Assam Explorer with Majuli Island

Highlights

• Kaziranga safaris (elephant + jeep)
• Ferry crossing to Majuli, the world's largest river island
• Kamalabari & Auniati Satras
• Mask-making & pottery villages

Day by day

1. Day 1Arrive Guwahati

   Picked up in Guwahati and straight into the old city — Kamakhya on its hill above the river, thick with incense and pilgrims; Nabagraha; and Umananda, a temple on an island midstream that you reach by boat, the Brahmaputra moving wide and brown on both sides.

2. Day 2Guwahati to Kaziranga

   East to Kaziranga through tea country, the gardens running to the horizon in flat green rows. The evening is yours, and the park sits quiet beyond the treeline waiting for morning.

3. Day 3Kaziranga Safaris

   Two safaris in one day. Elephant-back through the central range at first light, moving through elephant grass taller than you are while the mist burns off. Jeep through the western range in the afternoon, when the light goes long and gold across the grassland.

4. Day 4Kaziranga to Majuli

   On to Neamati Ghat by way of Jorhat, then the ferry across to Majuli — the crossing takes a while and the island reveals itself slowly. At Kamalabari and Auniati Satras, monks have kept Assamese Vaishnavite culture alive through dance, music and manuscript for four hundred years. This is the reason to come.

5. Day 5Majuli Exploration

   A whole day on Majuli, which asks for exactly that. The mask-making village, where papier-mâché faces of gods and demons are built for the satra dramas. The pottery village, worked by hand without a wheel. And a sunset over the river worth staying out for.

6. Day 6Majuli to Guwahati, Departure

   The ferry back to Jorhat and the drive to Guwahati for onward travel.

Gallery