Prayer Flags in Yoksum |
The people who usually walk slow were determined to be part of this party thus I was dead sure that they would nominate me to be part of this group. Therefore, on 5th November 2014, at early morning 19 students from BMC 304 & 50 - odd students from AMC - 172 left the base camp and marched towards Dzongri.
Me & Piyali |
Rest House at Bakkhim |
Next day, we had a target to reach Yuksom at the earliest so that we could visit this old capital of Sikkim more peacefully. Thus we started off at 6:15 and had to cover last 13 kms in lower Himalayas mostly through Kanchenjunga National Park.
We had been out of network grid for long enough and all of us were eager to share photos & other details with our near & dear ones. But apart from this, Room No. 8 members - Ela, Neha and I were more interested in visiting the Monasteries in Yuksom.
At a suspension bridge |
Somewhere in KNP |
Tent Pitching by Moromee and Debajit |
There was a small homely restaurant behind our camp. All of us haunted the cute ladies for authentic MoMos and some Maggie. Also after a real long time, few of us quenched their thirst for coffee. We pitched tents, did basic cleaning of ourselves and rushed off in the town. Some of us wanted to rush to old monastery thus they took a shared taxi ride.
On our way, we saw few chortens but hunger led us to Gupta Restaurant. Five of us, Nisarg, Ela, Neha Moromee and I, literally drove the lady mad! We ordered almost everything on the menu and ate like buffalos. The lady & the waiters served us with smile...
Nisarg midst of prayer wheels |
Later, we strolled through the town which is more or less of a village. First, we visited the monastery of 12 monks. There are 12 prayer wheels in this monastery and they represent each incarnation of Buddha. We circled the prayer wheels and took photos and moved ahead.
Neha, Nisarg, Ela,Me and Moromee at Karthok Monastery |
the camp before fall in time of 5PM. Also it had already started getting dark by 4:30 PM. So it would have been right choice to head back to the camp.
However, we were only few to return on time and others came like couple of hours later. We chatted with quartermaster sir, who told us about local beer – HIT and the famous person from Yuksom – Danny Denzongpa, a bollywood actor. (He also showed the helipad and the actor's bungalow next morning.)
Meantime, the dinner was ready. We ate & were asleep by 8:30 PM as next day we were to head back to the Institute at Darjeeling.
Karthok Monastery |
Picture Credits: Ashish Chanda, Moromee Das & few of my clicks.
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