Blogs from Sikkim, India, Asia - page 7

Geo: 27.3016, 88.2327I really like Sikkim, the scenery is really amazing with the steep hills and looming mountains above. It's a nice place to come and relax and take in the silence before heading into the more crowded places. It's amazing to drive through the valley's and seeing houses built on the most extreme slopes and in the most random places where even getting access would be a hassle.After taking a 5 hour jeep ride from Gangtok to Pelling we settled into Hotel Kabur. Two French girls, Anna and Lucie, who took our jeep also stayed here. Hotel Kabur is a nice little place to stay with a nice restaurant up the top. Here we found a whole bunch of other travelers.We grabbed some dinner and headed for an early night, it was pretty cold so ... read more

Sikkim was everything we expected and more. There were the ubiquitous monasteries with resident monks and beautiful mountains, but also a great capital city (Gangtok) where we could wash, launder and treat ourselves with delicious food.... read more

After three months already spent here in this Incredible India we realise that 6 months is definitely not enough and that we are for sure coming back for a second round. “If you think you can, you can. And if you think you can't , you're right!” First stop Kolkata, with hundredandninety percent humidity and monsoon rain. We mingled among the people, cows, chickens, goats, drinking chai on the street corner, looking at all the beautiful women in their bright coloured saris, heavy jewellery from nose to toe and henna painted hands and feet, avoiding getting runned down by racing cars, that use their horns instead of their breaks, auto rickshaws, cyklerickshaws, running rickshaws, trams, raging cows and bulls, men walking the crowded streets with 6 meter long steelbars on their heads and whatever you can ... read more

November 2006, I made my first big solo trip. All my savings and years of scheming were directed at one thing; to see...no to walk in the Himalayas. I chose to do it the grand way by joining the Himalayas Institute of Mountaineering. A 28 day course with lodging, food and the best guides possible and 10 days of roughing it out in the real mountains for Rs. 5000 (500USD for foreigners) is a deal hard to find. It was this trip that set the course to where I am now. I wrote a long piece about it for friends and family shortly after completing the piece but never posted it. So here it is now. Dug up from old dusty forgotten files. Nice to look back at my rather juvenile scribbles. Dali's been giving me ... read more

Having bid a sad farewell to Jess and Bert, we caught the overnight train to Siliguri in West Bengal. This was the end of the railway line, and from then on it was to be jeeps or buses. Our next stop was to be Kalimpong, so we booked our seats beneath a sign announcing ' Buses to the Hilly Regions'. Kalimpong is a smaller, quieter version of Darjeeling on the Sikkim border. It was used as a hill station by the Raj administration when it was too hot in the plains, and we too were very thankful for the drop in temperature. It's a pleasant town, were the Tibetan, Indian and Burmese races meet and mix. Alongside this is the accompanying mixture of faiths: Sikhs, Muslims, Hindus and Buddhists co-habiting seemingly well. It does make you ... read more