Like every North Indian wedding the Baraat and other functions are extremely delayed. The wedding card says the Baraat is scheduled for 7pm. We reach the venue at 8:30 pm and the Baraat happens at 9:45pm. That’s almost like a 3h delay. But nobody cares. It’s like an open secret. An unsaid rule.  The food … Continue reading Sikkim – May be not again

It’s 6 am. A bright and sunny day. We’ve booked a helicopter from Gangtok to Bagdogra. But we’re unsure if it will take off or not—it heavily depends on the weather. Sikkim weather is highly unpredictable, and helicopter cancellations are quite common. Heliport Sikkim We reach the Heliport (yes, like an airport) at 8:30 am. … Continue reading The Helicopter Ride

After 11 hours of travel the previous day and a ton of memories and photographs, I wake up. The time is around 8am. Through my window I can see the snow capped peaks. The sky is clear and the peaks are glistening in the early morning sun. Everyone wakes up one by one. Today’s plan … Continue reading Gangtok + Zumzin = Bliss

Sweet We decide to leave early for zero point. The hotel staff tell us that the checkpoint will only open at 630. We decide to leave at 530 from the hotel. Rather than waiting in a traffic jam behind 100 vehicles, we would prefer waiting for the checkpoint to open as the first vehicle. Sun … Continue reading Sweetbitter

We have traveled for over 30hrs in the last 48 hours.   That too on bad roads and in bad vehicles. We decide to minimise the travel today.  Lachen The original plan is to leave for Gurudongmar Lake at 5 am. But we choose sleep instead. We wake up at 9:30 am and head for … Continue reading Enough of travel

After a 10 hour tight cab ride yesterday, we got some good sleep and go ready to leave to Lachen. The plan was to halt at Lachen for the night and proceed to Gurudonmer lake.  We got permits to go to North Sikkim. We left Gangtok at 12pm. The ride was supposed to be 6-7 … Continue reading Yesterday Was Just the Starter; Here’s the Main Course

We landed in Bagdogra at 1140AM. Next stop was Gangtok. We saw a Helicopter service to Gangtok. There was a bleak chance that we might be able to get a seat on the 2:00 pm shuttle. The helicopter we never boarded The guy at the counter said, Sir, you have to wait for 2 hours. … Continue reading Tight seats, Traffic, Trauma

Of course - Generated by ChatGPT. A friend’s wedding in Siliguri became a convenient reason for a bunch of us to visit Sikkim. Basically, we turned a wedding into a short holiday. Last night, I slept at 2 am and woke up at 3. Honestly, that one hour hardly counts as sleep—it felt more like … Continue reading Sleep deprived thoughts