Before heading up to Darjeeling from Siliguri on the 30th, I decided to take the hour bus ride west to the Nepal border. My 180 day stay in India allowed by my visa was ending on May 17 and I doubted that was enough time for me to see all that I wanted to see in Darjeeling and Sikkim, so I headed to the border to see if I could leave and reenter India and get more time. Until last December, India required that you spend 60 days outside India before reentering, but the government had removed that restriction. Still, I wasn't sure that applied to my ten year visa.
I took an 8:30 bus west to the border at Panikanti, about 15 miles from Sililguri, passing tea plantations and the town of Naxalbari, birthplace of the Marxist Naxalbari guerrillas, on the way. The friendly Indian immigration officer said I could leave and come back, so I had him stamp my passport and I walked over the bridge to the immigration office in Kakarbhitta, Nepal. I remembered crossing this bridge in the dark one night in 1979 after a long bus ride from Kathmandu. I wasn't allowed to enter India because I didn't have a special permit to enter West Bengal, required at that time, and thus had to return to Kakarbhitta for the night and cross into India the next day at an alternative crossing into Bihar.
It cost me $25 and 100 rupees for a Nepali visa. After getting the visa, when I told them I wanted to immediately return to India, they told me I had to spend at least one night in Nepal. I tried to talk them out of that, but they showed me the regulation. Finally, one of them suggested a "gift." I asked how much and he said $10. We settled for the 400 Nepali rupees they had given me in lieu of $5 in change when I purchased my visa, plus another 100 Indian rupees, so about $7 in total. I got stamped out and walked back across the bridge and got a new entry stamp for India. I arrived in Siliguri after a crowded bus ride about 12:30.
Back in Siliguri I went to the train station to see about the narrow gauge train to Darjeeling and found that since a landslide in 2010 it no longer runs from Siliguri, but from Kurseong at about 4800 feet elevation. I had lunch and at 2 left on one of the many frequent jeeps that travel from Sililguri at about 400 feet elevation to Darjeeling at about 7000 feet elevation. Seats cost 130 rupees each, but I bought the two front seats for 260. The road followed the two foot wide tracks of the rail line for about 10 or 15 minutes before branching off to the northwest. I could see the foothills of the Himalayas soon after leaving Siliguri, which is only about 50 miles from Darjeeling. We drove through flatlands planted with tea at first and passed through a military base with roadside signs quoting George Patton, which seemed odd to me, followed by Buddha and Gandhi, which I suppose was even odder.
We reached the hills about half an hour after leaving Siliguri, after a gentle rise to about 1500 feet elevation. The road, with lots of ugly development along it, climbed steeply to Kurseong under overcast skies and rejoined the narrow railroad bed just before Kurseong about 3:15. The train station in Kurseong has a sign stating it is at 4864 feet elevation. The road and train tracks run right alongside each other through town under the shops lining the street. Kurseong has about 40,000 people, mostly Nepali, and its streets were clogged. Almost all the school children along the road through town were wearing sweaters in the cool weather. Clouds had begun to swirl by as we entered Kurseong and in town we encountered a thick fog.
The climb was less steep after Kurseong, with the train tracks always right along the road. It was foggy all the way, and especially so when we reached the high point of the road and rail line at the small town of Ghoom at 7400 feet. From Ghoom we descended the remaining four or five miles to Darjeeling and passed the narrow gauge train coming from Darjeeling. The weather brightened somewhat as we descended and we reached Darjeeling about 4:30. It was still cloudy, but the sun did make a brief appearance. The main road through Darjeeling, called Hill Cart Road as it is the route of the original road from the plains constructed in 1839, was clogged with traffic, including jeeps headed all over the hills and to the plains. Darjeeling now has over 100,000 people.
From the jeep stand on Hill Cart Road it is a steep climb (maybe 300 feet up) through narrow lanes to Chowrasta, the main square of Darjeeling. I huffed and puffed my way up with my backpack and then took another narrow, but less steep, lane from Chowrasta to a hotel where I checked in before taking a walk. It was cloudy and cool, but not raining. I had changed into long trousers and put on my windbreaker on the trip up from Siliguri, but was still wearing sandals. I walked back down to Chowrasta, filled with Indian tourists (and locals) who far outnumber the foreign tourists. Clouds blocked the views down and the north end is a construction site. Chowrasta is a pedestrian only area, as is the walk down a gentle slope along the Mall to Clubside, so called because the late 19th century Planters' Club is situated just above it. A colonial era clocktower stands a little further. The ridge upon which Darjeeling sits was discovered in 1828 by a couple of British army officers who decided it would be a good place for a sanatorium, allowing patients to escape the heat of the plains. Britain rented it from the Choygal (king) of Sikkim (it was later ceded to Britain) and the town was established in 1835, getting its name from the Dorje Ling ("Place of the Thunderbolt") Monastery that was located there. The Hill Cart Road up from the plains was completed in 1839 and tea growing introduced at about the same time. By 1857 Darjeeling had about 10,000 inhabitants, mostly Nepalis working on the tea plantations. The little railroad was completed in 1881. I had dinner that night at a Tibetan restaurant and had a good hot shower at my hotel before bed.
It was mostly cloudy the next day, though the sun poked through occasionally. I walked through Chowrasta and along the Mall before breakfast. A guy at breakfast told me he had been here ten days and it had been cloudy and rainy all the time. It is supposed to be less rainy this time of year, until late May or early June. After breakfast I walked up to Observatory Hill, just above Chowrasta, site of the original Dorje Ling Monastery. The monastery has moved and the hilltop now houses a combination Buddhist and Hindu temple, with lots of prayer flags fluttering in the wind. I spent some time at that colorful spot before walking down to the colonial Windemere Hotel on the ridge between Observatory Hill and Chowrasta. The Windemere is a wonderful old hotel with old furniture and old photos and letters displayed on the walls. It has a genuine colonial ambiance. They didn't seem to mind me wandering all around and looking at everything.
Leaving the Windemere, I walked further away from Chowrasta on a lane that led to the now closed and derelict colonial Gymkhana Club and St. Andrew's Church, all locked up. A little further on is the former residence of the British Lieutenant Governor of Bengal, now reserved for the Indian Governor of West Bengal and not open to the public. While walking along, I could hear the May Day speech being given on Hill Cart Road by the politician who heads the Gorkhaland local authority. The inhabitants of these hills, mostly Nepalis, want their own state, but for the time being have settled for a semi-autonomous local authority.
The sky cleared a bit after lunch and I could see the ridge to the east, with a long drop to the valley below. I walked down a narrow lane to the 19th century Bhutia Busty Monastery, moved from Observatory Hill. The friendly old monk in charge showed me around before I began the steep climb back up, a rise of 300 or 400 feet. A red uniformed band was playing in the Chowrasta bandstand at the end of the afternoon. That night fog swirled through Darjeeling's narrow lanes.
Sun streaming through my windows woke me up the next morning at 6:30, but soon the sunshine was gone. After a big and delicious breakfast at a very friendly and popular restaurant oriented to westerners, I walked northwest down Darjeeling's ridge to the Happy Valley Tea Estate, a drop of about 300 feet to the top of the plantation, and then another 300 foot drop through the tea gardens to the factory. Twenty or so women were engaged in plucking leaves and tossing them into the baskets on their backs as I descended. With a group of Canadians, I got an excellent tour of the factory, which unfortunately was not in operation as the previous day (May Day) had been a holiday and so no tea was picked. I later read in the newspaper that tea workers get 90 rupees, about $1.60, a day and that there are 55,000 of them, plus another 15,000 employed at the height of the season. The explanation of tea picking and processing was very interesting. Happy Valley is the highest in elevation of the more than 80 Darjeeling tea estates. In fact, there are photos of it covered with snow. Except for what it sells at the factory, all it produces is exported, including to Harrod's in London.
In the early afternoon the sun came out, though there were still many clouds. I took off my jacket as I walked up through the tea estate and back to Darjeeling and to the somethat disappointing Botanical Gardens below Hill Cart Road. I walked through narrow lanes from the gardens back to Hill Cart Road and then to the train station to check schedules. A sign at the station gave the elevation at 6812 feet. Five old and very small steam engines were on display in a nearby shed. While I was there, the tourist train that makes several daily runs to Ghoom and back arrived. It was pulled by a diesel locomotive and had only two small carriages. I visited a nearby Hindu temple with a view of the Happy Valley Tea Estate and then watched as the 4 p.m. tourist train, this time with four carriages, left for Ghoom.
From the train station I made the steep climb up to Clubside, passing the 1921 post office, an excellent Tibetan curio shop, a fancy tea shop and the clocktower. I spent some time looking around the somewhat shabby Planters' Club. It clearly has seen better days. The old furniture looked worn and the deer heads and tiger heads and skins on the walls moth eaten. There are some interesting old photos, though, including one of the members in 1916. Also on display is a World War I Maxim gun and two oxygen tanks from the 1924 Everest Expedition, which started from the Planters' Club. A plaque listed club presidents. The first Indian name dates from 1971, while the last British name from 1982. From the porch of the Planters' Club I watched the sun disappear into massive clouds to the west. The main part of Darjeeling ridge faces to the west, with a wide and very low valley down below.
I was awakened the next morning by the sun at 5:30. The sky was clear and shortly after 6:30 I made my way to an viewpoint north of Observatory Hill and just a short walk from Chowrasta and was pleased to see a magnificent view of snow covered Kanchenjunga (also spelled Kangchendzonga), the world's third highest peak at over 28,000 feet. It is about 40 miles north, on the Nepal-Sikkim border. A small cloud was drifting off the peak, but other than that the entire ridge of snow covered peaks on either side of Kanchenjunga was cloudless. I just sat and watched for a while, and then walked to other great viewpoints along the lane rounding Observatory Hill.
After breakfast I walked down again to the Happy Valley factory, as I wanted to see it in operation. Inside was a nice, warm tea smell and I watched the machines rolling the tea leaves and other sifting them. About 11:30 the woman tea pickers (the pickers are all women while the other tea workers are all men) tramped into the factory in their rubber boots to have their morning's pluckings weighed. That was fun to watch, with the weighed sacks of bright green tea leaves then dumped into a pile on the floor before being gathered up into big bags and spread out on the long withering beds, where they spend 18 hours losing much of their moisture as cool and then warm air is blown below them. Some tea remained on the floor and it was somewhat amusing to see tea bound for Harrod's being swept up off the floor and deposited on the withering beds.
From the tea estate I walked up to Hill Cart Road and then away from Darjeeling until I reached a 19th century cemetery, with laundry drying on the grass next to some of the tombstones. I walked up the steep slope of the cemetery to get to another lane that led to the zoo. Inside the zoo is the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute, formerly headed by Tenzing Norgay, and its museum. The displays included much of his mountaineering gear and much information on Everest and other expeditions, including lots of photos and newspaper articles. The spot where Norgay was cremated in 1986 at the age of 72 is just outside the museum. The zoo itself was very interesting, with decent enclosures and some wonderful animals, including colorful pheasants, red pandas, black bears, Himalayan wolves, tigers, leopards, a black panther (same species as a leopard, but black), and even rare clouded leopards and snow leopards. They were quite active in the late afternoon and I spent quite a lot of time watching a huge tiger pace maybe ten or fifteen feet from me. I saw the wolves being fed. Half chickens were tossed to them, which they devoured, or you might even say wolfed down, in about three or four bites.
It had clouded up and a cold wind came up in the late afternoon. From the zoo I walked back to Darjeeling after 5, stopping at a level part of the ridge called the Shrubbery, which I have to admit only reminded me of Monty Python. There are views of Kanchenjunga from the Shrubbery, but by late afternoon it was completely cloud covered. For dinner that night I went to Glenary's, a popular old colonial era restaurant on the Mall. It has a fireplace and many old photos on the walls of its big dining hall. The menu had roast beef and french fries on it, and I was tempted to order it, but didn't.
The next morning I was up about 6. The sky was sunny, but Kanchenjunga was cloud covered. About 9:30 I began a walk along a quiet road on the eastern side of Darjeeling's ridge that climbed to Ghoom, four miles away. Along the way I had hazy views down the valley below and across to the ridge leading to Tiger Hill at about 8500 feet elevation. When its clear, there are great views from Tiger Hill of Kanchenjunga and many other peaks, including Everest far to the west. I passed the Allobari Monastery, undergoing reconstruction, on the way. I got to Ghoom (also spelled Ghum, but I prefer Ghoom and most signs have it that way) about 11 and walked through town, with the two foot wide train tracks right along the road, to the train station, with a sign saying it is 7407 feet in elevation. The tourist train was at the station and there is an old steam engine on display next to the station. I went into the interesting museum on the top floor of the station and spent quite a bit of time in there. There were some great old photos and maps. It turns out Mark Twain was here in the 1890's and descended the rail line back to the plains in some sort of non-motorized carriage with only a hand brake. He wrote that the trip was the most exciting day of his life. Maybe the most dangerous, too.
The sky had clouded up by 12:30 as I began the descent to Darjeeling, about five miles away via Hill Cart Road. Just below the train station a side road leads to a monastery built in 1850. The young monk with the keys had to be summoned from a cricket game just behind the monastery. Inside is a beautiful large statue of the Maitreya Buddha, the Buddha of the future. Clouds were beginning to swirl up the hills as I left. I passed an ugly modern monastery right on Hill Cart Road with the teenage monks playing cricket in a little courtyard in front. The train again passed as I walked down Hill Cart Road, busy with traffic, to another monastery, this one very nice. Inside was another giant Buddha and very interesting paintings on the walls, including topless women, which I can't remember seeing in any other Buddhist monastery. It was getting cold as I reached Batastia Loop, where the rail line makes a 360 degree turn at the end of a ridge spur on its way down to Darjeeling. Inside the loop is the Gurkha War Memorial, with an obelisk, a statue of a soldier, and a list of local soldiers killed in action. As I understand it, the Nepalis who served, and still serve, in the British Army, and in the Indian Army nowadays, are called Gurkhas, while the Nepalis who live in India are called Gorkhas. My hotel owner says the pronunciation is the same. It is just that Gurkha is the traditional spelling for soldiers, for historical reasons. My hotel owner said Nepalis in Nepal are not called Gorkhas, but Nepalis. Of course, not all citizens of Nepal are of the Nepali ethnicity.
Further down the road, about halfway from Ghoom to Darjeeling, is another, very large monastery right off the road. When I arrived it was crowded with Tibetans and maybe other people, probably including Lepchas, the original inhabitants of Sikkim, and Sikkimese. Lepchas and Sikkimese are descendents of Tibetans who emigrated centuries ago. Signs welcomed the monastery's young leader back from his graduation from a university in Bhutan. I remember the name of the university, Tango, only because I wondered if the dance instructors came from Argentina. The young abbot, or whatever he is, was speaking while seated on a brightly decorated chair in front of the main door of the monastery, with hundreds of people in the courtyard in front and on stairs and landings. I could only get a glimpse from a stairway. Soon it began to rain and I ducked into a small prayer hall where two old monks were sitting and using straps to revolve great big prayer wheels. The one closest to me motioned me to sit in a nearby chair, so I did so and relaxed while watching them patiently revolve their prayers wheels.
When I left, the rain had stopped and the ceremony was breaking up. The young abbot (I think he was perhaps a reincarnation, as there was a photo of him as a little kid in the prayer hall where I had sat, along with a photo of an old man with the same name, except with a "I" after the old man's name and a "II" after the boy's name) was walking through the crowds under a red umbrella held by a monk. He carried a silver and gold object and pressed it against the heads of those gathered in front of him. He smiled often. Other monks in red accompanied him, one with a yellow hat, others with red hats. Two other monks stationed on the veranda of the main prayer hall continuously blew horns, with their cheeks quite puffed up. The young graduate patiently made many rounds of the courtyard, blessing everyone who came up. The crowd thinned out, with some leaving the monastery courtyard to go home and some entering the big prayer hall. The ones entering the prayer hall left thin white shawls on the seat in front of the main door, where the young graduate had sat and spoke, and on one of the five big statues at the back of the hall. Many in the crowd were beautifully dressed in new traditional clothing.
As the young graduate finished his rounds and left, I went into the big prayer hall, dedicated by the Dalai Lama in 1993. It is a beautifully painted hall. The five big statues along the back wall include one of a woman with one breast bare. I wandered around as the crowds left and monks began to file in to begin their evening prayers. They filled the hall quickly and began beating drums, clanging cymbals, and blowing horns before commencing chanting. I watched for a while, the only non-monk in the hall, before leaving. However, it was now cold and raining outside, so I stood on the veranda and listened to the monks through the main door, which had a canvas covering discouraging entry. The rain stopped at about a quarter to 6 and I began the two and a half mile walk back to Darjeeling. It took me about an hour, with lots of traffic on the road, but at least it didn't rain any more. I got back to my hotel just as it got dark.
It was cloudy when I got up the next morning at 6. There was little sun in the morning and some rain in the afternoon. I spent several hours in an internet cafe. In mid afternoon I looked for something to eat, but the restaurants and other shops were closing because a political party had called a strike after a fight between its members and the members of another political party in the nearby town of Mirik. The shop owners close down or face vandalism. In the open market with stalls along one of the little lanes coming off of Chowrasta I was able to buy a plate of ten vegetable momos (Tibetan dumplings) for 20 rupees and they were pretty good. After lunch I sat in my hotel room, with windows looking out over the fogged in valley east of Darjeeling's ridge, as the rain came down, with thunder and lightning. About 5 I went to one of the few restaurants open, in a hotel, and had a poor dinner that took about an hour and a half to arrive. It was rainy and cold as I walked back to my hotel.
The next day was foggy and cloudy and I spent most of the day in an internet cafe. The strike had been lifted. As every morning, I had had a delicious breakfast at a little restaurant very popular with foreigners. For 120 rupees you get eggs, fried tomatoes, cheese, crunchy hash browns, and two pieces of thick brown bread. For lunch I got some more momos at the market, but this time chicken ones, six for 30 rupees, followed by an ear of roasted corn on the cob for 10 rupees. For dessert I ate a chocolate brownie from Glenary's Bakery which cost me as much as the rest of my lunch. We had short intense rainstorm about 4 and it was drippy and wet thereafter. I had a good dinner at Glenary's, the colonial era restaurant over the bakery, and walked back to my hotel about 9 through thick fog and misty rain.
The next day was cloudy and cold. I've been told it has been this way for about six weeks. It is usually somewhat cloudy in April and May, but not as bad as it has been. Still, everyone arriving from India's hot plains, where it is now regularly over 100 degrees, is happy with the cool weather, if not the lack of views of the mountains. I read somewhere that the highest temperature ever recorded in Darjeeling in 80 degrees. I spent most of the day in an internet cafe with a few walks around town and had another dinner at Glenary's. After dinner, walking back to my hotel, I could see lights in the deep valley to the east of Darjeeling's ridge. That valley had been filled with clouds for days.
And the next morning it was fogged in again. The day was foggy and cold. About 10:30 I made a steep descent, more than 500 feet, through the fog on a narrow lane, partly washed away in one spot, to the Tibetan Refugee Self-Help Center, established in 1959. I spent quite a bit of time walking around and watching friendly Tibetan women spinning wool (on spining wheels made of bicycle wheels) and making carpets on looms. A storeroom contained hundreds of balls of wool colored with both vegetable and chemical dyes. The photographic exhibition was closed, as it was being repainted, but there were some posters around, including a few gruesome ones showing some of self-immolations of Tibetans in protest against the Chinese.
Rather than make the steep ascent the way I had come, I walked down another 150 feet to the road, called the Lebong Cart Road as it is the extension of Hill Cart Road from Darjeeling to the former horse race track at Lebong, a flat space on a spur below Darjeeling. You can see the race track from Darjeeling when it is clear. I walked back to Darjeeling on the road, a longer but easier route that took me an hour and a half or so. There wasn't much traffic until I got to the area called North Point, the northern end of the ridge. Shortly after North Point, I could climb up to the lane leading to the zoo and took that back to Chowrasta, passing the zoo and the Shrubbery. I had another chicken momo lunch about 3 and after 4 walked through Chowrasta and along the Mall to Clubside. The red uniformed band was again playing in the bandstand in Chowrasta. There is a great book store in an old colonial era building on Chowrasta. Most of the buildings,though, are ugly modern ones. I ate dinner again at Glenary's, with a very foggy walk back to my hotel afterward.
When I got up about 6 the next morning I could see down into the deep valley to the east through the swirling clouds. The sun didn't make much of an appearance, but I went up to the roof of the hotel and could see a bit of the Kanchenjunga's snowy ridge. The deep valley west of Darjeeling's ridge was also visible through the clouds. After ten or fifteen minutes, the clouds swirled in and erased the view to the east, and eventually to the west. I had another wonderful breakfast and then walked down to the train station and bought a ticket (the last one available, the ticket seller told me) on the narrow gauge railroad for the next morning to Kurseong, as far as it goes since the 2010 landslide. About four times a day, a train, called the "Joy Ride," goes to Ghoom and back, with stops at Ghoom and at the Batastia Loop, but I preferred the longer journey, which cost only 30 rupees compared to 335 for the Joy Ride. I walked back up to the Mall and got my required Sikkim permit and spent the rest of the day at an internet cafe and walking around in the drippy fog.
The next morning I left at 10:15 on the train to Kurseong. As usual, the sky was cloudy as we left. The train had only two carriages, one first class and one second class. Both were full and my seat in the 28 seat second class carriage was fine. I lucked out, too, getting a window seat on the side of the train best for views. I thoroughly enjoyed the 20 mile trip to Kurseong, which took a little under three hours. It took us about half an hour to rise the 600 feet over five miles to Ghoom, where we stopped for five minutes. Some passengers got off at Ghoom and the train was never full thereafter. Most, but not all, of the passengers were tourists. Except for two Koreans who got off at Ghoom, I was the only foreigner. From Ghoom we made the descent to Kurseong at 4800 feet, making brief stops at two other stops on the way. The sky was cloudy all the way, but I enjoyed what views we had and the slow pace of the train. People on the streets in the towns would spot me and smile or wave, or both. In the towns the little train rumbled right past shops. I almost could have reached out and touched the merchandise. Nearing Kurseong we had some wider views, especially down the deep valley northwest of Kurseong.
We arrived at 1 at the station at the southern end of town after passing through the town strung out along the narrow highway. From the station I walked a little over a half mile up a gentle rise to Eagle's Crag, a view point looking both north over a ridge jutting out west from Kurseong and to the valley beyond and south down the widening valley to the plains. I think I could see the outskirts of Siliguri thirty miles away. The sky was cloudy, but the clouds weren't clinging to the town, as has often been the case in Darjeeling. I walked back to the station and took another road heading down towards the western ridge and stopped at old St. Andrew's Church, where about thirty women were singing and praying.
I had planned to take a share jeep back to Darjeeling, but it was almost three o'clock and I decided to walk back to the station and see if there were seats on the 3 o'clock train back to Darjeeling. There were, so I bought a first class one for 185 rupees, more than six times the second class fare. A jeep ride back would have taken half the time, but I enjoyed the train. The trip back took just less than three hours, with a fifteen minute stop at Ghoom where two more carriages were attached. It took just over two hours, with two very brief stops, to travel the fifteen miles from Kurseong to Ghoom, so we were traveling at a blistering seven and a half miles per hour. My carriage was never full and the ride was comfortable and interesting. The sun even made a very brief appearance just north of Kurseong. We hit some fog maybe 500 feet above Kurseong, but it lifted before settling in again near Ghoom. Coming down from Ghoom, especially at the 360 degree turn at the Batastia Loop, at the end of a spur, we had great views towards Darjeeling and the valley to its west. Clouds filled the sky, but you could just barely make out the lower reaches of Kanchenjunga to the north. The view fogged in as we approached Darjeeling and it was raining when we arrived just before 6. As the rain came down fairly heavily, I made the steep climb to the Mall under my umbrella and ate an early dinner at Glenary's.
I took an 8:30 bus west to the border at Panikanti, about 15 miles from Sililguri, passing tea plantations and the town of Naxalbari, birthplace of the Marxist Naxalbari guerrillas, on the way. The friendly Indian immigration officer said I could leave and come back, so I had him stamp my passport and I walked over the bridge to the immigration office in Kakarbhitta, Nepal. I remembered crossing this bridge in the dark one night in 1979 after a long bus ride from Kathmandu. I wasn't allowed to enter India because I didn't have a special permit to enter West Bengal, required at that time, and thus had to return to Kakarbhitta for the night and cross into India the next day at an alternative crossing into Bihar.
It cost me $25 and 100 rupees for a Nepali visa. After getting the visa, when I told them I wanted to immediately return to India, they told me I had to spend at least one night in Nepal. I tried to talk them out of that, but they showed me the regulation. Finally, one of them suggested a "gift." I asked how much and he said $10. We settled for the 400 Nepali rupees they had given me in lieu of $5 in change when I purchased my visa, plus another 100 Indian rupees, so about $7 in total. I got stamped out and walked back across the bridge and got a new entry stamp for India. I arrived in Siliguri after a crowded bus ride about 12:30.
Back in Siliguri I went to the train station to see about the narrow gauge train to Darjeeling and found that since a landslide in 2010 it no longer runs from Siliguri, but from Kurseong at about 4800 feet elevation. I had lunch and at 2 left on one of the many frequent jeeps that travel from Sililguri at about 400 feet elevation to Darjeeling at about 7000 feet elevation. Seats cost 130 rupees each, but I bought the two front seats for 260. The road followed the two foot wide tracks of the rail line for about 10 or 15 minutes before branching off to the northwest. I could see the foothills of the Himalayas soon after leaving Siliguri, which is only about 50 miles from Darjeeling. We drove through flatlands planted with tea at first and passed through a military base with roadside signs quoting George Patton, which seemed odd to me, followed by Buddha and Gandhi, which I suppose was even odder.
We reached the hills about half an hour after leaving Siliguri, after a gentle rise to about 1500 feet elevation. The road, with lots of ugly development along it, climbed steeply to Kurseong under overcast skies and rejoined the narrow railroad bed just before Kurseong about 3:15. The train station in Kurseong has a sign stating it is at 4864 feet elevation. The road and train tracks run right alongside each other through town under the shops lining the street. Kurseong has about 40,000 people, mostly Nepali, and its streets were clogged. Almost all the school children along the road through town were wearing sweaters in the cool weather. Clouds had begun to swirl by as we entered Kurseong and in town we encountered a thick fog.
The climb was less steep after Kurseong, with the train tracks always right along the road. It was foggy all the way, and especially so when we reached the high point of the road and rail line at the small town of Ghoom at 7400 feet. From Ghoom we descended the remaining four or five miles to Darjeeling and passed the narrow gauge train coming from Darjeeling. The weather brightened somewhat as we descended and we reached Darjeeling about 4:30. It was still cloudy, but the sun did make a brief appearance. The main road through Darjeeling, called Hill Cart Road as it is the route of the original road from the plains constructed in 1839, was clogged with traffic, including jeeps headed all over the hills and to the plains. Darjeeling now has over 100,000 people.
From the jeep stand on Hill Cart Road it is a steep climb (maybe 300 feet up) through narrow lanes to Chowrasta, the main square of Darjeeling. I huffed and puffed my way up with my backpack and then took another narrow, but less steep, lane from Chowrasta to a hotel where I checked in before taking a walk. It was cloudy and cool, but not raining. I had changed into long trousers and put on my windbreaker on the trip up from Siliguri, but was still wearing sandals. I walked back down to Chowrasta, filled with Indian tourists (and locals) who far outnumber the foreign tourists. Clouds blocked the views down and the north end is a construction site. Chowrasta is a pedestrian only area, as is the walk down a gentle slope along the Mall to Clubside, so called because the late 19th century Planters' Club is situated just above it. A colonial era clocktower stands a little further. The ridge upon which Darjeeling sits was discovered in 1828 by a couple of British army officers who decided it would be a good place for a sanatorium, allowing patients to escape the heat of the plains. Britain rented it from the Choygal (king) of Sikkim (it was later ceded to Britain) and the town was established in 1835, getting its name from the Dorje Ling ("Place of the Thunderbolt") Monastery that was located there. The Hill Cart Road up from the plains was completed in 1839 and tea growing introduced at about the same time. By 1857 Darjeeling had about 10,000 inhabitants, mostly Nepalis working on the tea plantations. The little railroad was completed in 1881. I had dinner that night at a Tibetan restaurant and had a good hot shower at my hotel before bed.
It was mostly cloudy the next day, though the sun poked through occasionally. I walked through Chowrasta and along the Mall before breakfast. A guy at breakfast told me he had been here ten days and it had been cloudy and rainy all the time. It is supposed to be less rainy this time of year, until late May or early June. After breakfast I walked up to Observatory Hill, just above Chowrasta, site of the original Dorje Ling Monastery. The monastery has moved and the hilltop now houses a combination Buddhist and Hindu temple, with lots of prayer flags fluttering in the wind. I spent some time at that colorful spot before walking down to the colonial Windemere Hotel on the ridge between Observatory Hill and Chowrasta. The Windemere is a wonderful old hotel with old furniture and old photos and letters displayed on the walls. It has a genuine colonial ambiance. They didn't seem to mind me wandering all around and looking at everything.
Leaving the Windemere, I walked further away from Chowrasta on a lane that led to the now closed and derelict colonial Gymkhana Club and St. Andrew's Church, all locked up. A little further on is the former residence of the British Lieutenant Governor of Bengal, now reserved for the Indian Governor of West Bengal and not open to the public. While walking along, I could hear the May Day speech being given on Hill Cart Road by the politician who heads the Gorkhaland local authority. The inhabitants of these hills, mostly Nepalis, want their own state, but for the time being have settled for a semi-autonomous local authority.
The sky cleared a bit after lunch and I could see the ridge to the east, with a long drop to the valley below. I walked down a narrow lane to the 19th century Bhutia Busty Monastery, moved from Observatory Hill. The friendly old monk in charge showed me around before I began the steep climb back up, a rise of 300 or 400 feet. A red uniformed band was playing in the Chowrasta bandstand at the end of the afternoon. That night fog swirled through Darjeeling's narrow lanes.
Sun streaming through my windows woke me up the next morning at 6:30, but soon the sunshine was gone. After a big and delicious breakfast at a very friendly and popular restaurant oriented to westerners, I walked northwest down Darjeeling's ridge to the Happy Valley Tea Estate, a drop of about 300 feet to the top of the plantation, and then another 300 foot drop through the tea gardens to the factory. Twenty or so women were engaged in plucking leaves and tossing them into the baskets on their backs as I descended. With a group of Canadians, I got an excellent tour of the factory, which unfortunately was not in operation as the previous day (May Day) had been a holiday and so no tea was picked. I later read in the newspaper that tea workers get 90 rupees, about $1.60, a day and that there are 55,000 of them, plus another 15,000 employed at the height of the season. The explanation of tea picking and processing was very interesting. Happy Valley is the highest in elevation of the more than 80 Darjeeling tea estates. In fact, there are photos of it covered with snow. Except for what it sells at the factory, all it produces is exported, including to Harrod's in London.
In the early afternoon the sun came out, though there were still many clouds. I took off my jacket as I walked up through the tea estate and back to Darjeeling and to the somethat disappointing Botanical Gardens below Hill Cart Road. I walked through narrow lanes from the gardens back to Hill Cart Road and then to the train station to check schedules. A sign at the station gave the elevation at 6812 feet. Five old and very small steam engines were on display in a nearby shed. While I was there, the tourist train that makes several daily runs to Ghoom and back arrived. It was pulled by a diesel locomotive and had only two small carriages. I visited a nearby Hindu temple with a view of the Happy Valley Tea Estate and then watched as the 4 p.m. tourist train, this time with four carriages, left for Ghoom.
From the train station I made the steep climb up to Clubside, passing the 1921 post office, an excellent Tibetan curio shop, a fancy tea shop and the clocktower. I spent some time looking around the somewhat shabby Planters' Club. It clearly has seen better days. The old furniture looked worn and the deer heads and tiger heads and skins on the walls moth eaten. There are some interesting old photos, though, including one of the members in 1916. Also on display is a World War I Maxim gun and two oxygen tanks from the 1924 Everest Expedition, which started from the Planters' Club. A plaque listed club presidents. The first Indian name dates from 1971, while the last British name from 1982. From the porch of the Planters' Club I watched the sun disappear into massive clouds to the west. The main part of Darjeeling ridge faces to the west, with a wide and very low valley down below.
I was awakened the next morning by the sun at 5:30. The sky was clear and shortly after 6:30 I made my way to an viewpoint north of Observatory Hill and just a short walk from Chowrasta and was pleased to see a magnificent view of snow covered Kanchenjunga (also spelled Kangchendzonga), the world's third highest peak at over 28,000 feet. It is about 40 miles north, on the Nepal-Sikkim border. A small cloud was drifting off the peak, but other than that the entire ridge of snow covered peaks on either side of Kanchenjunga was cloudless. I just sat and watched for a while, and then walked to other great viewpoints along the lane rounding Observatory Hill.
After breakfast I walked down again to the Happy Valley factory, as I wanted to see it in operation. Inside was a nice, warm tea smell and I watched the machines rolling the tea leaves and other sifting them. About 11:30 the woman tea pickers (the pickers are all women while the other tea workers are all men) tramped into the factory in their rubber boots to have their morning's pluckings weighed. That was fun to watch, with the weighed sacks of bright green tea leaves then dumped into a pile on the floor before being gathered up into big bags and spread out on the long withering beds, where they spend 18 hours losing much of their moisture as cool and then warm air is blown below them. Some tea remained on the floor and it was somewhat amusing to see tea bound for Harrod's being swept up off the floor and deposited on the withering beds.
From the tea estate I walked up to Hill Cart Road and then away from Darjeeling until I reached a 19th century cemetery, with laundry drying on the grass next to some of the tombstones. I walked up the steep slope of the cemetery to get to another lane that led to the zoo. Inside the zoo is the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute, formerly headed by Tenzing Norgay, and its museum. The displays included much of his mountaineering gear and much information on Everest and other expeditions, including lots of photos and newspaper articles. The spot where Norgay was cremated in 1986 at the age of 72 is just outside the museum. The zoo itself was very interesting, with decent enclosures and some wonderful animals, including colorful pheasants, red pandas, black bears, Himalayan wolves, tigers, leopards, a black panther (same species as a leopard, but black), and even rare clouded leopards and snow leopards. They were quite active in the late afternoon and I spent quite a lot of time watching a huge tiger pace maybe ten or fifteen feet from me. I saw the wolves being fed. Half chickens were tossed to them, which they devoured, or you might even say wolfed down, in about three or four bites.
It had clouded up and a cold wind came up in the late afternoon. From the zoo I walked back to Darjeeling after 5, stopping at a level part of the ridge called the Shrubbery, which I have to admit only reminded me of Monty Python. There are views of Kanchenjunga from the Shrubbery, but by late afternoon it was completely cloud covered. For dinner that night I went to Glenary's, a popular old colonial era restaurant on the Mall. It has a fireplace and many old photos on the walls of its big dining hall. The menu had roast beef and french fries on it, and I was tempted to order it, but didn't.
The next morning I was up about 6. The sky was sunny, but Kanchenjunga was cloud covered. About 9:30 I began a walk along a quiet road on the eastern side of Darjeeling's ridge that climbed to Ghoom, four miles away. Along the way I had hazy views down the valley below and across to the ridge leading to Tiger Hill at about 8500 feet elevation. When its clear, there are great views from Tiger Hill of Kanchenjunga and many other peaks, including Everest far to the west. I passed the Allobari Monastery, undergoing reconstruction, on the way. I got to Ghoom (also spelled Ghum, but I prefer Ghoom and most signs have it that way) about 11 and walked through town, with the two foot wide train tracks right along the road, to the train station, with a sign saying it is 7407 feet in elevation. The tourist train was at the station and there is an old steam engine on display next to the station. I went into the interesting museum on the top floor of the station and spent quite a bit of time in there. There were some great old photos and maps. It turns out Mark Twain was here in the 1890's and descended the rail line back to the plains in some sort of non-motorized carriage with only a hand brake. He wrote that the trip was the most exciting day of his life. Maybe the most dangerous, too.
The sky had clouded up by 12:30 as I began the descent to Darjeeling, about five miles away via Hill Cart Road. Just below the train station a side road leads to a monastery built in 1850. The young monk with the keys had to be summoned from a cricket game just behind the monastery. Inside is a beautiful large statue of the Maitreya Buddha, the Buddha of the future. Clouds were beginning to swirl up the hills as I left. I passed an ugly modern monastery right on Hill Cart Road with the teenage monks playing cricket in a little courtyard in front. The train again passed as I walked down Hill Cart Road, busy with traffic, to another monastery, this one very nice. Inside was another giant Buddha and very interesting paintings on the walls, including topless women, which I can't remember seeing in any other Buddhist monastery. It was getting cold as I reached Batastia Loop, where the rail line makes a 360 degree turn at the end of a ridge spur on its way down to Darjeeling. Inside the loop is the Gurkha War Memorial, with an obelisk, a statue of a soldier, and a list of local soldiers killed in action. As I understand it, the Nepalis who served, and still serve, in the British Army, and in the Indian Army nowadays, are called Gurkhas, while the Nepalis who live in India are called Gorkhas. My hotel owner says the pronunciation is the same. It is just that Gurkha is the traditional spelling for soldiers, for historical reasons. My hotel owner said Nepalis in Nepal are not called Gorkhas, but Nepalis. Of course, not all citizens of Nepal are of the Nepali ethnicity.
Further down the road, about halfway from Ghoom to Darjeeling, is another, very large monastery right off the road. When I arrived it was crowded with Tibetans and maybe other people, probably including Lepchas, the original inhabitants of Sikkim, and Sikkimese. Lepchas and Sikkimese are descendents of Tibetans who emigrated centuries ago. Signs welcomed the monastery's young leader back from his graduation from a university in Bhutan. I remember the name of the university, Tango, only because I wondered if the dance instructors came from Argentina. The young abbot, or whatever he is, was speaking while seated on a brightly decorated chair in front of the main door of the monastery, with hundreds of people in the courtyard in front and on stairs and landings. I could only get a glimpse from a stairway. Soon it began to rain and I ducked into a small prayer hall where two old monks were sitting and using straps to revolve great big prayer wheels. The one closest to me motioned me to sit in a nearby chair, so I did so and relaxed while watching them patiently revolve their prayers wheels.
When I left, the rain had stopped and the ceremony was breaking up. The young abbot (I think he was perhaps a reincarnation, as there was a photo of him as a little kid in the prayer hall where I had sat, along with a photo of an old man with the same name, except with a "I" after the old man's name and a "II" after the boy's name) was walking through the crowds under a red umbrella held by a monk. He carried a silver and gold object and pressed it against the heads of those gathered in front of him. He smiled often. Other monks in red accompanied him, one with a yellow hat, others with red hats. Two other monks stationed on the veranda of the main prayer hall continuously blew horns, with their cheeks quite puffed up. The young graduate patiently made many rounds of the courtyard, blessing everyone who came up. The crowd thinned out, with some leaving the monastery courtyard to go home and some entering the big prayer hall. The ones entering the prayer hall left thin white shawls on the seat in front of the main door, where the young graduate had sat and spoke, and on one of the five big statues at the back of the hall. Many in the crowd were beautifully dressed in new traditional clothing.
As the young graduate finished his rounds and left, I went into the big prayer hall, dedicated by the Dalai Lama in 1993. It is a beautifully painted hall. The five big statues along the back wall include one of a woman with one breast bare. I wandered around as the crowds left and monks began to file in to begin their evening prayers. They filled the hall quickly and began beating drums, clanging cymbals, and blowing horns before commencing chanting. I watched for a while, the only non-monk in the hall, before leaving. However, it was now cold and raining outside, so I stood on the veranda and listened to the monks through the main door, which had a canvas covering discouraging entry. The rain stopped at about a quarter to 6 and I began the two and a half mile walk back to Darjeeling. It took me about an hour, with lots of traffic on the road, but at least it didn't rain any more. I got back to my hotel just as it got dark.
It was cloudy when I got up the next morning at 6. There was little sun in the morning and some rain in the afternoon. I spent several hours in an internet cafe. In mid afternoon I looked for something to eat, but the restaurants and other shops were closing because a political party had called a strike after a fight between its members and the members of another political party in the nearby town of Mirik. The shop owners close down or face vandalism. In the open market with stalls along one of the little lanes coming off of Chowrasta I was able to buy a plate of ten vegetable momos (Tibetan dumplings) for 20 rupees and they were pretty good. After lunch I sat in my hotel room, with windows looking out over the fogged in valley east of Darjeeling's ridge, as the rain came down, with thunder and lightning. About 5 I went to one of the few restaurants open, in a hotel, and had a poor dinner that took about an hour and a half to arrive. It was rainy and cold as I walked back to my hotel.
The next day was foggy and cloudy and I spent most of the day in an internet cafe. The strike had been lifted. As every morning, I had had a delicious breakfast at a little restaurant very popular with foreigners. For 120 rupees you get eggs, fried tomatoes, cheese, crunchy hash browns, and two pieces of thick brown bread. For lunch I got some more momos at the market, but this time chicken ones, six for 30 rupees, followed by an ear of roasted corn on the cob for 10 rupees. For dessert I ate a chocolate brownie from Glenary's Bakery which cost me as much as the rest of my lunch. We had short intense rainstorm about 4 and it was drippy and wet thereafter. I had a good dinner at Glenary's, the colonial era restaurant over the bakery, and walked back to my hotel about 9 through thick fog and misty rain.
The next day was cloudy and cold. I've been told it has been this way for about six weeks. It is usually somewhat cloudy in April and May, but not as bad as it has been. Still, everyone arriving from India's hot plains, where it is now regularly over 100 degrees, is happy with the cool weather, if not the lack of views of the mountains. I read somewhere that the highest temperature ever recorded in Darjeeling in 80 degrees. I spent most of the day in an internet cafe with a few walks around town and had another dinner at Glenary's. After dinner, walking back to my hotel, I could see lights in the deep valley to the east of Darjeeling's ridge. That valley had been filled with clouds for days.
And the next morning it was fogged in again. The day was foggy and cold. About 10:30 I made a steep descent, more than 500 feet, through the fog on a narrow lane, partly washed away in one spot, to the Tibetan Refugee Self-Help Center, established in 1959. I spent quite a bit of time walking around and watching friendly Tibetan women spinning wool (on spining wheels made of bicycle wheels) and making carpets on looms. A storeroom contained hundreds of balls of wool colored with both vegetable and chemical dyes. The photographic exhibition was closed, as it was being repainted, but there were some posters around, including a few gruesome ones showing some of self-immolations of Tibetans in protest against the Chinese.
Rather than make the steep ascent the way I had come, I walked down another 150 feet to the road, called the Lebong Cart Road as it is the extension of Hill Cart Road from Darjeeling to the former horse race track at Lebong, a flat space on a spur below Darjeeling. You can see the race track from Darjeeling when it is clear. I walked back to Darjeeling on the road, a longer but easier route that took me an hour and a half or so. There wasn't much traffic until I got to the area called North Point, the northern end of the ridge. Shortly after North Point, I could climb up to the lane leading to the zoo and took that back to Chowrasta, passing the zoo and the Shrubbery. I had another chicken momo lunch about 3 and after 4 walked through Chowrasta and along the Mall to Clubside. The red uniformed band was again playing in the bandstand in Chowrasta. There is a great book store in an old colonial era building on Chowrasta. Most of the buildings,though, are ugly modern ones. I ate dinner again at Glenary's, with a very foggy walk back to my hotel afterward.
When I got up about 6 the next morning I could see down into the deep valley to the east through the swirling clouds. The sun didn't make much of an appearance, but I went up to the roof of the hotel and could see a bit of the Kanchenjunga's snowy ridge. The deep valley west of Darjeeling's ridge was also visible through the clouds. After ten or fifteen minutes, the clouds swirled in and erased the view to the east, and eventually to the west. I had another wonderful breakfast and then walked down to the train station and bought a ticket (the last one available, the ticket seller told me) on the narrow gauge railroad for the next morning to Kurseong, as far as it goes since the 2010 landslide. About four times a day, a train, called the "Joy Ride," goes to Ghoom and back, with stops at Ghoom and at the Batastia Loop, but I preferred the longer journey, which cost only 30 rupees compared to 335 for the Joy Ride. I walked back up to the Mall and got my required Sikkim permit and spent the rest of the day at an internet cafe and walking around in the drippy fog.
The next morning I left at 10:15 on the train to Kurseong. As usual, the sky was cloudy as we left. The train had only two carriages, one first class and one second class. Both were full and my seat in the 28 seat second class carriage was fine. I lucked out, too, getting a window seat on the side of the train best for views. I thoroughly enjoyed the 20 mile trip to Kurseong, which took a little under three hours. It took us about half an hour to rise the 600 feet over five miles to Ghoom, where we stopped for five minutes. Some passengers got off at Ghoom and the train was never full thereafter. Most, but not all, of the passengers were tourists. Except for two Koreans who got off at Ghoom, I was the only foreigner. From Ghoom we made the descent to Kurseong at 4800 feet, making brief stops at two other stops on the way. The sky was cloudy all the way, but I enjoyed what views we had and the slow pace of the train. People on the streets in the towns would spot me and smile or wave, or both. In the towns the little train rumbled right past shops. I almost could have reached out and touched the merchandise. Nearing Kurseong we had some wider views, especially down the deep valley northwest of Kurseong.
We arrived at 1 at the station at the southern end of town after passing through the town strung out along the narrow highway. From the station I walked a little over a half mile up a gentle rise to Eagle's Crag, a view point looking both north over a ridge jutting out west from Kurseong and to the valley beyond and south down the widening valley to the plains. I think I could see the outskirts of Siliguri thirty miles away. The sky was cloudy, but the clouds weren't clinging to the town, as has often been the case in Darjeeling. I walked back to the station and took another road heading down towards the western ridge and stopped at old St. Andrew's Church, where about thirty women were singing and praying.
I had planned to take a share jeep back to Darjeeling, but it was almost three o'clock and I decided to walk back to the station and see if there were seats on the 3 o'clock train back to Darjeeling. There were, so I bought a first class one for 185 rupees, more than six times the second class fare. A jeep ride back would have taken half the time, but I enjoyed the train. The trip back took just less than three hours, with a fifteen minute stop at Ghoom where two more carriages were attached. It took just over two hours, with two very brief stops, to travel the fifteen miles from Kurseong to Ghoom, so we were traveling at a blistering seven and a half miles per hour. My carriage was never full and the ride was comfortable and interesting. The sun even made a very brief appearance just north of Kurseong. We hit some fog maybe 500 feet above Kurseong, but it lifted before settling in again near Ghoom. Coming down from Ghoom, especially at the 360 degree turn at the Batastia Loop, at the end of a spur, we had great views towards Darjeeling and the valley to its west. Clouds filled the sky, but you could just barely make out the lower reaches of Kanchenjunga to the north. The view fogged in as we approached Darjeeling and it was raining when we arrived just before 6. As the rain came down fairly heavily, I made the steep climb to the Mall under my umbrella and ate an early dinner at Glenary's.
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