Cart
INDIA REPORT 2010
INTRODUCTION
This year I was accompanied by Alexis from the Quebec Store. We started the trip in Kolkata as I always do and first went to a couple of offices to taste and get an idea of what was happening with the First Flush. First information was of a dry and hot Darjeeling praying for rain and very little teas had reached Kolkata as yet. We then headed for Darjeeling and began a week of non-stop garden visits. From the mountains we travelled back to the plains to visit a range of different Assam gardens. The third, more exploratory part of the trip took us over the Brahmaputra to the very isolated, tribal State of Arunachal Pradesh to check out a couple of tea projects there. Lastly we went back to Kolkata to finalise the buying and shipping arrangements.
|
DARJEELING Darjeeling had even less rain than last year (which was already a record dry one) making it the driest in 11 years. The whole industry were counting the days since last October 10th, , the last real precipitation they had, while watching the temperatures soar way above the norm. Even after a week of garden visits, when we left the mountains, they had been 175 days without rain. In the lower gardens it seemed much worse with more burning, lost plants and many going into banjhi after just one plucking round. Up the higher elevations the gardens weren’t quite as damaged due to better moisture retention in the soil, but leaf production was way down. It was immediately apparent that all the gardens were suffering. Gardens that we have come to expect solid quality were coming up with bland or harsh uninteresting teas. I had to use all my resources to look further afield and buy some “lucky” quality invoices from more obscure gardens. By the time I had finished buying I was very happy with this year’s catalogue: -CASTLETON DJ-12 CLONAL YR 2 CONVERSION
ASSAM This year was probably my best visit to Assam so far. I managed to visit all the gardens that are currently making the top orthodox leaf (with exception of Sri Sibarri which was too far off the route this time). I was early for buying, as the best “tippy” Assams are produced in May/June, but there are some treats on the way. Upper Assam had had plenty of rain where Lower Assam a little less than usual and was a bit dry, though nothing like Darjeeling. We visited a very varied selection of operations from the massive to the modest, from the kings of quality to the standards. ARUNACHALPRADESH From Halmari we headed for the town of Dibrugarh to meet for a trip into Arunachal Pradesh. This obscure and isolated state is bordered by Bhutan, Tibet and Burma on the West, North and East flanks respectively. All three are closed to the outside World. The southern border is mostly the mighty Brahmaputra, a river so wide here that it is constantly changing its banks and cannot be bridged. The Chinese border is still disputed, back in 1962 tensions mounted to the point of war between China and India. Military activity has now calmed but there is a certain amount of tribal tension as the region is principally tribal. We had arranged special permits to enter the region in advance. Leaving Dibrugarh we travelled South East then curved North to start crossing some of the hundreds of rivers that bring water down from the mountains into the Bramhaputra we drove through the steep, very beautiful, high altitude valleys. We moved deeper into Arunachal’s forests. The main “highway” is barely 2 lanes. The rivers often wash out the roads so there was a lot of driving through riverbeds. The projects we saw were both very interesting, tea related social development operations. Chapters from these travels will be posted in some of our upcoming blogs. |
Go to the top of the page.