Monday 7th March - A day in Siliguri

An idle day to day with a lie in. Until the chai wallah comes to knock on our door at 7.30. Today is our 31st wedding anniversary and we have decided to celebrate by having a boneshaker free day. About half of the group are taking the day trip to Kalimpong, 3 hours drive back up into the mountains but we have a late breakfast, catch up on the blog e-mail etc, then take a tuk-tuk into town. We don't have a map of Siliguri, nor do we know the names of any of the key features apart from the railway station so we head there and start to walk. We found ourselves in a quiet, shady part of town lacking only a significant retail experience. Eventually we turned into a street complete with a local market - lots of colour but not really what we were looking for. As we follow the road we realise that we have come in a big circle back to the station. At this point an optimist with a cycle rickshaw hailed us and offered a ride to the shops for 30 rupees. He certainly earned his money - at one point he roped in two small boys to push. We gave him a decent tip. The shops had everything that you could want as long as it was used tyres or water pumping equipment. Eventually we found a general market down a side street and succesfully purchased the extra bag that R considers needed for all of the swag that she intends to purchase. So much for travelling light.
By this time we were ready for a drink so we t-t'd back to the air-conditioned splendour of the Cindrella for a beer, a dosa and a siesta. Our next official duty was the 11th Annual DHR Lovers Conference, definitely a must for the hard core enthusiast. Most people just went for the free beer, a master-stroke on the part of the organisers.Afterwards D had an interesting chat with a retired Indian Railways general manager about the possibility of loaning a B Class to Glasgow for the Commonwealth Games. Festivities concluded with a few more beers on the terrace and the screening of a couple of classic Bollyrail numbers.