Daring to Defy Darjeeling

After going through an emotional family loss last month (read more about that in my “The Life of Chewie Post”), I (Ethan Stranger) am feeling slightly better and have returned to my blog, Today, I’ll be talking about another part of India (following my “Gone to Goa Post”) and that’ll be “Darjeeling”, so…allow me to further explain about this trip. 

As you can from these pics (Top Center), clear skies, deep valleys, and little housing down below, there’s even one (visible) snapshot of Mt. Everest, but I’ll forget how hard it was to get to our hotel, as we had to find our own transportation and it took 2 long hours to finally make it there and thus will begin on why this trip will be so…forgettable quickly. 

Plus, if you thought we took either the steam train or the diesel (Picture: Bottom Center), well…you thought wrong, the coaches were too dirty on the outside and too cramped on the inside, and the Railtrack even cuts through the road, surprisingly, both the Disesel and the steam engine’s designs remain me a bit of “Sir Handel and Rusty (From Thomas the Tank Engine And Friends)”. The reason the Engines are pulling their trains backward instead of forwards is to avoid strain on the couplings and one will think that engines can’t climb mountains, well these ones can.

(Click here to witness more of “Mountain Railways”)

(While I grew up loving trains, thanks to Thomas and Friends, and it would’ve been nice to ride on one of the trains, we didn’t have the time, plus I highly doubt those engines know their way to “Shining Time Station”)  

 

Meanwhile, there was more sightseeing to do around Darjeeling (Pictures: Bottom Center), however, because Darjeeling is a town located around the Himalayan area,  I would admit it was difficult to find some enjoyment, for whenever you visit a palace within a mountain range area, the locals are cut off from the rest of the big town that’s on the side, but I and my parents did try to make the best of it during our time here.

While everything was so nice and all, most of the issues we faced during this trip happened back at the hotel, due to cold nights and the service over there (in general), but who could really blame them, we were on vacation within a mountain range area with hardly any good WiFi and trying to make it through without suffering any “Vertigo effects (which we didn’t)”, what a relief. 

I would say the best trip out of that entire trip was the Zoo (Picture: Bottom Center)

Packed with various animals, mainly native to the jungle regions of India, though besides farm animals and stray dogs, the only wild animals outside of the zoo that we spotted were Macaques, mostly hanging around the airport area and around another area (not far from our hotel). Interestingly, whenever I would spot a Takin, I would describe it as a “Wooly Wildebeest”, sadly, there were no tigers inside their enclosures at the zoo, either they were hiding (just didn’t see them) or they were taken out to a different enclosure. 

The only animals at the zoo that weren’t native to India were these Macaws and Parrots were kept in a special big enclosure (just for the birds), though that rose-ringed parakeet (Picture: Bottom Right Corner) is native to the region of India, plus I think those are the same parakeets I remember seeing in Nepal, during m final days over there (Read more about my time in Nepal in both my “Navigating Nepal and Navigating Nepal II: Welcome to the Jungle”), where they would land in our garden and nibble on the seeds from our sunflowers while avoiding the many stray cats that were living in our backyard.     

One moment at the Zoo that (literally) almost ruined my day completed is when I was trying to get a clear shot of those 2 Asiatic black bears with my iPhone, when suddenly I felt a huge push from behind me, as a father of some little girl, nearly cost me to lose my grip on my phone, that could’ve ended up in the “Bear Pit”, plus the Zoo was very crowded that day, I don’t even remember, even though this trip was from last March, but I think we did cover the entire zoo.

As you can see (Pictures: Top Center), Evne in India (no matter what town you’re in), they always try to capitalize on American Culture, from fictional characters to even the peace-out sign.  

Heck, here’s one beggar pretending to be like a “Fiddler on the Roof” (only he’s not on a roof)

During our stay in Darjeeling, I’ll forget how Early My parents and I had to wake up, if we were to see the sun rising so bright, that you could actually see Mt. Everest, the big problem was the large crowd that slowly began showing up, even as t eh sun began to rise and everybody could see Mt. Everest, there as barely a good spot to stand and get a picture, there were just too many people. I was so tired, I just wanted to collapse, after everybody got their pics, it was back to the car, the only big problem was that we were stuck in a long line of cars (it took almost an hour and a half long to make it back to the hotel), plus we tried to avoid the big crowds that’ll show up for breakfast time (and even during lunch time).  

Finally, one of the last things I recalled doing in Darjeeling was driving around Darjeeling, as well as taking a big drive-upward to the border of Kathmandu, as Kathmandu was also located within a valley, I’ll forget how (whenever I was living in Nepal back in the day), I always felt like the entire town was trapped in a dome due to the all of the mountains. Along the way, we encountered many villagers who set up stands and small businesses for tourists and lots of farm animals and stray dogs. By the time we made it to the border of Kathmandu, it was a long drive back to the hotel, as well as getting ready to head out and go back to Hyderabad (Read more about that place in my “Hooray for Hyderabad” post).   

Overall, I did have some fun moments in Darjeeling, but it was a bit more….frustrating than compared to my trip to Goa (again, read more about that trip in my Gone to Goa Post), perhaps due to the pollution, big crowds, our hotel service and being within a mountain range made this trip a little bit difficult to enjoy than compare to Goa, but still a fun trip. 

Ethan Stranger Signing Off for Today