India: first impressions

Long story: I was supposed to stay at the New Opera Hotel (which I'd paid for on Booking.com: $18) but the taxi driver insisted I go to one closer to the airport. Which cost $118 (this is it) We flew in at midnight--and this was after 1:00AM--I didn't argue. I did get a few hour's sleep and after a rather strange breakfast (white bread sandwiches and Chai without sugar thank God) his company taxi picked me up (7 minutes late) at almost 6:00am. Our fligbt was at 8:00am--and I met the 19 others on the trip (Hurray) just fine at the gate...

It would have been cutting it at Denver's DIA--but baggage check and the slick operations at Delbi airport were impressive. Airports across Eurasia dazzle: Copenhagen, Frankfurt, Munich, Istanbul, Tashkent and at least five airports I've flown into and out of in China ALL make just about every airport in the USA (especially DIA) look dismally dingy, inefficient and ugly. So-called American "efficiency" and know how are apparently a thing of the past. And oh, yes! The Indian Government didn't cut the landscape budget like they did at DIA. Billions for engineering boondoggles, but not one red cent for plants. Something is dreadfully wrong in our country!

One of at LEAST a dozen nurseries we drove past at breakneck speed between Bangdogra (beautiful airport too--at Bandogra (elevation 160 meters) en route to tonight's destination, Kalimpong (elevation 1247m.)

Pine View Nursery

OK, I confess: I "borrowed" this off the internet: the second image that pops up if you click this. Kalimpong is where I'm typing this right now...succulents are obviously popular in the foothills of the Himalayas!

But the pictures and videos that follow convey (fitfully, I suspect, and frustratingly) a few of the glimpses we had on the 3 or so hour drive from Bangdogra to Kalimpong. Trailing cities and shantytowns and glistening new buildings alternating with towering forests of incredible tree diversity, ferns galore and  Nature Reserves with signs warning of  "elephant crossing" and wild Safari parks encircled by fences with concertina wire...

It takes some patience, but it works for me if you click the video clip you can see the random craziness that seems to be India. A LOT of people, traffic, vehicles and squalor next to splendor.

The shops are overwhelmingly small, and clustered by genre. I should have taken ever so many more--bere we are in the carved bed headpost district.

The lottery is a big thing in India as it is everywhere: the tax on people bad at math.

Bamboo scaffolding everywhere, and oh yes! Forests of giant bamboo I didn't photograph. My bad!

Another crazy video: I swear, if I had my own car (which would be suicidal) and stopped where I wanted, and had time and a tripod, I could have taken thousands of National Geographic style images of what we zipped past. Things that will haunt me (prayer groups in bright colors; nearly naked yogis, women dressed in gorgeous sarongs.

I was on the wrong side of the jeep to photograph the sculpture district that had an amazing array of kitchy statues!

After Uzbekistan, where signage is in Cyrillic alphabet (Russian and also transliterated Uzbek) and even more signs are in Latin alphabet--Uzbek and of course English is quite prevalent. Almost every sign in India IS in English (with a few Sanskrit letters here and there)....

I tried to photograph the building on the left bedecked with myriad pots, but got the corner one instead.

Stupas here and there-- hard to photgraph in a bouncing jeep!

Here we are in the domestic, wooden stupa district...

I was trying to photograph a large, formal park with a mystery symmetrical tree when...

Our first monkey shows up! There were a lot more later!

I can't believe I never got pictures of the majestic forests--must do so in the coming day(s),,,,,,

Incredible ferns and orchids and chasmophytes smothering the rocks--and us zipping along no way to stop. Oh well!

A typical structure along the way--right next to the busy road!

This was taken in a garden--but I saw what I assume is Clerodendron splendens all over the woodlands with astonishing butterflies crowding them. Apparently this is native to West Africa. What gives?

The sign at the restaurant where we stopped for lunch. White bread sandwiches with egg salad, chicken ets.

Guessing this is a gesneriad in the restaurant: but then I saw some on a cliff nearby....

There's a white bracted mystery plant next to the Clerodendron we never figured out what that was either.

Epiphytic ferns. Couldn't whip out the camera to shoot a telephone pole clustered with elk horn ferns...

More ferns...

'The elevation of happiness'

A bright shrub I couldn't get close to...

More statues: we're in Kalimpong now...

My fellow travelers getting out to change money--and a balcony with flowers.

I didn't photograph the wonderful garden at Silver Oaks, but here is my room--I'm sitting on that small couch typing right now for you...

And a very nice bathroom: gotta show everything!

 I couldn't end my first blog post about this adventure with a toilet: instead--here is the dining room where we sat down and has a fabulous buffet of Indian Food. And--oh yes, Chao Mein!