Honeymoon in Digha during Second Innings of life

 <script async src="https://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js?client=ca-pub-7947521186062979"

     crossorigin="anonymous"></script>

I myself with my wife visited Digha for the second time from April 19 to April 22, 2022 after about 30 years of our marriage. First time we visited Digha during May 1992 just after my marriage on April 26, 1992. As you know that in my one previous post on mental health I emphasised on going for outing for joy and recreation. With the same purpose we decided to visit Digha. 

      Digha is the most popular sea beach in West Bengal and is about 185 Km from Kolkata. It is a seaside resort town in Purba Medinipur District of West Bengal and is situated on the seashore of Bay of Bengal. Both sunrise and sunset are enjoyable at the Digha sea beach. I will give more detail information on Digha in my upcoming post. In this post I would like to focus on my trip to Digha.

         This is our second honeymoon trip to Digha as our first honeymoon trip was to Digha just after our marriage. We have visited Digha nearly after 30 years from our first honeymoon trip to Digha. This time we observed many changes during this trip. 

   Changes that we observed during this trip:

   Before 30 years just after our marriage, we planned to go for honeymoon at Digha. At that time, we travelled to Digha by Bus since road transport was the only available option at that time. But this time we travelled by train, Tamralipta Express, from Howrah to Digha. I always prefer to travel by train as rail transport is more comfortable to me than road transport. Rail transportation from Howrah to Digha started after the completion of Tamluk-Digha Rail track. Tamluk to Digha Railway line was opened in 2004 and the track was electrified during 2012-13. 

👈(Journey to Digha in AC Chair Car from Howrah by Tamralipta Express)

The train Tamralipta Express departed from Howrah station at 6.50 am and reached Digha Railway station at 10.00 am. From Digha Railway station we hired one Toto (an electric vehicle) to reach our Holiday Home. Our stay at Holiday home was comfortable. We got lot of information from the caretaker regarding places to be visited and mode of transport including reasonable fare. We enjoyed beauty of sea beaches both in the morning and in the evening. This time we found lot of tourist attractions near sea beaches of Old and New Digha. This time we stayed in Holiday Home of our Co-operative Credit Society whereas 30 years before we stayed in Hotel Sea Hawk which is near Old Digha Sea beach. 

(Hotel Sea Hawk from Sea Beach Side in 1992)                                                                                                        👇                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

 (Hotel Sea Hawk from Sea Beach Side in 2022)👉 

These two photographs of the same location shows the changes that took place during the period of 30 years. Lot of development took place near sea beaches. The places near sea beaches are now more neat and clean and attractive as evident from this photograph taken in 2022. Use of plastic carry bag has been completely prohibited in Digha. This helped in maintaining the cleanliness of beaches in Digha. This time I observed that there is no plastic and other garbages on sea shore and beaches. Sea beaches in Digha are neat and clean and attractive. 

👈(Beautiful and Clean Sea Beach in Digha)

We enjoyed the beauty of sea beaches daily in the morning and evening. We enjoyed sea breeze and roaring of sea waves. Seating on sea beach in the evening, observing waves and enjoying sea breeze gave us lot of pleasure to our mind and body. This time we also observed that the sea beach sides have been made more attractive. This time we found better seating arrangements in and around sea beaches.  

Night is beautiful near sea beach of both Old and New Digha. Lot of stalls are there in both Old Digha and New Digha Sea beaches from where you can purchase locally made bags, articles made from conch, etc. You will also find food stalls there. This time we found lighting decoration during night at sea beach which is having tourist attraction. 

(Lighting decoration at sea shore of Old Digha)👉

👈(Digha Beach during night)

This time we found metalled road parallel to sea shore stretching from New Digha to Mohana. In this picture you may find that tourists are walking on road and some tourists are seating on platform built on the embankment of sea beach. You may also find vendors selling tea, foods and other articles. This time we found that tourists are enjoying the night beauty of Digha Sea Beach. We also enjoyed the night beauty of Digha Sea beach. 

This time we also visited Amarabati Park in New Digha. It's a beautiful nature park with abundance of greenery. Inside the park there is a big lake, plants, trees and ropeway. There is an entry fee to get inside the park and seperate tickets for boating and riding ropeway. We enjoyed ropeway riding as the complete view of the garden is visible from ropeway. You may see the photo taken from ropeway covering the lake and surrounding area. 

(Photo taken from ropeway in the evening) 👉

    👈(Ducks inside Amarabati Park)

                                 

       You will find duck, animals and other birds inside the Park. There is a children play area inside the park. 
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               

(In the morning at Mohona Beach in Digha during high tide) 👉

Mohana is a meeting point of river Champa with the Bay of Bengal. During high tide it is very difficult to distinguish sea and river. River Champa is clearly visible during low tide when river water is flowing toward sea. During high tide sea water flows toward river Champa. There is a fish market at Mohana. One can enjoy sunrise at Mohana. Sunrise is beautiful at Mohana. We could not enjoy sunrise during this visit due to cloudy whether. We hope to enjoy it during our next visit to Digha.

       

   👈During this visit we found many such beautiful structures having tourist attractions in Digha near sea beach. We also found such beautifully designed sheds where tourists can seat.               👇                         

                         

  In our three day tour to Digha, we mainly covered sea beaches in Old and New Digha. There are many other places having tourist attractions near Digha like Mandarmani, Shankarpur Beach, Udaipur Beach, Talsari Beach, Chandaneswar Temple, etc. We have decided to cover these places during our next trip to Mandarmani. We never prefer hurricane tour covering many places in few days. We prefer leisure tour.

      

Changes that we felt within us during this trip: 

     Just few days after our marriage we went to Digha for honeymoon. Since our was an arranged marriage and not knowing each other before marriage it took much time to develop  understanding between us. Therefore, our experience during first trip to Digha was more of thrill than enjoyment. We were not aware of each other's liking and disliking and not so open to each other during our earlier trip. We spent time with each other on sea shore and beaches for developing understanding between us. We enjoyed street food like chingri bhaja (shrimp fried), beguni (eggplant fried), badam bhaja (fried nuts), etc. and did some purchasing of cashew nuts, articles made from cronch, etc. So our first honeymoon trip to Digha was more focussed on developing mutual understanding.

       This time our trip to Digha was totally focussed on leisure and enjoyment. Thirty years of togetherness is more than sufficient to develop mutual understanding between us. Both first and second trip to Digha are having certain similarities as well as differences. In both the trips to Digha I was accompanied by my wife but the only difference is that we are now having two adult sons though at present not staying with us due to their study and job. I was in job during my earlier visit. During this visit I am a retired person and leading second innings of life.  This time we were free from certain responsibilities and therefore enjoyed this trip better. We enjoyed this Digha tour from the core of our heart and mind. This time we enjoyed the nature and its beauty in different perspective from the core of our heart. During this trip we came into contact with one of my friend who was also my office colleague and incidentally his wife was also classmate of my wife which I was not knowing earlier. It was much added enjoyment for my wife and my friend's wife as they were meeting after 35 years. This made our Digha tour more enjoyable and memorable for ever.