We're quickly approaching the end of another school year, and the time shows no hints of slowing down. While Melanie, Sheree and the girls were in Bangkok (see below), their husbands were given the green light to travel to NE India. After some research, we discovered that it was possible to spend part of a day in Bhutan without a visa (or the required $200 per day per person for securing a visa!)

We left on Friday evening and arrived in Calcutta at around 2am. We spent the rest of the morning at a hotel and then took a one-hour flight straight north to Bagdogra. This is the airport and air force base at the base of the Himalayas in the NE part of the country. We then had a 4-hour minivan taxi ride to Darjeeling, arriving at a great Tibetan run hotel. We arranged to get up for sunrise the next morning and were rewarded for the short night of sleep - the sky was clear and our view of the mountains was beautiful (we even caught a glimpse of Everest)!

(part of our view that morning)

(trying to smile at 5am)

Our next day and a half were spent wandering through the streets of Darjeeling. It's at about 7,500 feet, so the days were very pleasant and the mornings/evenings were quite chilly.

(This was how most loads were carried on the steep streets)

From Darjeeling we took a 3-hour jeep ride to Kalimpong, a smaller town directly east of Darjeeling. Our ride took us down through a cloud, a forest of ferns, many tea plantations, a forest of enormous evergreen trees, a deciduous forest with leaves turning color and falling, and then along a quick moving river, before climbing the mountain on the other side.

From there we negotiated a jeep driver to take us to and from Bhutan the next day. After agreeing to the price, he asked his Bhutanese friend to drive us, as he had never been there, so we even got a guide to take us to a monestary a way out of town! We traveled through the plains in India and hit the border of Bhutan about 100 yards before hiting the mountains...

(our view from the monestary over the plains of India)

The next few hours were spent wandering around the town on the Bhutanese side of the border. Although we didn't get too far into the country, it was great to take a peek...

(2 boys in traditional Bhutanese outfits - all Bhutanese citizens must wear them)

Our last 3 days were spent in Kalimpong and then in Gangtok, Sikkim. Sikkim was its own kingdom for a long time and it still requires foreigners to have a permit to enter. However, it was a great place that is really catering to trekkers... our treks were limited to paved streets, but maybe some other time....

Instead of a 5+ hour drive back to the airport, we were able to secure seats on the Indian government subsidised helicopter! Not a bad way to finish up!

(spices in the market in Kalimpong)

(2 boys at 2 different monasteries)

(a view of the terraced mountains from the helicopter)