West Bengal, India

yesterday we successfully ascended 6000ft in our rickshaw, lots of pushing and running up hill. Who said fitness wasn't an issue?

We made it! ...to the start line

Hey guys,

 

Well very interesting journey we had.....  Got into Delhi airport at 6am local time, so spicy, so hot!  We then flew all the way across the country to Bagdogra which was an interesting place....  The airport was straight out of the wright brothers era and the public transport connections about as sophisticated as a bogan after 10 schooners!

 

Certainly the most interesting part of the trip has been the jeep ride from Bagdogra to Gangtok, Sikkim.  124km trip, thought it might take about 2 hours (did the sums, slow driving at 60km p/h average, too easy!)  Well it was far from easy....!

 

In what can only described as probably some of the most spectacular scenery in the world, 6 hours later, we made it!  Along the way we had to dodge about a million cows and mountain goats, hungry pack dogs and of course, a monkey or two!  As cute as the monkies are, they are riddled with rabies so best not to touch them!

 

My word though, the scenery was amazing....  Tall mountains far higher than anything we have to offer back home (they call them hills here) and in between, a valley with a fast flowing river rapid, the only thing dividing India from Bhutan.  Truly stunning.  Not so stunning was the real threat of landslides and we got caught up in one for an hour which proved to be very tricky but our driver was up to the task!  All I can say is, good luck to us getting back down again in that rickshaw!

 

So we take off on Sunday, 10.30am local time and our plan is to head to Darjeeling for some tea and some terribly snotty colonial living, I must say!  We will be blogging from the road (yes, somehow we have the ability in this country, don't ask how!)  So stay tuned, you can also track our route as we go on the map!

 

Cheers!!!