Nathula Pass (Day 5)

This is part of a series of posts about our trip to Darjeeling and North Sikkim. You can read about

• How we planned the trip here
• Darjeeling (Day 2)
• Darjeeling (Day 3)
• Gangtok (Day 4)

Day 5 – Nathulla Pass

Nathu La – “La” means, “Pass” in Tibetan language. This pass is at a distance of around 60 km from Gangtok, the capital of Sikkim and is one of the high altitude passes in Himalayas at a whooping 13000+ ft. It is one of the most important passes on Indo-tibetan silk trade routes and a strategic location for Indian Army as well.

Nathu La

Owing to the road’s bad conditions, despite continuous efforts by the Border Roads Organization (BRO), the 60-odd km journey from Gangtok takes more than 2 – 3 hours one way. These roads are known for their notorious landslides and frequent traffic jams. Certain places we felt little adrenaline rushing when the roads were so eroded. We had obtained permission from Indian Army to visit the pass. The travel agency that you book your car with can arrange permits. Visitors from India are allowed to visit the place on Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday. The other days, the traffic is open from the China side.

Roads on the way

Initially, we started seeing green mountains, slopes, small waterfalls on the way and suddenly the mountains started to become bare, rocky and the wind was very cold too. We realized we had climbed a good deal of altitude from Gangtok when we started seeing white patches on far away mountains and on the road. It took a little while for us to realize that we were actually looking at small patches of snow. And then, it was just like Christmas for us. Roads, mountains, army camps, jeeps, anything and everything around us were just covered in white!!  

Our Christmas 😀 😀

Ever ready BRO people on work.

Our jeep reached the parking lot of Nathu La and we climbed a few steps to reach the top of the pass.

There is a military canteen providing hot tea, coffee (the highlight here being hot), which just tastes awesome in such harsh cold conditions. We took customary photos playing with snow, with military soldiers, thanked them for everything they do to protect us, saw a similar establishment by the Chinese military, waved at Chinese soldiers, amazed by learning that there are actually land mines which are under the snow for security reasons. We also got ourselves certified by getting our names written on a certificate, which states that we visited one of the highest passes (at a small cost ofcourse)

Photos from Nathu La totally covered in snow  

Note – One has to be properly acclimatized before visiting Nathula or any high altitude place for that matter. Otherwise, we might feel nauseous, short of breath, giddy or even worse hit by AMS. Please take precautions for AMS since we climb a very high altitude within a short frame of time. AMS hit my mother and we had to take her to an army medical camp. She was provided with oxygen supplies and an injection. The army people took great care of my mother at no cost. The service of these people was so humbling.

A few parting shots 

On the way back from Nathula, we visited Baba Mandir, had some hot tea and soaked in the serene location at which this mandir was located.
Later we stopped at Tsongmo Lake, again another high altitude lake in the Himalayas. The lake is completely frozen during deep winters. The lake itself is a sight to behold to, frozen or not. While we visited, it had started freezing partially. Yaks are available plenty around the lakes and they charge as minimum as 50 rupees to 150 rupees to take photos by sitting on it or going on a leisure Yak ride around the lake.
A small lake on the way

Tsogmo Lake

 

We also visited the Kyongnolsa Waterfall while returning to Gangtok. This waterfall is right on the road and a nice place to refresh and take a break from the long journey. Traffic jams are frequent on this route and here is a photo of a jam when we were returning. 

The best leg of our journey comes later when we visit Gurudongmor Lake and Yumthang Valley (even more snow here). More details on it in my next post here… 

 

Day 4 – Gangtok

This is a series of posts covering my trip to Darjeeling and North Sikkim. You can read about my

• Overall trip plan here
• Darjeeling Day 2 here
• Darjeeling – Gangtok (Day 3) here

Day 4 –

Today, we woke up in the guesthouse at Gangtok to a wonderful view of Gangtok city from our balcony. One can just sit in the sofa of the balcony and read a book or sip a cup of tea.

View from our balcony 🙂

Our budget constraint didn’t allow us the luxury of sitting idle for a long time. So, it was time to begin our day trip around Gangtok. We covered the below places

• Enchey Monastery
• Ganesh Tok
• Sikkim Himalayan National Park
• Tashi viewpoint
• Bakthang Falls
• Rumtek Monastery

Below Google maps will give an overall view of the places and location

First stop was at the Enchey monastery. It was the first time we ever saw a monastery and it was quite captivating. The bells that people rotate while walking to and from the monastery, the prayer bells, prayer flags and chanting of the monks – it was very different to us. This is relatively small in size when compared to Rumtek. Still, I would suggest visiting it.

Ganesh Tok – further up the hill is this temple dedicated to Lord Ganesha. More than diety itself (forgive me), I found the views from this temple amazing and worth definitely a visit. If there are no mists, we can get a bird’s eye view of major part of the city.

Ganesh Tok

View from Ganesh Tok

Sikkim Himalayan Zoological Park – We stumbled upon this place while leaving Ganesh tok. We saw a signboard for the park and we got curious since it didn’t look like a zoo or national park. It was like a forest. This is the second best place among the places we see today.

This is basically a zoo. But animals are kept in natural environments. No cages, just deep trenches are created and animals are kept there. It requires long walks and climbs in a few places to see certain animals. We saw red panda, Tibetan wolf, Himalayan black bear, leopards, civets, yak and deer.

Tibetan Wolf

Red Panda

The atmosphere was so cool, the previous day’s rain had wet the entire floor, trees were lush green and the air was so crisp, clean and pristine. We spent close to two hours at this place walking inside the national park. I would definitely recommend it. (Maybe in summers, this might become a little hot to walk)

Note – Closed on Thursdays. Visiting hours – 9 am to 4 pm. Entry fee 25 INR (adult), 10 INR (child). Camera is free.

Misty walk in the forest 😛

Tashi viewpoint – is a few km after the zoological park. It gives marvelous views of the city, provided the sky is clear and there is no mist. On a clear day, Kanchenjunga is said to be visible from here. There is a souvenir shop and a canteen.

Bakthang Waterfalls – on the way to viewpoint, this waterfall is on the road. As I mentioned before, there are many such waterfalls throughout Sikkim from the mountains trickling and eroding the roads. It is a welcome break from the car journey and not more than that.

Rumtek Monastery – The highlight of today’s trip is this monastery and we proceeded towards Rumtek around 2 pm. It takes a while to reach there. Around 1 – 1.5 hours and takes us through the hills. As we got higher and higher, the views got prettier and prettier.

Views enroute Rumtek ❤ 

Rumtek is a very beautiful monastery set on a wide expanse of space. A few photos from the outer and inner side of the monastery.

Rumtek – Outer

Rumtek – Inner

The views from the monastery are “killer views”. There is also a stupa in the center of monastery were people throw coin.

View from the monastery

The stupa

Young monks were reading, older monks were chanting, the whole atmosphere was electric with good vibrations. The paintings on the walls of this monastery are very beautiful. But the interiors are too dark and without flash in camera, practically nothing can be captured in a camera

We had a light snack at the monastery’s canteen and proceeded towards Gangtok. As usual, we had our dinner from Agarwals in M.G. Road (I terribly regret this now for not having tried the local food). We had a big day ahead – Nathula Pass. The indo-chinese border at an altitude of 13000+ feet along with a possibility of seeing snow. 😀 😀 (Yeah, we had never seen snow before in our life). Inspite of the excitement for the next day, we slept peacefully with lots of expectations for the days that come.

You can read the story of our Day 5 trip here.

Darjeeling & North Sikkim Trip

This is a long overdue travelogue. Inspired by reading a textbook lesson on Darjeeling in Class X, I decided to plan a trip, two years after working for an IT firm (yeah, the trip was also long overdue). My initial Google searches took me to this wonderful website indiamike.com where like-minded travellers were helping each other plan trips. I read every thread on Darjeeling. The more I read, the more I was inclined to visit North Sikkim and Ladakh (which I did in 2012) than Darjeeling. So, the trip shifted to focus on North Sikkim with 2 days in Darjeeling. Let me begin my travelogue. Please do share your thoughts 🙂

Living in Chennai, which almost roasts me daily with its hot sun, I decided to travel during winter to see snow J and hence the trip was planned during November 2010 –

Day 1 – Chennai to Calcutta (By flight) – Howrah junction to New Jalpaiguri (NJP) junction by train

Day 2 – NJP to Darjeeling – Darjeeling Sight seeing

Day 3 – Darjeeling – Local sight seeing. Leave to Gangtok.

Day 4 – Gangtok – Local sight seeing

Day 5 – Gangtok – Nathulla Pass – Tsongmo Lake – Gangtok

Day 6 – Gangtok – Lachen

Day 7 – Lachen – Gurudongmor Lake – Lachung

Day 8 – Lachung – Zero point – Yumthang – Lachung – Gangtok

Day 9 – Gangtok – NJP junction – Howrah

Day 10 – Calcutta – Local sight seeing

Day 11 – Calcutta – Chennai (By flight)

 Day 1 –

First day of the journey was uneventful, except for these – it was our first flight travel, my first time to Calcutta, seeing trams there, boarding the train (which itself was a huge feat considering there was some pretty tense war of words by few people inside who locked the compartment to do so :X). A few photos clicked on the way till New Jalpaiguri railway station (NJP)

View from our plane

 

Trams in Calcutta

 

Note – Booking a flight to Kolkatta might be cheaper than Bagdogara airport. Numerous taxis are available from NJP/Siliguri towards Darjeeling. AC buses are available from Kolkatta airport to Howrah junction from where we can board overnight train to NJP (40 INR per person)

 Day 2 –

The train was on time (!!) and morning weather was pleasant enough at NJP junction. We refreshed ourselves and started to look for a taxi when all drama began to unwind. We were initially offered a taxi for certain amount and were asked to wait in a hotel while they bring a taxi. Even after an hour there was no sign of taxi. When we enquired, all we got was some indirect answers. Suddenly they said no taxis would run from NJP since a taxi driver was killed (not sure if this was true, but the taxi union there is pretty strong). So we took a shared auto to Siliguri (150 INR for entire auto). From Siliguri we hired a jeep to Darjeeling (1000 INR) – and there started our wonderful journey where I fell deeply in love with The Himalayas.

We had a simple breakfast at a roadside home-cum-inn in Kurseong (4864 ft). It roughly takes around 3 hours to reach Darjeeling (6710 ft) depending on number of breaks you take in-between. I have given a map of the route below (not drawn to scale)

Read the rest of the story here. (Day 2 continued)