Travel day. We have to be up at 4:45 for a 5:15 pick-up and 7 am flight. Probably the only time that the roads aren’t crowded! First flight goes smoothly, and we have packed our bags all the way to Kolkata, so no worries on that score. We are to overnight there, then catch a flight to Bogogdra, the closest airport to Darjeeling (spelled Darjiling here). But as we are cruising through the Delhi airport, we check the monitor and see there’s a flight to Bogogdra in a little over two hours. Is there room for us? Only one way to find out. We go to the gate for that particular flight and chat with the attendants. A few phone calls later and we are scurrying through security to buy tickets on the direct flight. We have to criss-cross the airport to buy the ticket, see a manager to get out bags pulled from a flight that leaves in 20 minutes, get them put on the new flight and get back through security. I’m a little(?) energized, but we get it done. I can’t believe it! No big city of Kolkata and no wasted day. I’m thrilled.
The hour and a half flight is pretty easy, I can’t sleep although way tired, but somehow Matty can sleep in so many positions it’s awe-inspiring. We land and wait for the answer to the million-dollar question: did our bags make it? Indeed they did! We find our new driver, take our seats in the car, and off we go, Blues Traveler wailing on the stereo. After a brief stop to get some local snacks (no lunch), we head up into the mountains. At some point, the road just starts going up. Please picture elbow shaped 45-degree turns. Add to that, a single lane, with a crumbling edge that drops off hundreds of feet, honking on approach to every turn, and you are starting to get the idea. And anyone who knows me knows how fun that was for me. I focus my eyes on a stick of Ganesh that is plastered right above the rear view mirror, but that doesn’t stop my peripheral vision from seeing the absolute spinning of scenery every time we round a turn, like I’m on the teacup ride at the amusement park. Hardly amusing. Will I make it?
Thank the stars, after about 30 minutes of this, the driver asks if we’d like a break for tea. Do I need to think about this question? I pace outside, where it’s a brisk mid-30’s and foggy (the ongoing weather theme in winter, it seems). Since I had dressed for arrival in Kolkata, where it is a balmy 80 degrees, I decide to dig my hot chillys out of my suitcase and dress more appropriately. Back on the road, things soon straighten out and I can start to come out of survival mode. We pick up a hitchhiker, who has a lit cigarette in his hand, and before he gets in, I bark (really?) out: “no cigarette, please!”. No problem.
We arrive in Darjiling, passing the railway tracks (in fact, the tracks wind back and forth across the road, I guess I need to add train to the list of moving items that can be found on a road in India) and a train on the way. One of the things on the list to do up here is to take the toy train (two cars and smaller than usual to fit the narrow lane the train has) from town down to Ghoom. As we drive through town, Matt and I comment on how much bigger town is than we expected, and I think of how all the people now look to be of Asian descent as opposed to the India features we’ve grown accustomed to. We arrive at our hotel, probably the nicest in town, and check in. It’s a lovely old British thing with sitting rooms, beautiful carpets, fireplaces everywhere and lots of smiles all around. The prevalent fireplaces are because there is no central heating and baby, it’s cold outside! People sit near the hotspots (with a different meaning here) to chat or work on laptops. Here is a photo of our beautiful room:
I don’t really want to go anywhere for a while, so we decide to eat in. Matt and I enjoy quite a few laughs throughout the meal because the food is SOOOOOO bad. Tonight is continental night and as an example, their spaghetti sauce is kind of a mixture of bad ketchup and asian sweet-and-sour sauce, ick. I ask if there are any plain noodles in the back, and sorry, no. The highlight of my dinner was the warm roll. As I said to my son, it brings home how lucky I am that I can’t remember the last time I had a meal that bad! Up to our rooms so I can lose another game of cribbage (dude is slaughtering me EVERY time!) and to bed in our woolens. As I said, no central heating, so we have a space heater and a fireplace that’s been set up with charcoal, which we light before hopping into bed.