Darjeerling is absolutely beautiful its 2134m up in the mountains the town is a maze of winding streets that go up and then down I tell u get a work out here particularly since my hotel is about 10mins out of town all the way up... so after an overnight train ride from Kolkata and a 3hr taxi ride i was in clean fresh air. The people here are great there's no pushing or pressuring, u can really see the strong Tibetan and Nepali influence here.

So yesterday I had a walk about the Chowrasta, which is the local sq with a statue of Bhanu Bahakta, and then up to observation hill, which is sacred to both Buddhist and Hindu's as it is the site of the Dorje Ling monastery, which Darjeerling is named after.

Today I got up at 3am for 4am jeep ride to tiger hill to see the sun rise with views of Khangchendzonga (world 3rd highest), Everest and other parts of the Himalayan's. With was spectacular for about 10mins and the cloud cover came over. On the way back we visit the war memorial, the diesel toy train and some other monasteries all which are total beautiful inside.

After breaky headed to the zoo where I saw finally a YAK (this is a joke between the intrepid tour people were we ate alot of yak cheese which is quite bitter tasting but never saw a single yak). Red panda, snow leopard, Siberian tiger, basically its a zoo featuring Himalayan animals...then to the Himalayan mountaineering institute where the Everest museum and the burial site of Tensing the Sherpa who accompanied Sir Edmund Hillary when he conquered Everest in 1953.

Was thinking of heading up the Sikkim but unfortunately today is a holiday day national non-violence day so all gov't offices are close and no drinking is allowed so I cant get my permit so after strolling the botanical gardens im going to see if I can get to Kalimpong for 2 days before heading back to Kolkata to meet robin...

Hope all is well with evrey1 oh and my Indian phone num has been temporally out of service for 4 days now and will be until????? So the oz number is working

Niki