30th March, 2013 Kohima to Mokokchung (140 kilometers in 6 hours)

We enjoyed checking our email and the internet before having breakfast and leaving our new hotel, with hot showers, TV, in-room coffee-maker, etc. We took a quick look at one of the local markets and then visited the Kohima War Memorial. This hilltop memorial commemorates the defeat of the Japanese invasion of India, their 1944 “March on Delhi”, also called the “Stalingrad of the East”. The cemetery contains 1,420 Allied war dead, mostly British but with some Indian and Canadian dead as well, who died in the siege of the mountaintop or in the surrounding actions. In addition, a memorial is also placed for 917 Hindu and Sikh Allied dead who were cremated.  A tennis court’s lines are still marked where it was the center of the fiercest battle of the siege, and we were impressed with how well the whole memorial was kept up by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission.

Before we left Kohima the guide stopped and had many copies made of our passports and India visa page as these would be needed later on in our travel in Nagaland.  As of last year travel permits for foreigners were no longer required. We were able to just keep driving today through at least eight check points that were set up on the road. Our guide for Arunachal Pradesh  that will meet us in a couple of days should have obtained the travel permit that we are required to have to enter that Indian state.

We then left on our dusty, bumpy road to Mokokchung, averaging only 23 kilometers per hour because of the bumps. There were multiple stone works along the way which were all run primarily with manual labor – men cutting large boulders into stone blocks that could be used for building as well as carrying blocks over to a crusher to get smaller pieces produced.  We saw 23 hunters with guns, including 9 hunters waiting for animals to try to escape a large forest fire the village had set for their slash and burn agriculture. They were apparently after porcupines as well as birds and other small animals.  We only really saw one bird – an lovely Indian roller on the whole drive. The drive is along the mountain ridges and snakes and winds forever.  We passed a crowd of people who had captured a small hill boa about 12 feet long but not too fat – not dangerous but good eating we think.

We reached our Hotel Metsuben in Mokokchung, the main city of the Ao Tribe, at about 4 PM. Our LP guide book states “the only place to stay with considering is the superb Tourist Lodge".  Our hotel is not mentioned, but it does purport to have internet in the lobby, but there is only hot water at certain times of the day, TV only comes on at 6 pm for a few hours etc.   The wireless that is advertised is nowhere to be found. We handed in some laundry as we will be here for two nights and had dinner at the hotel. Our tour includes breakfast and dinner at the hotels/guest houses.

We have tested the internet and it is working so we have uploaded this.  We had to laugh those as in looking at this padlock and key we have for the room door it says Tourist Lodge--- the name was changed about 5 years ago but I guess LP didn't come back through to check how the place was doing. Also we have been carrying our own wireless network router since we got it at Christmas and today it came in handy as this hotel is not wireless but we can fix that.