It was a hot and sultry day in kolkata and I was traveling to my college when a crazy idea struck my mind. What if I along with my closest friends from The Modern Academy go for a trip? The idea was immediately shared in our Whatsapp group and it was welcomed with a lot of positive responses. 5 of us finally decided to be a part of this legendary trip.
Gangtok to Pelling to Darjeeling to Siliguri was our plan. After random speculations we chose to travel by train and Padatik express had all the responsibilities of driving us safe to New Jalpaiguri. It was 5th night at 9 'o' clock when Rohit picked me up from my place and I sighed "Uff Finally". We reached Sealdah at 10 'o' clock only to see our train was not there in the platform it was supposed to be. Ankit, Agniv and Tanmay reached Sealdah around 10 30 and within 15mins we could see Padatik express entering platform 9B. We were buzzing with excitement as it was our first trip. We entered the S4 coach and arranged our luggage accordingly. All we could discuss were about the next few days that we were going to spend. After all the random banters and trash talks we decided to call it quits and we went off to sleep. As soon as we woke up in the morning our train was 1hr shy to our destination. We reached NJP at 10 in the morning on the 6th. A grey colored Tata Sumo was already waiting for us and Thanks to Rohit and his Dad's relentless efforts we could reach Gangtok in time.
The hotel that we were supposed to stay was known as Kanchen Norvu. We reached Gangtok around 3pm, unpacked our luggage, freshened up a bit, had our lunch and went out for sight seeing. But before going out we had to submit few documents which were later used to create permit for the best place that we visited in the whole trip-NATHULA. Again thanks to Rohit, the hotel room, food and hospitality were top notch. To be very honest Gangtok is not the place I would like to visit again but the ambiance in the mall area was so unlike India. It was captivating and very happening. We had one of the best pan fried momos from a local shop and two budweiser cans were just an icing on the cake. We returned to our hotel just before it started to rain very heavily. We were drooling over a few "Meter Down" classics and went off to sleep to welcome the new day which was supposedly very adventurous. The breakfast was ready before it was expected. The mahindra bolero was waiting outside. We were ready to visit Nathula which is located at an altitude of 4310m approx. We were on our way to Nathula, we stopped midway at the sight of a waterfall, clicked few pictures and then continued our journey to the most coveted place. It was getting very cold as we were getting more close to our destination. The journey was horrifying and I was taken aback at the sight of an unexpected void whenever I looked right out of the window of our car. I became jittery as the road was very not at all uniform and it was freaking narrow for one car to pass let alone two. We reached Nathula around 1'o' clock and discovered that out hands had already turned yellow and our veins were visible. It was because of the very low temperature. Even though we missed snow, it was closed to 2 degrees that time. It is the India-China border. We took enough pictures to remember every second that we spent in Nathula After spending 1hr out there we headed towards Changu Lake which was not very far from Nathula. Midway we hit a local shop for some noodles and momos. We reached changu lake at 3'o' clock. People were riding Yaks and we were busy clicking our pictures keeping the lake as our main theme. We visited Babamandir which was not at all fascinating. After babamandir we headed towards our hotel. We went to the mall area and enjoyed a couple of hours and returned back to hotel. We were really excited about the next day because we would be heading towards Pelling.
The car was punctual as usual and we had to get ready before 8 'o' clock as the journey was very long and the route was not safe at all. The roads which were spiral in shape, steep slopes that looked like a 90 degree free fall were a few things that made our journey to pelling worth remembering. Even though Rohit and Tanmay had fallen sick due to food poisoning, they were immediately charged up by nature's grace. Pelling was a beautiful place to visit, less crowded and serene, of course a place where you can bury all your sins and spend the life of a monk. We reached Pelling, Hotel Royal bintan to be precise around 2 'o' clock, unpacked our luggage, had our lunch and went out for Singshore bridge. We reached singshore bridge which was an alluring place. The 200m long hanging bridge was covered with clouds and we could not resist clicking most of our "Would be Facebook dps" out there. We spent an hour investigating the 200m long bridge. The cloud got cleared and the view from the Singshore bridge to the bottom most rock was petrifying. We had enough of that place and we decided to get back to our hotel as it was getting dark. Driving in the hills in low light is a real menace even if you are an expert. We slowed down at Changay falls which was not much attractive. We reached our hotel before sunset. Agniv and Rohit decided to stay back in the hotel while Ankit, Tanmay and I went out in search of icecream. Failing to discover an icecream shop, we hit a local momo shop which turned out to be one of the best we had in our whole trip. In the meanwhile it started to rain heavily and we decided to take a walk. We reached our hotel and it was almost time for our dinner. Since two rooms were allotted to us, we divided ourselves accordingly. Rohit, Ankit and I were in 1 room, Agniv and Tanmay in the other. Sony Six was telecasting the Fifa 1994 World cup film. Amidst the Roberto Baggio penalty miss gossip we don't remember when our eyes gave up and when we woke up it was time for us to leave Pelling and head towards Darjeeling. After having a delicious puri/dal breakfast we got up in the car. We left Pelling and headed towards Darjeeling.
We definitely understood the fact that the roads that led to Darjeeling were the worst ones. There was a place where our car was going up on a very steep slope and midway it stopped and started to roll backwards which would have killed us then and there. We had to step down and immediately arrange bigger stones to stop the car from rolling down. Our driver was skilled enough and he tactfully took help of the back gear and bang we overcame the steepest slope of our trip. We were always accompanied by some good music thanks to Rohit's Aux Cable. Darjeeling was definitely one of my favorite places from the trip. It was crowded by the ambiance was intriguing. It had a different essence altogether. We were stuck for an hour in a pathetic jam before we could finally reach our hotel and it was known as Hindustan Residency. We dropped our luggage in our hotel room and had our lunch. We rested for a while and went out for "Chelsea" a shop which we were very eager to visit. The best part about these hilly areas is that the people out here love football more than anything. Each house, car, shop was decorated with flags, scarves and posters. The world cup is here and these hill towns made it more lively than any other city could. Chelsea was immensely football dominating and I got some of the best stuffs that I would never get in my city. After we were done with the shopping we went to Glenary's. It is a must for everyone who visits darjeeling. Our tummies were stuffed with some of the best foods from Glenary's. We came back to our hotel and clicked pictures with everything that we bought from Chelsea. We turned on our television and enjoyed some old football videos and called it off for that night. The next day we had to wake up as early as 4am. Our car was waiting and we headed towards the Tiger Hill for the sunrise. The Sunrise was not clear mainly because of the clouds, still we could get an idea how beautiful it could be on another day with less clouds around. The place was worth visiting a million times. We left Tiger Hill and went to a monastery. On our way to hotel we stopped at a place called Batasia and after that went to Rock Garden. After rock garden we came back to our hotel. We had our breakfast and went out again. This time it was the Zoo and the Museum. We totally enjoyed our time at both these places. After witnessing some of the rarest animals in the zoo we went to the Tea Garden. We clicked a few pictures, bought tea for our loved ones and returned to our hotel. After we were done with our lunch we decided to go to Kebenter's for some hot chocolate, ham fry and meat balls. It was really special to visit a place which is more than 100 years old. After Kebenter's we went to a restaurant called Penang which supposedly sold the best momos out in darjeeling and hell yeah they were good. Penang was followed by Glenary's again and this time it was an all dessert venture. We spent a lot of time out there while Agniv and Rohit were busy buying chocolates for their loved ones. After Glenary's we went to the mall area and before it started to rain we went back to our hotel because next day was a hectic one as we would be heading towards siliguri via pashupati. It was the last day of our trip.
After a good night slip, we woke up early and packed our bags as fast as possible. Our car was waiting and as soon as we finished we went to a place called Bhanu Bhavan where our car was waiting for us. We knew that the pleasant weather will only last for a few hours because siliguri is at a similar altitude level like Kolkata. We stopped at pashupati, shopped for a couple of hours and went to siliguri via Mirik. We were in Bidhan Lodge and were too tired and hungry to wait for any sort of formalities. We hit "Gest Food" which was close by. After our lunch we rested for an hour and went to Hong Kong market. After exploring Hong Kong market my friends met with one of my close friends Subhayan. This selfless guy came all the way just to make the last day of our trip worth remembering. We went to Cosmos mall where we had one of the best momos of our trip. Momos were followed by a couple of pool games which my friends enjoyed the most in the enitre trip. Thanks to Subhayan my friends and I had a really great time at Siliguri. The next day was going to be a long one and so we returned to our hotel as early as possible. We slept early and woke up early.
It was time to get back to Kolkata. We reached NJP 1 hour before time. We all bid goodbye to all the places we visited with heavy hearts and we definitely wish to go back to all those places in near future. This was our first trip and first of many more to come. The train came early as well. With all the memories of the previous 7 days we headed towards Kolkata with one thing in mind. The World Cup is here.
