The lake got bigger and bigger till it eddied across the shore, slid up the slope, crossed the lawn and climbed the balcony. Then it entered the mind.

Not the best way to start a travel account. Lakes are not known to climb balconies. But what do you do, if they start playing tricks on your mind? Water — from limpid pools to dark oceans — has often done that. Cast a spell, that is. And not just in times when magic was real, not magic. 

That March evening, as darkness fell on Umiam Lake in Shillong, it too was playing a trick. It had, after all, been kept waiting. This is the story of how the lake — a must write about in any Shillong diary — was kept waiting. 

They also call it Barapani, or big water. It falls on the way to Shillong from Guwahati, a two-and-a-half-hour’s picture-perfect drive, past a rash of colours: tall green trees on red soil, red flowers on brown soil and stretches of tawny mountainside under a blue sky.

The original plan was to stop over at a resort by the lakeside for a couple of nights and then carry on to Shillong. But a change in schedule — partly to cut the travel time to Guwahati airport on the way back — meant Umiam Lake had to wait.

Driver Ganesh Singh did slow down when the lake suddenly shimmered into view through a thicket of trees on the journey up but pressed the accelerator soon. “We can’t reach Cherrapunjee in time if we stop here,” he said. Cars are generally impatient by nature, especially on hill roads. 

So the lake travelled alongside, a long, riveting sweep before it disappeared in a blur of mountain bend and a by now sky-grey haze. The weather changes fast in the mountains.

Its turn came on the return trip to Guwahati. “Your room is at the back, Sir,” the front desk manager of the resort in Ri Bhoi district, Meghalaya, smiled. “Lake facing.”

Bewitched and bewildered

The sun had already begun calling it a day. The haze had given way to a flame of rust and red and the balcony seemed the only place in the world to be, a still point in a poignant whirl of memories, of past tragedies and future separations. That’s when the lake entered the mind. It stayed there through the speedboat ride the next day.

A friendly tip: Lake Placid is perhaps not the film to be seen before the ride. No, crocodiles don’t certainly explode from Umiam’s green waters but in the middle of a bewitching lake, a seemingly measureless body of green in the stillness of the time-sculpted mountains, the spray in your face, something stirs and then settles on the riverbed of your mind.
A Wikipedia search reveals that Umiam Lake, with a catchment area of 220sqkm, is a reservoir, 15km from Shillong, created by damming the Umiam river in the 1960s. Which means it is man-made. But in the white speedboat, life-jacket on as the purring craft cuts an arc through the water, the churned-up froth racing alongside, it seemed more primal than human-designed.

A splash broke the spell. A young couple, probably honeymooners, were tossing pebbles into the water, their ankles damp, sloshed by a small wave that had just rippled over.

From the boathouse to the resort, it’s a short distance but the climb is steep. And the crisp mountain air makes you hungry.

“Is it too early for lunch?”

“Whenever you want,” the manager smiled. “How was the ride?”

“Nice. Have you seen Lake Placid?”

“Lake, what?”

“Placid, the film where a crocodile attacks people.”

A local visitor’s head rocked back in laughter. Must be daft, his eyes seemed to say. But the lake and its unseen denizens stayed in the mind. The charm — so what it had been entirely imagined? — hadn’t fully broken yet.

Beyond the balcony, across the lawn, a slope runs down to the lake that lay ahead like a giant carpet, wrinkled by the breeze. Boulders and pebbles lay strewn. An involuntary arm suddenly reached down and a stone flew through the air. Splash! A bird squawked but the lake didn’t stir.

Palms cupped, the tourist bent down, touched the water and ran his wet fingers through his hair. Then he turned and clambered up the slope. He paused once, looked back to make sure the lake wasn’t following, turned and walked towards his hotel room.

We had made peace, lake and man.

TRAVEL TIPS

How to reach Barapani from Calcutta: Take a flight to Guwahati airport and hire a cab. They’ll ask for anything between Rs 2,200 and Rs 2,500

If hungry, you can snack at KFC bang opposite the airport

Ananda Sen
Pictures: Adreesh