Today started with an orchid tour around the hotel premises – after which it was back to the cars for a final long drive of about 170km, now heading into the lowlands of West Bengal towards Jaigaon and the border crossing into Bhutan.

As yesterday we were initially following the Teesta River, until we used the Coronation Bridge to cross the river and continue East towards the border. Soon the scenery changed – instead of a mountainous forest we were now driving through more of flat bush land (well, some of those bushes turned out to be tea gardens). We made it to our hotel near Jaigaon in the late afternoon, with little to do around.

On the way from the temple to our hotel we were dropped in downtown Kalimpong for a leisurely walk through the Raja Dorjee Market and “high street”, making the final mile to the hotel by foot and getting in a bit of physical activity after a day of driving.