A t r i P a l - 13 years
Sweden
Darjeeling is a small hill station in West Bengal, India and famous for tea, breathtaking view of Kanchenjunga, and the historic mountain railway. It is the shooting spot for many successful films.
First day: Departure
This summer, my family and I hopped on a train to Darjeeling. My parents had tried to visit Darjeeling a couple of times, but every time, their trip had to be canceled due to various reasons. Thus, they were determined to get to Darjeeling to prove a point!
However, a few days before our trip, we saw from weather reports and heard from our relatives that Darjeeling and the surrounding region were having dangerously bad weather, so my parents were considering canceling our trip again. But after some thinking and discussing, we decided to go anyway and avoid the problematic routes.
On our one-week trip, we would not go straight to Darjeeling but take a de-route through a small town called ‘Jhandi’. We would stay in a homestay in Jhandi for two days to experience the raw serene ambiance of the hill and then will head towards our beloved Darjeeling for the rest of our trip. We would also spend the first and last nights of our trip in the sleeper cabin of a train.
Finally, the awaited day came, and we were excited! We took a white cab to the Sealdah train station. It was blazing hot that day and our train was scheduled about an hour later. So, we tried to find a waiting room. After a bit of searching, we found an air-conditioned waiting room, but it took 10 rupees per hour to use it. It was surprising that the Indian Railway had stopped providing a waiting room even for passengers with reservations. My mom and I went into the waiting room while my dad went to find which platform our train would depart from and also to grab some food.
The waiting room in general was pretty good, the air conditioning was fine, but there was some awful smell of chemicals, which was annoying. Around half an hour later, my dad joined us in the waiting room, and we had some snacks. After waiting a bit, we went downstairs and bought chicken rolls and cold drinks from ‘Shiraz’ for our dinner to eat on the train.
Our train came on time and found our cabin pretty quickly, which was clean and spacious. There was another family nearby. The dad and the daughter from the other family were okay, but first, the mom tried to capture our window seat and then she was nagging about almost everything. The most prominent one was that our compartment was just after the engine, so in a crash we were going to die first. According to her, it would be better if the cheaper classes were put first to be used as a damper!
We had our dinner, which was delicious. After eating we talked about random things for a bit, and I played a few games on my phone. Soon the lights on the train went out, being the youngest in the family, I took the privilege of enjoying the bunk bed.
Second day: Reaching Jhandi
The next morning, I woke up pretty early to discover that I had a stomachache. It was probably a side effect of a series of biryani over the last few days and the royal chicken roll last night!
Our train reached the destination at around 10 in the morning. We got off and waited a bit for our pre-booked car. During this time my stomach started to hurt but the pain went away when I sat down or started walking. After a while, we were greeted by our driver, put all our luggage in the trunk, and got in our car. Soon I fell asleep as my stomachache got worse.
The next time I woke up, I still felt sick, but hungry as well. Our driver said there was a fabulous dumplings shop nearby beside the river 'Chel'. The spot was lovely and the dumplings as well. They were different from the ones we usually eat in Sweden. These dumplings were spherical, much larger and meatier. After the dumplings, I sipped some water, and it was super cold. This little thermal shock wiped out my sleepiness.

Since I was feeling a bit better, we decided to go take some exquisite photos. After taking the photos, we went back to the car, and I took another nap. When I woke up, our car was carving through the mountains, and it was foggy. But the small glimpse through the parts we could see looked stunning.
Soon, we reached our homestay, and it was a stark contrast to our home city Kolkata, which was loud and flashy. Here, it was almost dark because of dense fog even at lunch time and pin drop silence except the chirping of the hills.
Within the room, however, it was gloomy and very humid. We felt damp but ignored that. It was a stay for two days anyway. The people running the homestay were very polite. The quantity and quality of the food served every time was great.
After eating our lunch, we went back to our room, and since I still felt sick, I went to sleep. I slept until my parents woke me up for dinner. The way to the dining hall was outside the building and wet from continuous rain.
After dinner, I felt better, and we relaxed a bit. Suddenly, my mom ran out of the toilet shouting that a leech had stung her on the foot. But she could rip it off her skin and throw it on the toilet floor. Some salt could kill it instantly, but we could not find any.
In case you don’t know what a ‘leech’ is, it is a tiny insect that stings other animals and then sucks blood out into itself, and it just gets fatter and fatter until it is full of blood. Then it falls off, but it becomes difficult to stop the bleeding. The dangerous thing about leeches is that their stingers are so sharp and steady that humans don’t feel any pain until a significant amount of blood is extracted. If multiple leeches grab onto a person, they can suck out enough blood to make a person sick or even worse.
Third day: traveling to Lava and Lolegaon
On the third day, we traveled to Lava and Lolegaon, two small towns near Kalimpong. First, we visited a monastery called the 'Kagyu Thekchen Ling Monastery' which had nice views of the hills. With the foggy atmosphere, it created the perfect environment for photography.

Then, we went to another monastery called the 'Gumba Dara Monastery'. This monastery was bright white with golden accents, and it was surrounded by a lush green field amidst the fog, again creating a perfect ambiance for photos. There was a friendly mountainous canine relaxing in the field who seems to have interest in friendship with us.

Soon, the monks came and took their shoes off at the base of the staircase and went up into the monastery. They were wearing red robes draped over their shoulders called 'Kasaya'. Surprisingly, my mom spotted one of them holding a Coke bottle, and many of them were wearing modern Crocs.
We entered with them and watched as they sat down around a carpet. They were preparing some musical prayer. Their instruments mainly consisted of bells and other percussion instruments along with a wind instrument called a 'Rgya-gling'. We watched their prayer for some time and it was a completely different kind of musical performance. It sounded melodious and felt serious.
On our way back to homestay, we visited the 'Sambien' tea garden which had neatly organized tea plants. They were a lot taller than they look in photos. I liked the tea garden a lot because it was simple, peaceful, quiet, and quite a contrast to the usual city life we live in.
That evening, at our homestay, we found an amusing, friendly dog! All day and night it was lying in front of our door, as if, it was protecting us. The thing we noticed about the dogs here was that they were a bit bigger than the city dogs, and a lot fluffier (which in turn meant a lot cuter). They were friendly which means local people treat them nicely.
Fourth day: Darjeeling!
On this day, we were heading to Darjeeling in our car. Because the usual road was flooded, we had to take an alternative road, which was a lot longer. We drove along the fierce Teesta River and took the opportunity to visit Rabindranath Tagore’s summer house in Mangpoo, which is also known as Rabindra Bhavan. It is a well-kept museum with large glass windows that provide mesmerizing views, and it shows different phases of his life and some of his personal belongings.
Continuing our trip, we called our hotel to inform them our arrival time and after tackling some traffic, we finally arrived at Darjeeling. We got out of our car, and was pleased to see that one of the hotel staff was already waiting for us. He helped us with luggage and directed us to the hotel. This was about three minutes’ walk. It is worth noting, in Darjeeling, the most scenic road is mall road and it’s pedestrian only. Since our hotel was on that road, we could not take our car till the entrance of the hotel.
However, we realized that we were finally in Darjeeling! The hotel we booked was ‘Summit Oakden’, which had a scenic location and a wonderful viewpoint beside. We checked in, and again pleasantly surprised that they provided the exact room we requested. My dad researched a lot about ideal room booking in Darjeeling to maximize the possibility of viewing Kanchenjunga. The room was cozy and clean. The room had a large double bed with two bedside tables; it was decently big and had an armchair that could convert into a single bed. The most important thing is that the room had a huge window. Almost the entire wall was a window, which would later give us awesome views of the Kanchenjunga (more about this later)!
After putting our luggage in, we visited the hotel’s restaurant. The restaurant was extravagant and we ordered some fancy food, having which my stomachache seemed to disappear!
Since the fog was dying down and the sun started to shine, we ventured out again, this time to the mall square on foot. On our way to the mall, we visited the Mahakal temple which had many deities, and we encountered a lot of monkeys. It was a calm place which we enjoyed for a bit before continuing to the mall. After descending down some stairs, we saw the Mahakal market. The market is very famous among tourists for handcrafted woolen clothes at a low cost. As always, my mom wanted to buy some souvenirs, so me and my dad had to stop her.
Finally, we reached the mall and saw a stage on the left. There seemed to be some kind of Tibetan dance program going on with many traditional Tibetan dances. We watched that for some time before turning around to see numerous vintage shops around the mall. It felt like we had been teleported into the scenes of movies. This is mainly because many iconic Bengali movies had been shot right there.
To add to my pleasure, there were also horse rides. Obviously, I had to try! The horse was more of a pony, but it didn't stop my imagination to consider myself as a knight, straight out of a Disney movie! The name of the horse was 'Bullet'. I took many laps which made me smile cheek to cheek as captured on my parent’s camera. Finally, I got off the horse with the owner’s help. This was my first time riding a horse but surely is not last.

We thanked the horse and his owner for the ride, and headed to the iconic Gelanary's. After taking a few pictures in front of the iconic HOPE sign, we entered the bakery, and were greeted by the smell of delicious pastries and aromatic teas.

After ordering some pastries and a pot of tea, we took a table near the back where you could see a scenic view of the mountains below. We appreciated the vintage styling of the bakery. Soon our cupcake and black forest cake arrived along with a silver pot of tea. After devouring the cakes and surrendering our senses to Darjeeling tea, we returned to our hotel. That night I dreamed myself riding on Bullet.
Fifth day: Surprise!
On the early dawn of the fifth day, I was peacefully sleeping when suddenly my dad woke me up and told me to go look at the window. I was reluctant to wake up because just the previous evening, I was fooled when my parents told me there was Kanchenjunga outside our window!
But still, I got up and there, I experienced it. The majestic Kanchenjunga. Being the third highest mountain in the world and famous for the way it reflects the sun in the morning, it is a very iconic mountain and one we were very lucky to see because it is very rare to see it peeking out in July. We got an incredible view of the mountain due to my dad’s hotel room research. The morning sun reflected on the ivory snow, creating the enchanting Kanchenjunga which made us feel like we were on the top of the world.

One of the things we knew about the Kanchenjunga from watching hours of Feluda was that in Tibetan, the name meant the “Five treasures of the great snow”. But I did not know that the Kanchenjunga was sacred to the Tibetans. After taking some photos, we returned to rest, relishing the wonderful moment we just had.
In the morning, it was raining a little but still we visited the peace pagoda and Japanese temple. It was made to remember the civilian victims of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The peace pagoda is quite tranquil and the white with the golden accents surrounded by the lush greenery make a very peaceful environment.

Weather started to support us. So, we continued to the Dali monastery, which is kind of head office of all monasteries in that region. It seemed grand with a huge buddha statue inside, and I felt it was a bit more orthodox compared to the ones we saw before. But the funniest thing to us was that people had left Pringles, chocolates and bottles of Coke-cola as an offering to Buddha rather than the typical fruits and sweets.

The monastery is situated at a high spot, and we felt like a soaring bird as we saw the entire Darjeeling from above.

After that, we went to the beautiful 'Rock Garden' near the outskirts of Darjeeling but sadly, people had littered it with plastic. We focused on the huge waterfalls and beautiful lakes. The interesting thing about this waterfall is that it is natural for the most part but some of it has been man made later. Even after the good things, it made us quite sad that people had ruined such a pleasant and calm place with all kind of garbage.
Our next destination was the orange valley tea garden. This tea garden was a lot more sloped which allowed for even better views. We did a bit of trekking and took in the views.

Next, we took the famous joy ride in Darjeeling, in the toy train! It is a UNESCO heritage site. The train ride took us to Ghoom, the highest train station in India at an altitude of 2,258 m from sea level. On our way we would have great views and encounter the Batasia loop. The Batasia loop is an engineering marvel that allows old and less powerful trains to ascend through the track.
We went for a tea shopping trip after. My dad is very enthusiastic about the tea while my mom had a magnetic pull towards the tea vessels, leaving me hanging in the middle. We bought some exotic Darjeeling tea but then interrupted by heavy downpour.
To end the day, we indulged in sumptuous dinner at Glenary's. It had live music and performed one of my favorite songs, Perfect by Ed Sheeran. After listening, we returned to our hotel. We quickly fell asleep reflecting on the satisfying day we had.
Sixth day: Touring
On the sixth day, we went to a cafe near the hotel called 'Cafe House' for breakfast before heading to the Darjeeling Zoo. This zoo is very famous for red pandas, an endangered species of panda (also learned from Feluda). We saw many other animals such as the snow leopard, gorals (mountain goats) and many species of endangered birds.
The Royal Bengal tiger also lives there, but unfortunately, we could not spot it. It makes sense that the Royal Bengal tiger would come out on their own terms. They are among one of the biggest wild cats alive today.
Another interesting thing about the zoo is that the animals seemed to be very healthy and happy with their living conditions and we saw that it is possible to adopt some of these animals. This meant that you could pay for their food, water and other amenities for a year or more.
After visiting the zoo, we went to the HMI (Himalayan Mountaineering Institute). This is the first step for people who want to learn mountaineering and train for it. There’s also a museum part where we visited. We learnt about many different types of rock, where different mountains are, the history of mountaineering in India, insights from Everest, equipment from mountaineers, current and old. We also read about pioneers in the sport of mountaineering and much more. There was a really engaging scale model of the Himalayas where there were many mountains and rivers and many labeled buttons. Pressing the buttons lit up lights near the landmarks, providing an interactive experience.
After visiting the HMI, we went to have some snacks. My dad was eager to try local 'Thukpa', which is a kind of soup containing rice noodles, different vegetables and various kind of meat and fish. My mom and I wanted to stick to the tried and tested dumplings instead. We had those at a restaurant at the mall and the heavy rain outside created the perfect ambiance for some street photography. We captured some photos before heading to the local shops for some warm woolen clothes. While exploring the city, we felt attracted to the charm of Darjeeling’s steep roads, foggy weather and light rain.
Seventh day: Everything has an end.
Today would be our last day in Darjeeling but we still had one more iconic place to visit. We had our grand breakfast at 'Keventer’s'. We liked the food there quite a lot because the bacon and sausages were crispy, and the food was satisfying and fulfilling. We filled our stomachs till limits and, my dad exclaimed “ethereal”!
We went back to our hotel for one last time to get our luggage and got in the car to head to New Jalpaiguri Railway station where we will catch the train towards home. But we will take a longer route covering pine forest, Lepcha Jagat, Gopal Dhara tea garden and Mirik.
First, we went to a pine forest. It felt endless and surreal. Every view felt mystic. We did some trekking, and I became a bit overconfident and stepped on the wrong place. I had to grab my dad’s arm to avoid falling and possible injury.

Then, we passed through Lepcha Jagat, a popular viewpoint for adoring the Kanchenjunga. On our way forward, we stopped to explore the Gopal Dara tea estate for a small break. We drank and bought some more tea. This marked the last bitter-sweet viewing point of our wonderful Darjeeling trip.
In about two more hours we reached Mirik. We had some snacks while looking out to the lively lake. Again, we carved through the mountain and soon we were at sea level when we needed to roll up the window and turn on air conditioning. We again realized how refreshing the mountains are.
Soon we arrived at the train station, but were very confused as the train seemed to never come. According to the railway display, our train was at the station, but we could not spot it on any platform. After scheduled departure time, the train appeared and we finally got on our train, the “Padatic express” for a ten-hour trip back home. Soon I fell asleep and the next day my parents woke me up and I saw that we were pulling into the Sealdah station, and my parents were telling me to get ready to go home.