learn some Hindi…!


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