The Start of the Odyssey – Sikkim

The planning started in December and we spent sleepless nights booking tickets, accommodation etc etc. And finally the day dawned, when we had to embark on our much awaited Sikkim Trip. Our Air Deccan flight was at 5:45 in the morning. Lemme introduce my co-travellers. There z Dhanya popularly known as DCM , a veteran traveler, the ever organized , process-oriented Sid ,veteran No.2 , Kiran, one of the Managers of D, JK aka Entertainment Unlimited ,Sandhya the other manager of D and Sandhya’s better half, Manoj.

The Herculean task ahead of us was to get to the airport by 4 atleast, with all our luggage (packed).Given Air Deccan ‘s reputation for overbooking , PARANOA was the word of the day !After all the initial hustle bustle we boarded the flight to Kolkatta !The flight was on time and uneventful except for the Coffee Making Process . We land in the hot and humid Kolkatta and start the hunt for restaurants! Found a horrendously expensive snack joint but had to make do with this place! The loooooooooooong wait for the Baghdogra flight seemed endless! Finally it was 2 PM and time to board the flight! Again the flight was normal and boring .Air Deccan earned more brownie points for no schedule variance.

We finally got to meet Mr. Mukhiya our tour guide/travel agent! The Mahindra Max seemed very comfortable and spacious and the driver – Durga was ahem ahem ;-)!
We drove to Pelling –our first destination in Sikkim .It was quite a long drive but the journey got scenic by the minute!

Some facts about Sikkim – Sikkim has four districts –West Sikkim, East Sikkim, South Sikkim and North Sikkim- Elementary wasn’t it ;-)?Pelling happens to be in West Sikkim .The highlight of Pelling being its vicinity to Mount Kanchenjunga – BTW The peak is spelt as KhanChenDzonga.Apparently the mountain peaks are very clearly visible from ay part of Pelling.

We finally reached our hotel and retired for the night after 2 flights and a road journey. Incidentally the Hindi spoken in this part of Sikkim is influenced by Bengali .So it takes a while (especially for people from South) to understand what the people speak.
Lots more on the Odysseys of Sikkim will follow