Kaziranga & Meghalaya — Rhino Country and the Rain Hills

East along the Brahmaputra, around 200 km and four to five hours through tea estate country. Kaziranga runs for some fifty kilometres along the south bank of the river — tall elephant grass, marsh and patches of semi-evergreen forest, flooded annually by the Brahmaputra and renewed by it. It was protected from 1905 after Lady Curzon failed to find a single rhino here, and now holds around two-thirds of the world population. The evening is free.

Out at first light, which is when the grassland works — rhino grazing in the open, wild buffalo at the beels, swamp deer in numbers, and a tiger density among the highest anywhere though the grass makes them hard to see. Safaris are booked and paid through the forest department and are not part of the package price. Then south and west, back past Guwahati and up onto the Khasi plateau — a long day ending at Shillong at about 1,500 m.

A gentler day after yesterday. Elephant Falls below the town, Shillong Peak for the overview, and the Don Bosco museum, which is a genuinely good account of the seven north-eastern states and their peoples rather than a municipal collection. Ward's Lake and the Police Bazar quarter fill the afternoon. Shillong has an unusually strong music scene for a town of its size and it is worth asking what is on.

Two hours south to Sohra, where the plateau stops in a sheer drop toward Bangladesh and the monsoon lands harder than anywhere on earth. Nohkalikai falls around 340 m in a single plunge. Mawsmai cave is a short walk-through limestone passage and Arwah nearby holds fossils in its walls. Staying here rather than day-tripping means seeing the rim at dusk and again at dawn, which is when the cloud moves and the plain below appears and disappears.

The living root bridges, which are the reason many people come to Meghalaya at all — Ficus elastica roots trained across streams over decades by Khasi villages until they bear weight, and strengthening rather than rotting with age. Riwai's bridge is a short walk from the road; the double-decker at Nongriat is three thousand steps down and back and is a hard half day for the fit. Mawlynnong and its sky walk sit alongside Riwai and look out over the Bangladesh plain.

North across the plateau and down the escarpment to the Brahmaputra, about four hours, with Umiam lake on the descent. If the flight allows, Kamakhya on Nilachal hill above Guwahati is among the most important Shakta temples in India and worth the stop, though the queue is unpredictable. The airport is on the far bank of the river, so the crossing needs to be in the calculation.