Gangtok

02.05.2008 to 06.05.2008

The drive to Gangtok took us five hours in all, and was a very pleasant drive with beautiful scenery. One thing which was immediatly evident was that Sikkim is much cleaner than West Bengal(which mind you isn't saying much). We were stopped at Rangpo checkpoint to apply for our Inland Permit… the maximum a foreigner can stay in Sikkim is 45 days (permits being given for periods of 15 days which can be extended twice to a total of 45 days) and once these are over you cannot access Sikkim again for the following three months. As soon as we went down from the jeep the driver took off, backpacks and all. We were somehow concerned about what was going on but eventually we found him waiting for us a couple of metres ahead. Once we got to Gangtok we tried to make out the way to our pre-selected guesthouse but could not manage so we caught a taxi. The road to the guesthouse turned out to a very steep hill, which made us really glad to have opted for the Taxi. We checked into our guesthouse and made our way out to start exploring Gangtok, the capital city of Sikkim. This place seemed more like Europe than India, especially the main shopping street, MG Marg. But undoubtedly this was India… We tried having lunch in a "posh restaurant" and were excited to see that there was pasta on the menu. We ordered spaghetti lasagna, which we presumed were in actual fact lasagna…but we were wrong…they were spaghetti disguised in the form of a lasagna. Don’t try picturing them…it takes a fervent imagination to succeed. Janet thought that in Sikkim she would not longer have a problem with people staring at her hair…but she was so wrong… it was actually worse here. This led her to a much suffered decision…removing her braids. It was only a month since she had had them re-done, but the people around us were making her life miserable and so it was. It took us six hours to remove it, but we managed. Yakof also managed to colour her hair the following morning! And the result… amazing… she felt invisible. The stares, giggles, strange looks, all stopped as if by magic and this made the sacrifice worth while and brought a smile back to her face. In Gangtok we met a very nice ozzy girl, Elana. We had seen her before in Kalimpong but actually talked to her for the first time here. We were at a coffee shop, she asked us whether she could sit on our table as the coffee shop was full and we welcomed her to do so. We spent more than an hour talking to her… she is very interesting and so much fun. We both like her way of life… she has been traveling for the past fourteen years and this was her eight time in India. She works every other year and travels in between, seems to be just perfect. We hoped to meet her again during our travelling, especially given that were planning to follow similar routes. In all we had to spend five nights in Gangtok due to Janet's hair and our health (nothing too serious probably just effects of the sudden change in altitude). As soon as it was all over we made our way to Pelling.

Sikkim

02.05.2008 to 18.05.2008

Sikkim is a landlocked Indian state nestled in the Himalayas. It is the least populous state in India and the second-smallest in area after Goa. Today the majority of Sikkim's residents are of Nepali ethnic-national origin who came to the province in the 19th century. The native Sikkimese consist of the Bhutias, who migrated from the Kham district of Tibet in the 14th century, and the Lepchas who are believed to have migrated from the Far East. Tibetans reside mostly in the northern and eastern reaches of the state. We spent around twenty days in Sikkim and we had a wonderful time here. This was the place were Janet decided to cut her braids, where we were lucky enough to stare at a clear sky dominated by the mighty Kangchenjunga and where we stayed with a Nepali/Lepcha/Bhutia community on a hill, amongst other things.

Trekking would have been an option had the weather been nicer, but it was not the case and, given the trek we liked was not an easy one, we decided to go trekking some other time. We visited Gangtok; Pelling; Khecheoprai Lake; Tashiding; Ravangla and somehow Borong....these are our stories.

The Nightmare Loop : Way to Samthar

27.04.2008 to 29.04.2008

Imagine yourself having a very bad dream... a nightmare, and you desperately want to wake up, but alas you do not manage; or when you find yourself in a situation where you feel helpless and lost… thats one way to look at our trek. We set out, back packs and all, to Namco Ropeway, and even for starters, our adventure was illustrating itself to be a tough bone to break. The way down to the actual ropeway was quite steep and although Yakof had no problems whatsoever, Janet was finding difficulties to go down down and balance herself at the same time. After around thirty minutes we finally reached the ropeway. The carriage consisted of a small steel box connected to a steel rope via two pulleys, which passed over the river at a height of around 50m all operated by a skinny but impressively strong guy. The short trip was a mixture between being very really cool (for Yakof) and terrifying (for Janet)…but we made it to the other side in no time. And so our trek started. We asked directions to Samthar Plateau and started walking no map just directions from the locals. So we walked, and walked, and walked, should have been a simple 5 km walk for our first day, but we were soon past that, and were starting to get worried. Nevertheless, when we were asking for directions, everyone was telling us : ‘Samthar, Samthar…yes yes…and pointing straight.’ After around six hours of walking…we stopped to ask a lady where Samthar was, and she pointed out that Samthar was behind the hills, which turned out to be as unbelieveable to us, as it was true. Janet was getting tired and started to get hysterical, especially when it eventually started raining (irony :) ), but we had to keep going. In the meantime, we have to say, that the nature around us was incredible, the most beautiful we had seen till now. But that was not much of a consolation. So we kept walking. On the way we came across three boys who were cutting wood, and at that point we realized that Samthar was indeed still a long way over the hills. We started climbing the hill, until at a point Janet could not take it any more and refused to walk any further. Yakof saw a farm in the relative wilderness and went to try talk to the family which happened to be the same family of the three boys who we had previously met cutting wood. At first our tries at communication were going no where, until eventually somehow our mobile picked up connection, we called Raju (of Sherpa Lodge) and he spoke to the mother who in turn offered one of her sons to walk us to Samthar but Janet preferred to stop for the night, and with Raju’s help, the family was more than willing to accomodate us. The one night stay here turned out to be one of the nicest things we experienced since we have been traveling. Let us start by explaining the Farm in which this family lived. First they had a small shed which seemed to serve as a wardwrobe and a store at the same time. Next to the shed there were two wooden beds. Then there was the main ‘house’. This was basically a brick house with three rooms, two of which were empty, apart a wooden snake lying on the door of one of them, (which the kids jokingly used to scare Yakof). The third room had one table, two chairs, some shelves, a wall clock and a goat, which eventually peed in the room. This last room was the place where we spent the night. This same room led upstairs to, what we assumed, was the family's dormitory. Then there was the kitchen… a nice shed full of pots and pans and vegetables where all the meals were cooked. It was so nice seeing the pot warming on the new lit fire and smelling the nice smell coming out from it! Yakof decided to try to communicate with one of the sons with our phrasebook….no success at all…at first we found it to be quite uncomfortable being unable to communicate properly. We were saved by the bell when the mum called us for coffee. Eventually another son came who understood and spoke some English and we managed to understand that the province we were in was quite poor, Samthar was not that bad and Sikkim was a rich place. He was also telling us that he attended some kind of school, that he liked playing football and that our phrasebook was practically useless. After this short conversation we were served a snack which was the best puri (fried bread) and alu gobi(potato and cabbage stew) we have ever tasted. Seems to be a universal truth… home cooked meals are the best! Eventually the english speaking guy told us he was off to sleep in the forest and that we would be sleeping in the house. At that point we were not really sure what he meant by that. After our snack we went for a tour of the place and found out that this family was really organized : they had chicken, cows, pigs and goats (and also a sweet, roach killer, kitten). They had corn and also a beehive for honey!! At one point Yakof noticed that the mother was peeling corn and so we decided to help her our which turned out to be quite a learning experience. We sat on the porch until sunset and made our way into our room. They set up a bed for us in the "furnished" room, and we put on the mosquito net, which is serving much more to stop bugs strolling on our bodies than actually stopping mosquitos. From the kitchen we could smell nice things happening on the pot…their dinner smelled great…little did we know that was our dinner as well. At around seven we were served dinner…plane rice, with a "boiled/fried egg", and alu gobi…nice, nice and again nice. We did not dare to touch the water though. This family treated us like royalty… we never really expected that kind of hospitality. What was troubling Janet, was this…we were going to sleep in the forest…surrounded by animals…with a kind of roof on our head, from which unidentified flying insects were crawling into our "room." She was therefore "prepared" for any kind of insect assault. In the dim light of the kerosene lamp, we were preparing to go into bed when Janet noticed a big roach strolling on the wall. A few moments later we got scared to death by the kitten who was following another roach….Janet loved the kitten!! Exhaustion fell in and we slept till around 5am. Coffee was already boiling, and we started making our preparations to leave. Unluckily we were given no guide to take us to Samthar but they told us it was two hours away. We left the place at 7.30 and arrived in Samthar…..seven hours later!!!! This second day was much worse than the first. All the road was uphill and getting worse as we went along. Strangely enough, whoever we asked along the way stated that Samthar was just one kilometer away… Indians here have a strange way of measuring distances. The more we walked, the longer our perception of a kilometer stretched itself. Yakof was doing pretty well but Janet was getting more and more tired and her hurt foot was getting worse. It was too much of a strain climbing the hill with weight!! So she had another hysterical outburst, crying, saying how much she hated India and Yakof especially for getting her here. In the end we managed to arrived in Samthar. Looking down we could not believe we had literally climbed a hill at seventy degree climb. The worst thing about all this was that we did not manage to find accommodation and the only place available was ridiculously expensive… so, after all this hard work to get to Samthar, we decided to make our way towards Lava to find a cheaper accommodation here. So this is the end our nightmare trek. It was a unique experience to say the least. The nature around us was one of the most stunning we have ever seen. It has thought us many things…one of them is to never go trekking alone without a proper map cause directions in India are similar to the ones in Italy "sempre in dritto"…

That evening we slept at a place next to Lava and the day after we made our way there. We don't really have to say much about Lava as we did not like the place, mostly because the people there tried to cheat us all the time. We just spent one day there, watching TV and went back to Kalimpong the following day.

The drive back to Kalimpong was the worst we ever had since we have been traveling. The jeep started off and after a couple of minutes the guy sitting next to the driver took over the staring. All the pedals and gear box were still in the former driver control. Never, and again we make emphasis on the word NEVER, in our lives have we seen such a bad driver….and he was just taking care of the steering wheel!!! What made it so much scarier is that the 20 km drive was full of bends and curves down a hill so one wrong miss and….well we arrived safe and sound and changed jeeps to get to Kalimpong. Back in Kalimpong we checked in Sherpa Lodge were we narrated all our adventures and mis-adventure to Raju. We were just spending a couple of days there just to get our laundry sorted, given all of our clothes were filthy, and to get transport to Sikkim. We both needed to get to a place which is nicer than Kalimpong and, from what we have heard all along, Sikkim was the place.

Kalimpong

23.04.2008 to 26.04.2008

It was time for us to leave Darjeeling and move on to Kalimpong. We took off early in the morning and reached Kalimpong at around noon. It took a while to find accommodation, which would fit our budget, until finally we managed a room for Rs200. We were not that happy with our room as it was dirty, and there was no water, so we decided to go in the search of another guesthouse. We managed to find a good-value guesthouse a couple of minutes away from the motor stand…Sherpa Lodge….and we decided to move there on the morrow. Kalimpong was not much of a nice place… but for us it was a stopping point in order to go trekking. What made the place worthwhile was the owner of Sherpa Lodge, Raju, who was very friendly, and helpful. He gave us a lot of information about trekking and always had good advice for us. We did a couple of things in Kalimpong, which included visiting a small paper factory, where they produce paper from Daphne leaves. The final products are really nice, ranging from cards, bags, lamps, notebooks, etc. Kalimpong was the place where we changed a lot of rooms… in two days we changed three rooms!! First time was to change from the first hotel to Sherpa Lodge and following that to a different room within Sherpa Lodge itself. We were given a lovely room but with a 'little' problem, an unpleasant surprise which struck us during the night. Janet was sleeping, when, she suddenly felt something running on her arm. At first she tought it could be her hair but on second thoughts she put on the torch and she saw a small roach running on the mattress in Yakof’s direction. Yakof was woken up, by the ubrupt shouting, only to learn that there were around four other small roaches in the room, together with a big dead one next to the door and another (living one) on its way in!!!! That was the end of our sleep….from 04:30 in the morning we waited for Raju to wake up and we changed rooms. The room was pretty much the same but with a TV… and as long as there were no roaches it would be fine. It turned out that we could not make do without roaches even in that room, though we have to say the maximum we found were three. We spent the days in Kalimpong to preparing ourselves for our trek… bought trekking boots and so on. Our next destination The Trek… and that is one hell of a story….

Darjeeling

15.04.2008 to 22.04.2008

Darjeeling, the "Queen of Hills" and the land of the muscatel flavoured Darjeeling tea. Quoting Mark Twain, "the one land that all men desire to see, and having seen once-by even a glimpse, would not give that glimpse for the shows of the rest of the world combined".

Darjeeling was a beautiful experience for us and we spent seven great days. We left Siliguri very early in the morning, at around 06:00 as Yakof managed to find a shared taxi at a very good price. The ride there took us about two and a half hours, of serene mountain sceneries and bumpy curvy hills.

Once there, we tried to orientate ourselves and after some missed hits we ended up at the hotel we were looking for….Bellevieu Hotel. For once we had chosen a hotel beforehand because we were going to spend our anniversary here and we did not mind spending a bit extra to treat ourselves for the occasion.

The hotel is Tibetan owned and the rooms extremely nice and cosy. We opted for one of cheaper ones….Rs700 which is equivalent to 11.9 Euros. The room was a great luxury for us and we were feeling a little bit guilty of spending this amount of money, but we wanted to celebrate. The room had two great features…..the first one was an old beaten metal fire stove, which we use in two occasions when the weather got a little bit chilly. The other one was a hot shower!!! We had forgotten the last time we had a hot shower, and the feeling underneath the tub was exhilarating….we could not get ourselves out of the bathroom.

The first and last day of our stay were rainy, but during the rest of our stay the weather was pretty nice. We did not push ourselves too much to do a lot of sightseeing but concentrated on what we really wanted to do, ie, enjoy the beauty of the place and indulge ourselves in books and food!!

As sightseeing goes we visited the Tibetan Refugee Centre, the Zoological Park, The Himalayan Mountaineering Institute, the Ropeway, the Batasia Loop and the magnificent Tiger Hill.

The Tibetan Refugee Self Help Center was quite of a walk from our guesthouse, a "small" detail which we had previously overlooked, was our first go.

The Tibetan Refugee Self-Help Centre was started on October 1, 1959. At that time, following the dramatic escape of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, thousands of Tibetans leaving hearth and home, fled into the neighboring countries to live as "free" human beings. When the Centre first started over 34 years ago, there were just four workers. Today the centre is the home of more than 750 refugees.

Given the long walk Janet could not possibly leave without purchasing something. So after browsing the store she came across a particularly nice Tibetan bag which was extremely fairly priced. And that was the purchase of the day. We also toured round their small museum where pictures and stories of the atrocities suffered by Tibetan from Chinese were narrated and exposed.

On the day of our anniversary we visited the Zoological Park and the Himalayan Mountaneering Institute. It always gets to our nerves when we have to pay five times as much the price for Indian nationals to visit attractions….twice would be reasonable, but five times as much is quite a steal.

The time spent in both of these places was great. In the zoo we got to see animals which we had never seen before. Amongst them Janet’s favourites were the snow leopard, the leopard cats and the gorgeous red panda. Yakof’s favourite was, undoubtedly, the Tibetan wolf. One attraction which was catching the eye of most Indians was the rare Maltese, plaited-hair female... in other words Janet. At some points she was getting much more attention than the animals themselves!!! She even got to pose for a photo with a kid. Next in line she will be giving out autographs!

Having spared enough time to the zoo, we made our way to the Himalayan Mountaneering Institute, which at first we thought would be a pretty boring expereince. We were totally wrong, so much so that Yakof considered attending a course himself (which he will not do due to both money and time restraints).

Tenzing Norgay’s ascent of Mount Everest (8848/29,028ft.) along with Edmund Hillary, 1953 provided the desired impetus to mountaineering as an organized sports in India. Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, then Prime Minister and a visionary wanted to canalize the abundant energy of the youth of nation into a constructive field of mountaineering and hence planned to open a mountaineering institute(HMI) was founded in Darjeeling on4th November by none else pandit Nehru himself. Within no time HMI became the renowned mountaineering institute in the world. Being the home town of Tenzing Norgay and one of the most beautiful place in Himalayas, Darjeeling was selected as the most appropriate place for this institute.

It's history is fascinating and we spent a good hour going round the museum before deciding to get back to our guest house. On our way back we stopped at a small coffee shop : Hot Stimulating Cafe. Janet had the best Masala tea ever from there and the owner was a really nice lady. She had previously broken her arm which couldn't seem to heal... and yakof spens a sound hour giving her advice. In the end, she told us to leave a note in their journal and we noticed that, a few days before, two maltese had visited the place as well...shoot we were second :)

We ended that day by dining at a very good place, The Park Restaurant, where we ate delcious chicken with cashewnut sauce.

The other two places we visited during the rest of our stay were the Observatory Hill, where we went round a monastery full of cheeky monkeys, and the famous Tiger Hill...

We woke up at 04:00 and went to look out for a jeep to take us to the hill. We ended up in a small van, with all jeeps surpassing us, which was getting quite frustrating as we thought we were going to miss sunrise.

The trip to the summit of the hill is through Ghoom, the highest railway station on the D.H. Ry. The elevation of Ghoom is 7,407 feet from sea level, while the altitude of the top of this hill exceeds that of Ghoom by 1,100 feet. In the fast receding glimmer of the night, we found ourselves standing in front of a magnificent scene, in hush and silence and steeped in frigid cold. It is said that a traveller whose vision has not been entertained with the two sights, the Taj Mahal by moonlight and sunrise from Tiger Hill, has missed a pleasure that does not lend itself to be substituted.

The first rays of the sun shot ahead and shed light upon the twin peaks of Kanchenjunga and gradually painted the whole of its snow body with a beautiful orange colour. From Tiger Hill, just the top of Mount Everest (29,002') is visible, peeping out through two other peaks standing by its side. If you are lucky you get to see it as the weather is most of the time not ideal....and we had that luck!!! The peak that looks highest is that of Makalu (27,799'). These three peaks are seen to the north-west a little left of Phalut. Everest looks smaller than any of its two sisters, although Everest is not only higher than either of them, but the highest peak in the world, the distance in straight line of Everest from Tiger Hill being 107 miles. This phenomenon arises from the fact that Everest is several miles beyond them.

So this trip was a complete success and Janet was even glad that she did not attract any attention (due to the fact that she had, ingeniously, covered her hair with a hood). Nonetheless she was still asked to pose for a photograph by a sweet boy, whose father was friends with a guy who had asked to have her picture taken with his daughter when we had visited ropeway (which was not operational).

After having absorbed a heart-stopping experience, we decided to make our way back to Darjeeling on foot, a nice long walk of 11km. The first few kilometres were simply great! Only the two of us walking in the silence. The bad part came when we started reached the main road and were welcomed by the inevitable hooting of the jeeps. On the way we stopped at Ava Art Gallery. This gallery displays fine art and embroidery work of Mrs. Ava Devi. Her art was amazing. Janet was already considering which one she was going to buy when we discovered that the painting were no longer for sale as the artist had deceased. This was such a let down! We consoled ourserlves by buying two sets of reproduction postcards.

After five hours of walking we managed to reach Darjeeling and we stopped to have some food at Glenary's. We spent the rest of the day gladly doing nothing.

In Darjeeling, we experienced both cultural and culinary pleasures.

We discoved a great bookshop and ended up buying a lot of interesting books, ranging from Sufism, to Zen Teachings to Chakra. We also discovered various culinary pleasures... we were never dissatisfied with the food we ate here, it being western, chinese and indian and its here that Janet discovered for the first time the momos.

A momo is a type of Tibetan dumpling. Momos are made of a simple flour-and-water dough--white flour is generally preferred--and sometimes a little yeast or baking soda is added to give a more 'doughy' texture to the finished product. There are various fillings : beef, chicken, vegetables, cheese and apparently in nepal even chocolate (one thing Janet will make sure to discover once we are in Nepal) These fillings are then enclosed in a round of the above dough, which is sealed in a circular fashion, resembling a pinwheel, though it's also not uncommon for them to be folded in half and sealed. The resulting dumplings are then cooked by steaming over a soup (either a stock based on bones or tomato-based), which is served with the dumplings, as well as chili sauce. They may also be pan-fried or deep-fried after being steamed.

The best momos she tasted were at a Tibetan restaurant (Kunga), where she also savoured tibetan tea (tea with salt and butter)...a little bit heavy and distasteful but she had to give it a try, after all, it was tea!

Yakof, on the other hand, returned to his carnivourous state... and he loved it :)

Our days in Darjeeling passed on quickly, maybe too quickly. After seven wonderful days we decided to make our way to Kalimpong.

For more pictures click here: