Till a few years ago, the picturesque Dambuk village sprawling by the banks of the Dibang River in Arunachal Pradesh's Lower Dibang Valley would remain cut off from the rest of the country, and the world, for nearly eight months a year.
The North-Eastern state bordering Tibet receives copious amount of rain for nearly eight months a year. Consequently, the swollen rivers around Dambuk would render this small town virtually inaccessible. Dambuk, for all practical purposes, remained like an island reachable only by boats for most of the year.
Things were not easier during the dry winter months either. Absence of bridges spanning the rivers meant arduous drive through boulder and rock-strewn treacherous river beds. Driving to Dambuk from Assam meant taking one's vehicle across the Brahmaputra on a ferry to land at Pasighat and then embarking on a gruelling drive over riverbeds, dirt tracks through hills and rickety bamboo bridges over fast-flowing streams.
