From Kalimpong

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Yesterday morning caught a share jeep from Kalimpong to Siliguri, for the start of the home stretch.

We left Kalimpong at about 12.30 for what was scheduled to be a two and a half hour drive. The Darjeeling Mail wasn't scheduled to leave Siliguri til 8pm, so I'd figured I got about five hours to play with, and was congratulating myself on having got through two weeks without any major mishaps when we turned the corner to find ourselves at the wrong end of a line of stationery vehicles; jeeps, trucks, buses. Apparently, the road had caved in, and was being fixed, and there was no saying how long it would take. I was quite glad that I'd opted to take an earlier jeep than originally planned. Earlier on in the holiday, I'd got talking to a South African woman, on the journey from Gangtok to Pelling, and she'd told me about how she'd been stimied by a landslide; cars- mainly shared jeeps and buses- had been building up on either side of the obstruction, and eventually, people just swapped vehicles, getting out from a car/jeep on one side of the obstruction, walking across to the other side, getting into a recently vacated vehicle, and continuing their journey. After about half an hour, I was beginning to wonder at what point I'd have to think about doing something similar, but luckily the delay only(!) lasted an hour.

It was interesting watching the landscape change, the further down we went. The first sign was the monkeys. I hadnt seen any in either Sikkim or W Bengal, and it only seemed to be an hour or so out of Pelling that they started to appear, sitting solemnly on the concrete bars at the side of the highway, picking nits out of each others fur, or just staring in bemusement at the lorries and jeeps tearing past them, almost as though they'd never seen anything like it before.

Leaving the mountains behind took a bit of readjustment as well. Suddenly from being surrounded on all sides by lots of green mountain and little bits of grey sky and road, we went to large, open stretches of grey sky and road, with the green bits shrinking to the size of fields and hedgerows. Everything became quite flat, open and straight. From travelling along narrow, twisty turny little roads, we were on a large, wide, two lane highway. The chaos of Siliguri (and later, Kolkata) was another brief shock.

We eventually reached Siliguri at about 4pm, just as the skies opened and it started to pour with rain. I went and found something to eat, and then made for the train station at NJP.

Didn't sleep brilliantly on the train. We arrived in Kolkata at about 7 this morning, and I was instantly thrust into a maelstrom of taxi drivers and hotel touts - I'm almost grateful to be getting back to the relative peace of Tottenham. In fact I will be grateful- I love this travelling lark, but it don't half knacker you out. I'm looking forward to a decent kip in my own bed, and catching up on Eastenders.

PS If anyone reading this happens to be passing through Kalimpong in the not too distant future, I'd love to know how the Himalayan Idol turns out- there were signs up outside Kalimpong Town Hall, advertising a gala evening featuring the top ten contestants.

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Comments

[Ann Marie Sears]

Wendy's friend
Hi Sarah--I remember when I was travelling in Tanzania and I was climbing Kilimanjaro for awhile (7 days?) always looking DOWN at clouds and then after I decended, it seems very strange to be looking UP at clouds and be on flat ground! I read your whole blog and feel like I was right along with you. Take care