It was a scorching summer in Kolkata with news of heat waves and rising temperature coming in the daily weather forecast. I decided it was once more time to move out of the city. To a cool destination - Darjeeling, I thought was the correct place.
We boarded the Kolkata-Haldibari Superfast Express and set out towards New Jalpaiguri. The train reached NJP an hour and a half behind the scheduled time of 18:50 hrs. That night we stayed at Hotel Miami in New Jalpaiguri. The day after we went to Siliguri by auto rickshaw. Siliguri and New Jalpaiguri are actually twin towns and are located very close to each other. Our auto dropped us at one of the many travel agency counters scattered in the town of Siliguri which conduct daily car service to Darjeeling. We bought tickets from the counter and hopped into the car. The car started moving. Soon we saw a narrow gauge railway line by the road side - the track of the heritage Darjeeling Toy Train. But soon our car was diverted to Rohini Highway instead of travelling on Hill Cart Road, the traditional way to reach Darjeeling because of a land slide on that road. The new road was very steep and had a number of pin head curves. It took about three hours for our car to get to Darjeeling. We descended from the car at Super Market Taxi Stand. Since we had made no hotel booking so my first job was to find a hotel to stay at least for that night.
I found a decent room at Hotel Mount Pleasant in H.D. Lama Road but it's tariff was pretty high. The H.D. Lama Road was situated much higher than the taxi stand. I had to hire a porter to carry our luggage to the hotel. From our room we could get a panoramic view of the hills and the Darjeeling skyline. After that we went for lunch at the restaurant inside our hotel. The food was very costly and of poor quality. We had ordered fish meal but found that one of the piece was bitter in taste. I asked them to change the piece but they refused to do so. Highly disappointed and irritated by the arrogant nature of the restaurant owners, we went back to our room to take a quick nap.
At around 4:30 pm we walked out of the hotel to take a stroll in the streets of Darjeeling. I soon noticed that the streets of this town were much steeper than that of Gangtok. Ultimately we reached Chowrasta or Mall of Darjeeling. It was a large flat open space marked for pedestrians only. Our current hotel was far away from the mall so we were in search of another hotel which would be closer to the Chowrasta. Soon we found another hotel in Dr. Zakir Hussain Road. Although the tarriff was cheap but it's room did not offer view of Kanchenjunga. We booked room in Hotel Norling for the next day. After having dinner at 8 o' clock in a restaurant we went back to our hotel. We had already learnt that the whole town of Darjeeling goes to sleep very early and it would be hard to get food after 9 pm.
The next day we woke up early. I discovered that Mt. Kanchenjunga was visible from our room window. We quickly dressed up and set out towards observatory hill - the point from where one can get a clear view of the snow capped peaks. There we took some shots of the mountain. On the way back we visited Mahakal Temple. It was a steep walk to the top where the temple was located. After that we went back to our hotel, hired a porter and moved to the new hotel. Then we had lunch. Our next destination was Darjeeling Railway Station.
How to Reach :
A number of trains are running from Sealdah, Howrah and Kolkata station to New Jalpaiguri. Auto rickshaws are plying from New Jalpaiguri to Siliguri. There are many travel agency counters scattered around the city of Siliguri which run daily car service to Darjeeling. You can buy tickets from those counters and get into the car in order to reach Darjeeling.
Where to Stay :
Darjeeling has plenty of hotels for the accommodation of tourists but they are quite scattered around the town. In Darjeeling you cannot expect a road with a line of hotels. It often becomes difficult to find a perfect hotel in one go because there are no taxis or horse carts or other vehicles at the taxi stand and you're on your own feet. Hotel tariffs also vary wildly with season and even within few days. Here are names of some hotels in Darjeeling.
1. Hotel Alice Villa
2. Hotel Bellevue
3. Hotel Dreamland
4. Hotel Sonali
5. Hotel Mount Pleasant
6. Hotel Dikila
7. Hotel Dekeling
Places of Interest :
The main tourist attractions of Darjeeling are the Mall (Chowrasta), Observatory Hill, Padmaja Naidu Himalayan Zoological Park, Himalayan Mountaineering Institute and the Toy Train. Other tourist spots include the Japanese Temple, Peace Pagoda, Dhirdham Temple and Happy Valley Tea Estate. A great attraction for tourists visiting Darjeeling is watching sunrise from Tiger Hill (11 km from the town). The car will also take you to Batasia Loop and Ghum Monastery. Other excursions tours include Mirik, Kalimpong and Kurseong.
For more information, please contact :
GTA Tourism
Deputy Director of Tourism,
Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council Silver Fir Building,
The Mall, Darjeeling-734301
INDIA
We boarded the Kolkata-Haldibari Superfast Express and set out towards New Jalpaiguri. The train reached NJP an hour and a half behind the scheduled time of 18:50 hrs. That night we stayed at Hotel Miami in New Jalpaiguri. The day after we went to Siliguri by auto rickshaw. Siliguri and New Jalpaiguri are actually twin towns and are located very close to each other. Our auto dropped us at one of the many travel agency counters scattered in the town of Siliguri which conduct daily car service to Darjeeling. We bought tickets from the counter and hopped into the car. The car started moving. Soon we saw a narrow gauge railway line by the road side - the track of the heritage Darjeeling Toy Train. But soon our car was diverted to Rohini Highway instead of travelling on Hill Cart Road, the traditional way to reach Darjeeling because of a land slide on that road. The new road was very steep and had a number of pin head curves. It took about three hours for our car to get to Darjeeling. We descended from the car at Super Market Taxi Stand. Since we had made no hotel booking so my first job was to find a hotel to stay at least for that night.
 |
| On the way to Darjeeling |
I found a decent room at Hotel Mount Pleasant in H.D. Lama Road but it's tariff was pretty high. The H.D. Lama Road was situated much higher than the taxi stand. I had to hire a porter to carry our luggage to the hotel. From our room we could get a panoramic view of the hills and the Darjeeling skyline. After that we went for lunch at the restaurant inside our hotel. The food was very costly and of poor quality. We had ordered fish meal but found that one of the piece was bitter in taste. I asked them to change the piece but they refused to do so. Highly disappointed and irritated by the arrogant nature of the restaurant owners, we went back to our room to take a quick nap.
 |
| Chowrasta (The Mall) |
 |
| View of Snow Capped Peaks |
Continued to Trip to Darjeeling - 2
How to Reach :
A number of trains are running from Sealdah, Howrah and Kolkata station to New Jalpaiguri. Auto rickshaws are plying from New Jalpaiguri to Siliguri. There are many travel agency counters scattered around the city of Siliguri which run daily car service to Darjeeling. You can buy tickets from those counters and get into the car in order to reach Darjeeling.
Where to Stay :
Darjeeling has plenty of hotels for the accommodation of tourists but they are quite scattered around the town. In Darjeeling you cannot expect a road with a line of hotels. It often becomes difficult to find a perfect hotel in one go because there are no taxis or horse carts or other vehicles at the taxi stand and you're on your own feet. Hotel tariffs also vary wildly with season and even within few days. Here are names of some hotels in Darjeeling.
1. Hotel Alice Villa
2. Hotel Bellevue
3. Hotel Dreamland
4. Hotel Sonali
5. Hotel Mount Pleasant
6. Hotel Dikila
7. Hotel Dekeling
Places of Interest :
The main tourist attractions of Darjeeling are the Mall (Chowrasta), Observatory Hill, Padmaja Naidu Himalayan Zoological Park, Himalayan Mountaineering Institute and the Toy Train. Other tourist spots include the Japanese Temple, Peace Pagoda, Dhirdham Temple and Happy Valley Tea Estate. A great attraction for tourists visiting Darjeeling is watching sunrise from Tiger Hill (11 km from the town). The car will also take you to Batasia Loop and Ghum Monastery. Other excursions tours include Mirik, Kalimpong and Kurseong.
For more information, please contact :
GTA Tourism
Deputy Director of Tourism,
Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council Silver Fir Building,
The Mall, Darjeeling-734301
INDIA
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