Day 127 (Sat 11 Nov) - Siliguri / Darjeeling

We all slept well. Jo popped out early to book a hotel in Darjeeling that Disco had been recommended by her friendly travelers. She also managed to book a jeep to take us all to Darjeeling later that morning. Busy bee!

Had breakfast and then commenced the check out saga. Even by Indian standards this was painful. Disco and Sarb watched as the guy at the desk wrote out the bills on one set of forms, then repeated this on a completely new set of forms (not content with just writing the figures he actually wrote down the amounts in words) and then laboriously searched under his desk for some unidentified tickets that he tore from a book and then stapled to the bills. It was like watching a sloth that had overdosed on Valium.

Finally left Siliguri at 11.30am and in no time we left the busy town and were traveling through tea plantations. Slowly wove our way up a steep road into the mountains ( [1], [2] ). As we drove along the road we kept crossing the toy train tracks. We had considered taking the toy train but it sounded pretty exhausting as it took 9 hours, whereas the jeep would only take 3 hours. Further up the road we came across the toy train slowly, crawling up the tracks - it would be quicker to walk. We stopped on the way up and took in the breathtaking views.

Arrived in Darjeeling at about 2.30pm. The driver couldn't take us all the way to our hotel so we had to lug our rucksacks up a steep busy street which was full of enticing market stalls. We arrived at the Bellevue Hotel. Disco and Jo headed off to check out the rooms. They weren't impressed, though on the way up in the jeep we had discovered that Jo might have booked the wrong hotel as there was also one called the Main Olde Bellevue Hotel. Jo spotted that the other hotel was next door so whilst she got prepared to stall the hotel owner of Bellevue, Disco and Sarb popped next door to check it out.

The Main Olde Bellevue Hotel was the right hotel and we checked in to rooms 8 & 9 which had stunning views over Darjeeling and the snow peaked mountains from the garden area just outside our rooms.

After we dumped our stuff we found a nice cafe on Chowrasta which had fabulous views of Khangchendzonga. It felt quite chilly so whilst Sarb headed off to the internet cafe Disco and Jo went shopping. We had a great time bartering with the owners of the colourful market stalls. We had a very successful shop - we both bought woolly shawls, Jo bought Sarb a rather fetching woolly jumper and we all had matching Darjeeling woolly hats. We all looked like woolies.

On the way back to meet Sarb at the hotel, we stopped off at a shop and stocked up with beer and wine.

Wrapped in our new attire, we had a drink, on what we called our verandah, whilst we watched the sun go down outside our rooms - it was beautiful.

Later went to Glenary's for dinner and then headed back to sit outside our rooms and gaze at the starry night.