Our train to Darjeeling terminated south of the town center and so from there we had to navigate our way through the crooked alleys of Darjeeling to our hotel. Easier said then done when in the dark and armed with only a Lonely Planet map which, at the best of times, are only mildly helpful. But, as is the case I'd say... 90% of the time, we did manage to find our hotel and were relieved that for once, the review of the hotel was spot on; it was warm, cozy, clean and even had a well bathed dog hogging the best spot beside the coal burning stove. It was there that we met John and Beth, two Poms from London, defrosting their digits after the chilly train ride. We'd been on the same train as them but they'd been slumming it in 2nd class so we hadn't crossed paths. They were lovely and it was really nice to sit around a fire swapping traveling stories in what could have been their grandmother's living room it was so comfortable. To top it off, before going to sleep that night, one of the guys brought us hot water bottles to go to bed with-too perfect!
So unbeknownst to us, we had arrived in Darjeeling during the two-week-long Tibetan New Year celebration. The next morning when we headed to Observatory Hill, which is the home to both Buddhist and Hindu temples, many of the locals were on top praying, lighting incense, ringing bells but most of all just celebrating with each other and having a great time.
They included us in their celebrating by offering us "tea". Tea turned out to be a kind of rice wine that was hot and thick, kind of like what you would get if you mixed porridge with sake. At first gulp it was delicious but, as soon as the cup got half emptied, they filled it up again. A bottomless cup of sake porridge wasn't exactly what I'd signed up for but Jb seemed to liked it and mercifully drank the rest of mine.
Another reason for their jovial mood may have been that the entire town was on a two day strike! Apparently strikes are a somewhat regular occurrence due to the long struggle of the people in the Darjeeling area to gain autonomy from West Bengal and form their own state called Ghorkhaland. The irony is that we changed our itinerary to come to Darjeeling in response to the Pune terrorist attacks thinking that we were heading to a peaceful place. Instead we find out that the sleepy town of Kurseong (the place where we'd had a nice relaxing time) had riots the day after we left resulting in 3 police vehicles being burnt out. However, things were decidedly more contained in Darjeeling with only peaceful marches and one rally taking place.
While the strike made things a little inconvenient because most everything was closed, it was actually really nice to wander the streets when they were so peaceful as Darjeeling (as we found out later) is really quite a buzzing town.
Even the dogs were on strike...
The view from our hotel window...
Without much choice in the matter, we happily spent the next couple of days wandering around the town. A pretty church we came upon.
We spent a couple of hours ascending to a peace pagoda perched on a hill overlooking the town.
A welcoming sign of spring we happened upon along the way.
The steep descent down to some tea gardens on the outskirts of town.
A school cricket match on the top of the world...
While we'd enjoyed our time in Darjeeling thus far, the strike was beginning to get a bit old and we were itching to do something besides wander around town. We'd contemplated going on an overnight trek while in the area and when John and Beth had mentioned that they might be up for something like that, we decided we'd all look into it together. With all the tourist offices and operators closed, we were lucky we could organize a trek through our hotel. And so what began as a possible overnighter somewhere in the mountains, morphed into a 3 night-4 day trek to Singalila Ridge along the Nepal-India border. Once we paid our 50% deposit there was no turning back so we packed our bags and hoped we hadn't made a big mistake!