Daringbadi is a tiny village situated in the district of Kandhamal in Odisha at an elevation of 914 meter. This beautiful hill station is also called ”Kashmir Of Odisha” because of its unprecedented paradigm of nature. However if you are finding a lone place to liberate your daily heeds then you should definitely try this place. From Kolkata it is about 687 kilometer. Route to reach Daringbadi by train: you have to get down at Brahmapur station. It is located in the district of Ganjam. From there Daringbadi is about 119 kilometer and it takes almost 2 hour 40 minutes to reach there by car.

Now coming to my experience with my elder brothers(DADA, PRATYUSH DA, SNEHANGSHU DA) and sisters(AMRITA DI, MOUMITA DI, SASWATI DI). On 9th August 2019 we started out by boarding the DGHA VSKP EXPRESS (22873) from Kharagpur Junction at 8.20 PM.

The Chicken curry cooked by Snehangshu Da was really laudable and it added greed to our mouth at the very beginning of our journey in the train. The chatter for the day ended with grim and chuckles.

At 4.40 AM in the next morning the train halted in Brahmapur and we got down from the train.

Then we headed towards Gopalpur beach by car. It took about 35 minutes (from 5.06 – 5.41 AM) to reach there. In the bright morning rays the waves spattered glint of gold. The spree of waves allowed our sleepy eyes to turn into sunny eyes and cherish the beauty of the amiable sea. Perhaps the sea is unaware of the insignias created by me but I will remember the waves mopping my footsteps that I had left again and again. The joy to play with the sea is nonpareil indeed.

After that we freshened up ourselves in a rest-house near Anangapur (Dist.- Ganjam). It is a well-maintained and well-organized rest-house of the Government.

Our next destination was Taptapani Temple. We reached there at around 9.10 AM. The main attraction is the Hot spring. Here hot water is generated naturally from the ground. We stayed there for about 15 minutes as there was nothing much to see.

Khasada waterfall was the next place of interest that we had visited. This is a beautiful place comprising faded small and big stones. The water gushing vertically from the rock is muddy in color and it seemingly creates the view of erstwhile civilization with the essence of natural elegance. We felt cold comfort beneath the big rocks and became crony of the surrounding rocks that were virid vividly.

 

We entered Jiranga Monastery at around 11.46 AM. Peaceful and pleasant environment touched our heart.  The harmony of Buddhist prayer tuned our heart to synchronization and it was really creating bland ambience of peace and consonance.

Then we were confronted with the magnificent view of Dasingbari falls. It seemed to me a dreamy place like the fairyland. Colour of butterflies sprinkles the beauty of nature and the swift falling water is heavenly when it gives a blissful tig in your body. The difficulty of going up 165 stairs after watching the unexpectedly beautiful place is replaced with the feeling of wonder and gain only;

We cannot forget our pastime in the amazing pine forest. We were taking witty pictures and slow motion videos of us and wanted to get back our childhood days and play with the trees sportively. A lot of funny moments are still tweaking me to annotate the pine forest.However with an aflame heart we came to ‘Hotel Padma’ where we had been staying in Daringbadi. After reaching there we had a refreshing shower to calm our body and mind. The evening of 10th August was not over and we planned to go out and have the taste of local surrounding. So we came out from the hotel and just after few minutes it started raining. Then with only 2 umbrellas we went to a tea stall. We were waiting for the tea but the shopkeeper was making delay. The tea was made perfectly. So his delay did not make us angry at all. To lull pratyush dada’s sweet anger dada and Snehangshu Da brought 3 plates of chowmein. We all came to room no. 306 of the hotel (where dada and pratysh da stayed) and chattered. Then had the dinner. The day came to an end with  laughter and good memories.
When we opened our eyes in the next morning (11th August 2019) we were able to think out that we had failed to manage to wake up in the right time. Hence we hurried to have a bath and breakfast as quick as possible. Then at 10.46 AM our ‘driver dada’ started for Mandasoru. On the way the landscape drew the view of nifty and beautiful village comprising very few households. Cowherds with herd of cows were passing the road and the greens were beckoning. I liked the way Dada and Snehangshu da boosted our energy by singing odia songs😊. They eased the grave moments with their funny talks. However with a rife ardour we reached Mandasoru after one hour.

The assembly of rocks vividly creates pleasant landscape here. There are view points to watch the area.

The place is beautifully organized and we took a lot of snaps there.Had tea in the Mandasoru restaurant.

Then we left Mandasoru at 12.55 PM and headed towards Lovers’ point.
The most cheerful part of our journey in the car was it. We, girls were singing Tagore’s songs whereas folk songs sung by the other two – ‘captain’ and ‘vice captain’😜 overpowered us with their enormous range of voice.

We reached lovers’ point at 1.55 PM and left the place at 2.20PM.
Then went to the emu breeding centre.

From there we returned to our hotel to have the lunch. After completing lunch we again set off for visiting the nearby parks- Nature park and The Hill View park.
Firstly we entered the Nature Park at 4.21 PM at the expense of rupees 10 for each. The park is well adorned with flowers and variety of plants including medicinal plants. Small bridges are ornamental here. Almost everyone clicked picture there.

The park let us to commemorate the good old days of childhood when we took pleasure of riding the cradler. Then we visited the Hill View Park (5.21 PM) opposite to the Nature Park.

The blithesome breeze in this zone had taken our hearts.

It was almost 6 o’clock in the evening when we left the beautiful hill view park.

On the way to hotel we stopped near an ATM and then thought of having mouth watering ‘Fuchka’ but unfortunately it went in vain! After returning to the hotel we were playing ‘Dam Saraj’ and the more we played the more our reluctance grew for not going to the dinner table. However we had to take our dinner. So we left the play unfinished. After dinner Dada and Snehangshu Da were not playing with us because they had to talk about the whereabouts regarding outgivings. So we four played as Moumita Di also went to bed for sleeping. It was so funny when Pratyush Da acted time and again to show the bengali movie ‘Sare chuattor’ but saswati di could not catch up. However we had plethora of good memories in Daringbadi and we did not want to leave them at all.
We already knew that the Amravati Express had been late for 6 hours but the hour of delay was increasing with time. We were happy with this because we would not have to rise early in the morning but when we woke up in the morning at about 8 o’clock our driver prodded us to be ready within 8.30 AM. However we managed to be ready within 9 o’clock and took our breakfast. Then it was the time to say good bye to the green beauty. Perhaps this place was also making silent whining like us. The driver informed us that he handed over his duty to another one and
he could drive us to rambha and then to tampara lake. So we thought it would be better to appease our soul’s desire than waiting at sulky Brahmapur railway station.
Rambha is a beautiful place to cherish the view of chilka. Here Panthanivas is a good shelter which provides boating facilities. It was our bad luck that we could not avail a  boat. Still the view of chilka surrounded by small rocks creates scant and cozy landscape.

From rambha tampara lake was 15 minutes. We visited the huge and nice tampara lake and stayed there for more than one hour; probably we spent the longest time because others did not spare more than 5 minutes in this place. We took pleasure both of waiting and spending time there.

Then at last with sweet and happy remembrance we came to Brahmapur station around 6.30 PM but had to wait long for the train. However Amravati Express arrived at 10.40 PM examining our trench of patience. Hitherto Daringbadi brings bright and winsome memories whenever I think about it😊.

We are grateful to our driver dada (Dhoba Gouda)who tolerated our childlike spree always. His contact No. 1. 9938246826 2. 653900319

The Padma Hotel is also good to take shelter.(Well maintained and tidy; behaviour of the staffs was good)