Darjeeling and Kalimpong are two hill towns in the Eastern Himalaya, each shaped by trade, empire and migration. Though close in distance, they offer contrasting experiences: Darjeeling is louder and larger; Kalimpong quieter, more withdrawn.

Darjeeling developed in the mid-19th century as a British sanatorium and administrative centre. The legacy of that period still defines much of the town – in its tea estates, schools, churches, and the narrow-gauge railway that climbs from the plains. The surrounding slopes produce some of the most sought-after teas in the world, grown at high altitude and exported globally.

Kalimpong lies to the east, above the Teesta River. It was once a key stop on the trade route between India and Tibet and has long attracted missionaries, monks, and teachers. The town is less vertical than Darjeeling, its pace slower. Monasteries sit on quiet ridges; orchids and cacti grow in family-run nurseries.

Both towns are home to Nepali-speaking communities, as well as Tibetan, Lepcha, Bengali and other groups. The result is a region that is linguistically and culturally diverse, shaped by movement across borders.

Darjeeling: Empire of Tea

North of Kolkata the road climbs out of Bengal. A road that for generations the British ascended each summer: caravans of bullock carts and elephants and ayahs and children, all on their way to Darjeeling.

Darjeeling: swindled from Sikkim and used to seed the stolen leaf of China. Here came Englishmen who had failed to make it as sailors or soldiers. Scoundrels and scallywags enlisted to become lord and master of a little fiefdom called a tea garden in the hills.

A reflection of Empire remains. At Glenburn Tea Estate guests are presented with a picnic hamper of chicken-and-mint sandwiches, apple cake and a teacup to unwrap at scenic viewpoints. Keventer’s still sells cheese-toast sandwiches, and throughout the town boys from St Paul’s saunter in V-neck sweater-vests and crested blazers.

But Darjeeling is more than the nostalgia of snuggeries, wisteria and steam-train memorabilia. Not British, and not quite Indian. Travellers will be reminded of Darjeeling’s independent streak by the beat of the drum from a Free Gorkaland demonstration; by the socks of Tenzing Norgay, spread-eagled with pride at the Himalayan Mountain Institute; by the view in the distance, beyond the violet orchids and pale ginger lilies, of the mighty Kanchenjunga, on the doorstep to the Himalayas …

Kalimpong: Nest of Spies

Kalimpong is Darjeeling’s quieter, smaller and – today, in many ways – much more charming sister. Kalimpong was once at the end of a major caravan route from Tibet and, before China’s annexation, was filled with Tibetan traders, Indian merchants and thousands of yaks and mules that transported goods back and forth.  

After the British left India, what had been a fault line between the British Empire and Tsarist Russia during The Great Game, became a point of tension in the Cold War, heightened when the Chinese entered Tibet, and reaching a peak during the Indo-Sino War of 1962 and India’s annexation of Sikkim in 1975.

Indian Prime Minister Nehru was to describe Kalimpong as a “nest of spies.” Amongst those suspected of being spies were Prince Peter of Greece and Denmark and his Russian wife Princess Irene. Prince Peter was an anthropologist with a deep interest in polyandry and was a cousin of the late Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Philip. Amongst Prince Peter and Princess Irene, in the mid-1950s Kalimpong attracted an array of extraordinary characters. Adrian Conan Doyle, son of the Sherlock Holmes novelist, was one, seeking a “spiritual reunion” with his late father. There were Afghan princesses, relatives of the deposed King of Burma, and the Russian painter Dr. Nicholas Roerich, who lived with his beautiful mystic wife Helena in a hilltop abode they called Crookety House.

Kalimpong was also the eventual home of Gyalo Thondup, the older brother of the Dalai Lama, and for decades the foreign minister of the Tibetan government-in-exile. In 2014, from Kalimpong’s Himalayan Hotel, American scholar Anne Thurston worked with Gyalo Thondup to write his memoirs. In the introduction to this fascinating book – titled The Noodle Maker of Kalimpong – Anne writes that in 2014:

“… The foreign spies who once gave the town its unseemly reputation have disappeared, and so have the colorful Tibetan traders with their dangling earrings, long swords, and yaks and mules loaded with salt and wool. Traces of history can be still found at the Himalayan Hotel, once the home of David Macdonald, a leading officer in the Younghusband expedition to Lhasa in 1904, who helped the Thirteenth Dalai Lama escape to India in advance of the Chinese army in 1910, and later served as a British trade official in Tibet for some twenty years.”

Today, the history of Kalimpong can be hard to snuffle out – the Himalayan Hotel has changed hands and is best avoided. It is worth visiting Dr Graham’s Homes, set up as a school for Anglo-Indian children, and Crookety House.

Foodies will have better luck in Kalimpong. The most popular snack is the momo, steamed dumplings made of pork, beef or vegetable cooked in a wrapping of flour and served with watery soup. Wai-Wai is a packaged Nepalese snack made of noodles which are eaten either dry or in soup form. Churpee, a kind of hard cheese made from yak’s or chauri’s (a hybrid of yak and cattle) milk, is sometimes chewed.  A form of noodle called thukpa, served in soup form is also popular in Kalimpong 

For keen botanists, Kalimpong is home to the most diverse varieties of orchid, cactus and ornamental plants.