Glimpses of Gangtok - Day 3 Continues !

True to my word, here comes the Gangtok post.

Gangtok, with its population of 50000, has a cosmopolitan flavor attached to it, with a combination of old-age charm, hospitality and Cyber parlors. I was fascinated with this hilly urbanized hamlet and its inhabitants.

We first headed towards Hanuman Tok and Ganesh Tok. Apparently one gets an amazing view of the Khanchendzonga from the Toks ;-).

As the name suggests, Hanuman Tok has a Hanuman Temple. The place was a humdrum of activity by the Army Junta .The next day happened to be Hanuman Jayanthi and the Governor was expected to visit the place. The zeal and fervor with which they were setting up the place was amazing. They really taught us what commitment and enthusiasm is all about .In addition to decorating the place, there was a small band of people singing bhajans and playing various instruments. I cannot describe in words, the ambience and the aura this place exuded.

Fortunately or unfortunately our gang, with all the Digital SLR’s and cameras, stood out completely, as tourists. So after all the initial introductions like “ We are from Bangalore “ – “Oh U have come ALL the way from Bangalore “ our gracious host threw a bombshell – Apparently one of the local channels was doing a piece on this event and they wanted the touristy Bangaloreans to share their exhilarating experience with the media .

Like always the guinea pig was chosen (No points for guessing) and the apparently media savvy me had to come up with a few lines! Needless to say I was horrified at the thought of doing anything remotely close to this!

So I scampered around the place pretending to take pictures etc etc. Somehow this was not to be my day. JK and I were asked to enact a dramatic ringing-the-bell entry into the temple! It was hilarious, to say the least, but thankfully the whole episode didn’t last for more than a few seconds! In the meantime the whole tourist interview was over and done with by the rest of the gangJ. We had some nice Kadak Masala chai and scooted from the place.

We went to a few other viewpoints but there were no signs of the mountains anywhere around the place and continuing to curse our luck we headed back to the city centre.

I have always wondered, why every city, not only has an MG Road, but it also happens to be the most happening part of the city. Gangtok is no different. But the MG Road in Gangtok is open only to pedestrians in the evenings and no vehicles are allowed. It felt weird and also blissful to walk in the middle of MG Road in the evening with no fear of being run over.

You would also find kids playing football on MG Road in the evenings! This was a sight worth watching especially to someone who is all too familiar with the likes of MG Road in Bangalore ;-).

Eventually we got around to discussing the itinerary. There was some trepidation regarding the itinerary because Nathu-La which was supposedly a must-see was not a part of the itinerary. After some local socializing we realized that a serious discussion with Mr. Mukhiya and itinerary-revisit was imminent.

We finally wound up on the third day with a nice walk back from MG Road to our habitat in Gangtok. There was some illusion of a glimpse of the peaks.

But it was too dark and we were too tired to decide if we were just hallucinating, or the peaks finally decided to bestow upon us the views we were longing for from the time we stepped into this land !( I know its too long a sentence ;-)).

This was just an appetizer of Gangtok. The main highlights of Gangtok will come in the next post

Ruins , Confusion and Gangtok Glimpses - Day 2 -Sikkim

By virtue of its location, mornings dawn early in Sikkim. After all the ravings and rantings about A.Tiptur, the previous night (We are indebted to JK for throwing so much light about such a worthy soul), the morning started on a lazy note. Finally we started off towards Rabdenste Ruins (For some reason the apparently phonetic me is still not sure how this is pronouncedL). Rabdenste was the second capital of Sikkim shifted from Yuksom. Presently the Rabdentse Palace in West Sikkim is in ruins.

The entry to the ruins is calm, enchanting place where it seems criminal to exercise your vocal chords and disturb the tranquility.

A walk of about 0.5- 1 Km leads us to the ruins.

There are many motivating boards enroute, which ensure that the lazy software guys don’t head back without getting a peek of the Ruins.

(The climb could be a wee bit strenuous for someone who is used to staring at the monitor 8-10 hours a day).

The ruins are on a small hillock and are primarily blocks of walls and a chorten. On a clear day (which we were not blessed with) one could get a very nice view of the Pemayangste Monastery! The ace photographers were exhibiting all the acrobatic skills they possessed by climbing up and down several of the walls :-P.

Our videographer a.k.a Kiran recorded some rather scandalous conversations and is shameless enough to use those as blackmail tools :-(( .

Our itinerary said we would be heading towards Temi Tea Garden and Ravangla! None of us had any clue about either of the places except that a couple of us had read these names in the itinerary. The mallu junta was not very enthused about the Tea Garden coz no Tea Gardens can compare to Munnar. Durga with his ESP sensed this, and decided to head straight to Gangtok. Unfortunately his ESP did not make sense to us and we had to sort out the confusion with our Mr. Mukhiya. And before we realized, we reached Gangtok by 4 in the evening.

An interesting piece of information – Every vehicle in Sikkim is generally registered in specific districts and the permits allow them to operate only these specific district(s). So , to my misery, we had to bid farewell to our dear Durga since he was the West Sikkim hero. After a tearful farewell we headed towards our hotel in Gangtok. The journey was full of mystery and we were curious to know our destination. We went through the winding roads, savoring this small hill capital and eventually reached a narrow dingy road. I was hoping against hope, this was not going be our destination! But Murphy being my close buddy, our hotel happened to be on this narrow piece of winding land called a street. The hotel was disappointing to say the least and we realized that we are possibly being taken on a ride by our dear Mr. Mukhiya and the ride had just begun!

But the hotel happened to be nice cozy place and it seemed like a cottage entirely for our group. DCM and I got the best room (I prefer to think so) with a heavenly view. But we were not yet blessed with the view of the mountains :-(.

Travails of Gangtok will follow soon! The good news is that I have decided to update my blog especially the Sikkim travelogue regularly and the bad news is that I am yet to implement them.

Keep visiting http://rashthedash.blogspot.com for quick(hopefully) updates ;-).

Placid Pelling – West Sikkim – Day One

Placid Pelling(West Sikkim)

At an altitude of 7200 Ft, Pelling was where our odyssey of Sikkim began. The hamlet was immensely popular for its view of the Khanchendzonga range of mountains. The pictures and travelogues promised us a breathtaking view of the mighty mountains at very close quarters.

After a tiring day of travel, we were looking forward to the glimpse of the mountains, next morning from the balcony! But the weather gods decided to play games with us.

All that we saw next morning was White Vacuum in all directions. The guessing game started and all of us started guessing which direction the mountains would be visible.

The morning was a disappointment for me (coz I was really looking forward to viewing the gigantic mountain).

Apparently Pelling is as close as u can get to the Khanchendzonga without leaving the material comforts of good accommodation.

Driving on narrow hanging bridges, through small gurgling streams, we got the first taste of Sikkim’s enchanting beauty. Our first stop was at the Rock Garden which is a small garden by the side of a very picturesque stream .The photographers got into action. Some of the poses/antics exhibited by JK, Sid were worth an audience. It was more like they were trying to ape different species of reptiles/insects!

We then headed towards Khanchendzonga Waterfalls and then towards this lake called Khecheopalri(Kanji Pinji lake in Kiran’s words) .This is supposedly a sacred lake and myths have it that the birds do not permit even a single leaf to float on the lake surface.

The lake is really calm and the surroundings are an epitome of calm and serenity! I had started having my mood swing (not so much a frequent visitor lately) by then and Chinki hibernation set in for a while! In the meantime, Sid’s latest obsession had set in – “SimplyMarry.Com”. For some reason the whole bunch of people (Sid, JK, and Kiran etc etc) started taking snaps of me with the purpose of publishing it in on SimplyMarry.com. They were trying to achieve the impossible – Help me get hooked on ;-)))!

We had a nice lunch back in Pelling after driving through a stream – Am not kidding when I say that Durga (our hunky driver) drove the Max through the stream. No points for guessing that this is a very convenient way of cleaning vehicles in Pelling ;-)

Post-Lunch we drove through the hills to this awfully long bridge called Singshore Bridge.This hanging bridge looks very nice from the road and the photography bonanza began! The theme of photography this time was – “Pictures through Holes”.Dont ask me what that was! The name says it all!

The last stop for the day was Pemayangtse Monastery, supposedly one of the oldest and most important monasteries in Sikkim .Its located on a small hillock and completely surrounded by Prayer Flags which look heavenly when fluttering in the breeze.Inspite of restrictions on photography , we could find tourists violating the law and taking pictures. I wonder when we ll learn to respect and obey rules atleast in a religious abode like monasteries and temples.

We also encountered a traffic hazard where our Max and a Truck (oposite direction) had a separation of few centimetres . The guys pushed the Max away from the Truck and got it going. One had to witness this scene to believe what was being done to move the vehicles :-) !

We had some nice momos in a small bar in the evening and savored the early sunset in Eastern India. The last thing in the day before sleeping was an extremely profound discussion on the architecture of buildings in Pelling. It took me a while to figure out that the discussion was about our very own Pelling abode. I have no qualms in admitting that the topic and the discussion was too profound for my liking. The Gyaani (He prefers to consider himself that - JK) had to intervene and put a logical end to the thesis and like he always does, he confused everyone so much, that people decided they had enough of architecture!

Thus ended Day One – A nice breath of Sikkim, Some Momos and some Architectural Discussions which was apparently Common Sense J but no KhanchendzongaL.

Some useful links for Pelling

http://www.sikkiminfo.net/pelling.htm

http://www.east-himalaya.com/sikkim/pelling.htm