Darjeeling is a small hilltop village in the northern end of West Bengal, situated in the Himalayan foothills between Nepal and Bhutan. It is known for its tea plantations, as well as the popular old-fashioned “toy train,” which was completed in 1881 and connects Darjeeling to Siliguri on a narrow track. Personally, Darjeeling holds a very special meaning for me, as my favorite Indian restaurant is named after it, which, at least partially, inspired my visit to India!
How to get to Darjeeling from Kolkata
From Kolkata, there are daily train departures to Siliguri. At the time of my travel, there were no night trains covering this journey, so I took a train departing at 14:25 from Kolkata and arriving at 22:55 in Siliguri. At this time, it was not really possible anymore, except maybe by private taxi, to continue onward to Darjeeling. I spent the night in Siliguri (there are cheap rooms just around the train station) and continued the next day to Darjeeling by shared taxi, which cost 250 INR and took about 3 hours, arriving around noon.
An alternative would have been to book the iconic Darjeeling Himalayan Railway, which connects Siliguri to Darjeeling, but that would have taken 7 hours during the daytime, and I didn’t really feel like spending two days in a row on trains.
Darjeeling
Darjeeling is set at an elevation of 2045 meters, and temperatures were around 20°C during the daytime. This was a harsh but very welcome contrast to Kolkata, where I had just come from. It is surrounded by tea plantations and should offer perfect views of the Himalayas. In theory, with clear weather, even Everest (about 170 km away!) can be seen from here, but the more prominent skyline is, of course, the Indian Himalayas, dominated by Mt. Kangchenjunga, the third-highest mountain in the world and India’s only mountain above 8000m.
Sadly, during the 2 and a half days of my stay, Darjeeling was covered in clouds. No dust and smoke like previously in Pokhara, but just plain old regular clouds. The effect was the same: no mountain views for me. If you read about the best time to visit the Himalayas, you’ll find that there are two main seasons: October-November and March-May. Unless I was very unlucky (which is possible, of course), I believe that the October-November season must be the better one.
Main things to see
These are some of the things that can be done around Darjeeling :
- Tiger hill – get up early and catch a (shared) cab to take you all the way up to witness the sunrise over the Himalayas and enjoy amazing views. Or go there later and enjoy the views without the sunrise. Either way, it’s only possible if there are no clouds. 🙂
- Himalayan Mountaineering institute & Darjeeling Zoo – two institutions in one. You can only access the HMI by going through the zoo. Visiting a zoo was not exactly my plan in Darjeeling, but I wanted to see the HMI. In the end, both of them were quite nice, and at last, I got to see a Bengal tiger, albeit in captivity.
- Tea plantations – take a walk outside of Darjeeling through the tea plantations and visit one of the tea factories.
- Dali Monastery – this has nothing to do with spanish surrealism, it is a beautiful tibetan monastery about 2 km from the center of Darjeeling. It can be visited for a small fee and it has also a small museum with tibetan items.
- Toy train – a part from booking the full 7 hour trip down to Siligur, there are several daily “joy rides” which take about 2 hours. The train travels from Darjeeling to the next village – Ghum – and back. Come on join the joy ride!
- Darjeeling – the town on itself is very charming and inviting to stroll through its small streets and admire the town. Some streets between the train station and the hilltop are for pedestrians (and maybe motorcycles) only. There is also a nice buddhist temple anda viewpoint on the hilltop in the center.
Enjoy the picturesque little Darjeeling :
