A street vendor in a grey jumper tossing noodles on a hot griddle at his stall in Darjeeling, a steamer pot beside him

Food journey · 6 nights

Kitchens of the Hills

Raj bakeries and a tea merchant in Darjeeling, cheese and glass noodles in Kalimpong, a Sikkimese stove.

  • 6nights, private
  • 3bases
  • 2,258 mhighest point
  • ₹1,25,000from, per person, twin share
Price this journey for my dates See the 7 days

In short

Is Kitchens of the Hills right for you?

Kitchens of the Hills is a private six-night food journey for people who travel to eat. From Bagdogra airport (IXB) it spends two nights in Darjeeling, two in Kalimpong and two in Gangtok, eating in each town with a guide or cook from there.

Made forcouples who plan trips around meals, home cooks and serious tea drinkers, families with curious children over 8 and returning visitors who have done the sights.

Not for you ifNot for anyone who wants dawn viewpoints and high lakes at the centre of the trip; for Kanchenjunga at every turn, choose Kanchenjunga at First Light.

Most visitors come to these hills for a mountain and leave having eaten the same plate of momos five times. The kitchens deserve better, and each town cooks differently. Darjeeling still breakfasts like the Raj hill station it was, and drinks its tea by the flush. Kalimpong keeps the tastes of the old Tibet trade: phing, the mung-bean glass noodle, the jelly called phumbi, churpi hard and soft, and a cheese first made here by Father Andre Butty, one of the Swiss canons of St Maurice who ran the Catholic mission. Gangtok eats Sikkimese: rice, dal, a curry, fermented greens and an achar of dalle, the round chilli, hot enough to stop conversation.

You eat with the people who know each kitchen: a guide who shops in Chowk Bazaar, a guide who grew up in Kalimpong, and a home cook in Gangtok who hands you the spoon. Our chef writes to every kitchen before you land, so what you cannot eat never reaches the table, and the drives stay short enough that lunch is never a sandwich in the car. You leave knowing gundruk from sinki, with a bag that smells of tea.

Designed in the Darjeeling hills by the Darjeeling Trips team · Updated September 2026

Length
6 nights, 7 days
Starts and ends
Bagdogra airport to Bagdogra airport
Best months
October to December, March to May
Avoid
mid June to mid September (monsoon)
Pace
Gentle
Longest drive
About 4.5 hours, 359 km in all
Highest point
Ghum, 2,258 m
Group
Private, 2 to 6 guests

The route

Why Darjeeling comes first

Darjeeling comes first because its bakeries and tea rooms make the gentlest start, and it is the shortest climb from Bagdogra. Kalimpong is 55 km away across the Teesta, a morning's drive, and two nights there let one morning fall on a Haat Bazaar day. Gangtok comes last because the Sikkimese kitchen is the boldest of the three, and because foreign guests then reach the Sikkim border on day five with their online permit long approved. From Gangtok the road runs straight down the Teesta to the airport.

Sikkim Kanchenjunga 8,586 mJomolhari 7,326 m Bagdogra airport 1 Darjeeling · 2 nights 2 Kalimpong · 2 nights 3 Gangtok · 2 nights
your bases, in orderby roadborders not drawn

Where the nights go

Read the place guidesDarjeelingKalimpongGangtok & East Sikkim

The shape of the journey

From 126 m to 2,258 m, day by day

You sleep between 1,250 m and 2,130 m. The highest you go is 2,258 m, on day 1 at Ghum, and you come down again to sleep.

Built around

Darjeeling, Kalimpong and Gangtok at their best

  • Breakfast of ham, bacon and sausages at Keventer's, where Darjeeling has eaten since 1911

  • Three flushes in white cups with a tea merchant on Laden La Road, trading since 1931

  • Lopchu's own tea poured from a flask above the garden it grew in, on the road down to the Teesta

  • Kalimpong's Wednesday Haat Bazaar at 07:30, shopped for the kitchen: phing, kinema, the season's new gundruk

  • Lal Bazaar with a Sikkimese home cook, then lunch cooked with you at the cook's own stove

  • Tongba at the Nor-Khill's Dragon Bar: warm millet beer drawn through a bamboo straw

Day by day

Day by day, Darjeeling to Gangtok

The longest drive is day 7, Gangtok to Bagdogra airport, about 4.5 hours with stops.

  1. Day 1 · Bagdogra airport Darjeeling

    Up the hill, with a pot of tea at Kurseong

    • 70 km, about 3 h
    • High point 2,258 m
    • Sleep at 2,130 m
    • Easy
    A red roofed building perched above a bend of the hill road on the drive up to Darjeeling, the plains lost in haze below

    Your driver is at the arrivals exit, and the road starts climbing almost at once. At about 14:00, near Kurseong at 1,483 m, the car pulls in at Margaret's Deck, a tea lounge built like a ship's deck above the Margaret's Hope garden, 900 m from Kurseong station; we phone ahead for a table at the rail. Order the garden's own tea and whatever came out of the oven that morning, and look down on the bushes the leaf came from. The last stretch to Darjeeling is steady climbing, and you reach the Windamere on Observatory Hill at about 16:30, bags already in your room. At dusk, walk three minutes to Chowrasta and watch the town take its evening turn. Dinner is at 19:30 in the Windamere's dining room, whose kitchen already has the note our chef, Suman Barman, sent last week: who eats meat, who does not, and how much chilli each of you can take.

    The momentThe first cup of the trip at Margaret's Deck, the tea garden dropping away below the rail and the plains already lost in haze.

    InsiderThe lounge belongs to Goodricke, which owns the Margaret's Hope garden below it; the pot list also carries its Castleton and Badamtam teas.

    If the weather turnsIf the Rohini road is shut, we climb by Pankhabari or NH110 through Tindharia and take tea in Kurseong town. A late landing goes straight up the hill.

    Meals
    Dinner

  2. Day 2 · Darjeeling

    Keventer's, Chowk Bazaar, a tasting and thenthuk

    • 5 km, about 0.5 h
    • High point 2,134 m
    • Sleep at 2,130 m
    • Easy
    Keventer's corner on a misty Darjeeling morning, its red KEV'S sign above the sloping street and early walkers

    Skip the hotel breakfast. At 08:00 we walk you to Keventer's on Nehru Road, the dairy-born café that has been frying ham, bacon and sausages since 1911, and you eat on the terrace above the street. At 09:30 a guide from the hills takes you down the lanes to Chowk Bazaar, the lower market where Darjeeling does its own shopping. Taste hard chhurpi, find the sellers of gundruk and dried chilli, and eat sel roti hot from a stall. At 11:30 the car lifts you back up Laden La Road to Nathmull's, tea merchants since 1931, for the tasting we booked: first flush, second flush and autumn, side by side in white cups. Lunch at 12:45 is at Kunga on Gandhi Road, a Tibetan family kitchen with about twenty seats; order thenthuk, the hand-torn noodle soup. At 16:00 the Windamere lays afternoon tea, reserved a day ahead as the house asks. Dinner is late and light.

    The momentThree cups from one ridge in a row, pale gold, copper and amber, and the merchant naming each flush a second before you do.

    InsiderMost Chowk Bazaar shops close on Thursdays, bakeries apart, so we never put your market morning on one. Village traders bring in the most goods at weekends.

    If the weather turnsIf rain sets in, Nathmull's comes first and the market walk shortens. If Kunga's queue runs long, we take a table upstairs at Glenary's instead.

    Meals
    Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

  3. Day 3 · Darjeeling Kalimpong

    Glenary's at opening, then across to Kalimpong

    • 55 km, about 2.5 h
    • High point 2,258 m
    • Sleep at 1,250 m
    • Easy
    A lone walker on an empty Darjeeling street at sunrise, shuttered shopfronts and hazy ridges glowing behind

    Glenary's opens its bakery at 07:00, and for that first hour the bread shelves are full and the terrace over the valley is yours: a scone, a pot of tea and a bag of jeera and ginger biscuits for the road. The car leaves the Windamere at 09:30, turns off above Ghum for the Peshok road and drops through the tea. Above Lopchu, a garden planted in the early 1860s at about 1,500 m, the driver pulls over and pours you its own tea from a flask we filled that morning, so you drink the leaf with its bushes in front of you. You cross the Teesta at the bottom and reach Kalimpong by 12:15. Lunch is at Gompu's beside Maharani Chowk, which Gompu Tshering opened as a bakery and tea shop around 1920 and which later became a Tibetan restaurant: pork momos, thukpa, and the chicken cutlet left from its British customers. After tea at the Silver Oaks, walk two minutes into the market for phumbi at a stall, then Lark's Provisions for cheese and milk lollipops.

    The momentLopchu's tea poured from the flask on the verge, the bushes it came from falling away below the road.

    InsiderPhumbi is made from what is left when phing, the mung-bean glass noodle, is cooked: the starchy liquid sets into a yellow jelly, cut and tossed in chilli.

    If the weather turnsIf the Peshok road is blocked, we go down to Sevoke and up NH10, about an hour longer, and eat at Gompu's later. If Lark's is out of cheese, we find it at the Haat.

    Meals
    Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

  4. Day 4 · Kalimpong

    Haat Bazaar on a Wednesday, cheese in the afternoon

    • 15 km, about 1 h
    • High point 1,704 m
    • Sleep at 1,250 m
    • Easy
    A small round of white homemade cheese being cut with a knife on a wooden board

    Today is Wednesday, market day, which is why we set your arrival for a Sunday. At 07:30 a guide who grew up in Kalimpong walks you down from the hotel before the day's crowd, and the morning is for the kitchen rather than the cloth stalls: hard and soft chhurpi, bundles of phing, fresh butter, kinema, dried dalle, pickles of pork, tofu and dried fish, and in October and November the season's new gundruk. Taste as you go; we carry the bags. Breakfast waits at the Silver Oaks at 09:30. At 11:30 we take you to one of the town's small cheesemakers, arranged the week before because supply comes and goes, to see a young wheel cut and ask how the batch was set. Lunch at 13:00 is at the hotel, where the kitchen cooks something from your morning's shopping. At 16:00, coffee on a bench at Deolo, the town's high hill, before a quiet dinner.

    The momentA slab of soft chhurpi broken off at the Haat for you to taste, cool and faintly sour, with the morning's market noise all around.

    InsiderThe town's best-known noodle maker was Gyalo Thondup, elder brother of the Dalai Lama, who started a factory at 8th Mile in 1967 and wrote The Noodle Maker of Kalimpong.

    If the weather turnsIf your dates miss Wednesday, a Monday arrival puts this morning on a Thursday, when a newer haat on the same ground sells local produce; otherwise we buy chhurpi, phing and pickles in the town's shops. If cloud sits on Deolo, coffee moves

    Meals
    Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

  5. Day 5 · Kalimpong Gangtok

    Cheese on toast, the Teesta, a Sikkimese thali

    • 75 km, about 3 h
    • High point 1,650 m
    • Sleep at 1,650 m
    • Easy
    Rain-wet paving on MG Marg in Gangtok, walkers with umbrellas between shopfronts and street lamps

    Breakfast at 08:00 is the Kalimpong way: yesterday's cheese melted on toast, which we asked the kitchen to do, and a twist of Lark's milk lollipops goes into the car for the road. Away at 09:30: 75 km and about three hours down to the Teesta and north into Sikkim, where the Rangpo post checks foreign guests' permits. You reach Gangtok at about 12:30, where a Sikkim-registered car and driver wait at the Nor-Khill: West Bengal taxis may drop guests in Sikkim but not tour it, so your bags change boots in the porch. Lunch at 13:00 is a Sikkimese thali at Nimtho: rice, dal, a vegetable curry, gundruk and a spoon of dalle achar that sets the pace for the table. Rest until 17:00, then walk MG Marg, where no car may enter. At 19:00 the Nor-Khill's Dragon Bar serves tongba, the Limbu millet beer: hot water poured over fermented millet in a wooden vessel and drawn up through a bamboo straw.

    The momentThe first taste of dalle achar at Nimtho, and the whole table going quiet while everyone decides whether to reach for water.

    InsiderDalle means round in Nepali. Ask for alikati piro, a little spicy, before the achar comes, and break one chilli in half rather than eating it whole.

    If the weather turnsIf NH10 is blocked at Sevoke or Rangpo, we take the police diversion and eat lunch on the road. If Nimtho is full, we ask the Nor-Khill for a Sikkimese plate.

    Meals
    Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

  6. Day 6 · Gangtok

    Lal Bazaar and lunch at a Sikkimese stove

    • 15 km, about 1 h
    • High point 1,650 m
    • Sleep at 1,650 m
    • Easy
    A cook in a woolly cap serving noodles and chilli fry from a wide griddle at a night market stall in Sikkim

    At 08:00 a Sikkimese home cook meets you at Lal Bazaar, Gangtok's main market since 1956 and now five storeys of stalls. The cook shops the way a household does: a handful of round dalle, soft chhurpi, a packet of kinema, sinki and gundruk, and whatever greens came in from the villages that morning. At 10:00 the car takes you both to the cook's home kitchen, where lunch is made with you rather than for you: gundruk soup, phagshapa of pork with radish and dried chilli, a sinki achar, dalle pounded with tomato, and rice. Vegetarians get kinema curry and iskus, the local chayote, in place of the pork, a change we agree with the cook a month ahead. You eat at the family table at about 13:00. The afternoon is yours: sleep, or take tea in the Nor-Khill's garden gazebo, which serves until 18:00. Dinner is small, if at all.

    The momentYour own spoon of phagshapa from the pot, the radish gone soft and red with chilli, in a Gangtok kitchen at noon.

    InsiderGundruk is made in October and November from the first mustard, radish and cauliflower leaves, so autumn guests often taste this year's batch.

    If the weather turnsLal Bazaar shuts on Thursdays, so if dates shift we cook first and shop after. If the cook falls ill, we eat at a Sikkimese kitchen in town and shop with a guide.

    Meals
    Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

  7. Day 7 · Gangtok Bagdogra airport

    Down the Teesta with the pantry in the boot

    • 124 km, about 4.5 h
    • High point 1,650 m
    • Easy
    The white arch of the Coronation Bridge over the Teesta gorge at Sevoke, framed by leaves against the forested slope

    Breakfast is ready at 06:30, packed if you prefer, because Bagdogra flights mostly leave from 13:00 and the road down takes about four and a half hours. The car leaves at 07:00. Your shopping rides in a cool bag in the boot: the chhurpi, the wrapped cheese, the Nathmull's tea, and the achar double-bagged, since jars of pickle in oil must go in checked luggage. Before dawn your driver called drivers already on NH10 to hear how the road was running. The road drops through Singtam and Rangpo and follows the Teesta south to the plains. We stop once, for tea, and you reach Bagdogra at about 11:30.

    The momentThe smell of chhurpi and tea rising from the bag at your feet as the last bends straighten out into the plains.

    InsiderFor gundruk soup at home, do what the Gangtok cook did: soak the gundruk, fry it with onion, tomato and chilli, and only then add the water.

    If the weather turnsIf NH10 is shut, the police diversion through Gorubathan adds two hours or more, so we leave at 05:00. When the STDC helicopter flies, seats from Burtuk are quicker.

    Tonight
    Homeward
    Meals
    Breakfast

Where you will stay

Where you sleep, three houses

Windamere Hotel, The Elgin Silver Oaks and The Elgin Nor-Khill. Prefer a different house on any night? Say which and we re-price it.

  1. The Windamere Hotel in Darjeeling seen from its terraced garden, with white painted railings and the hotel signboard
    Windamere from its garden on Observatory Hill.P.K.Niyogi, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
    2 nights

    Windamere Hotel

    Darjeeling

    A Raj-era house on Observatory Hill with afternoon tea and formal dinners, a short walk from Chowrasta, Keventer's and Glenary's.

    Ask for A Superior (Deluxe) room, away from the 2026 restoration works, with afternoon tea reserved a day ahead.

  2. The terraced garden at Silver Oaks in Kalimpong, a small stone edged pond below clipped shrubs and marigolds
    The garden at Silver Oaks, above its pond.Anuj Kumar Pradhan, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
    2 nights

    The Elgin Silver Oaks

    Kalimpong

    A 1930 house two minutes' walk from the main market, so the Haat, the phumbi stalls and Lark's are all on foot.

    Ask for A Premium Double/Twin on the valley side, with lunch on day 4 added to the room plan.

    • BathroomAttached private bath with shower, bathrobes and bath slippers.
  3. Gangtok seen from above, coloured buildings stacked down the ridge with a footbridge over the road and hills beyond
    Gangtok from above, the town the Nor-Khill sits in the middle of.Ahad Hasan / Pexels
    2 nights

    The Elgin Nor-Khill

    Gangtok

    Gangtok's old royal guest house near Paljor Stadium: Sikkimese rooms, tongba at the Dragon Bar and tea served in the garden.

    Ask for A Deluxe Double/Twin facing the garden and the valley; a Deluxe Suite if you want a sitting room.

Price and what it covers

from₹1,25,000

per person, twin share. How our prices are built

About £970 or US$1,300 at the rates of 19 September 2026.

Price my dates
Less time?The Singalila Ridge5 nights More time?Kanchenjunga at First Light7 nights

Included

  • Two nights at the Windamere Hotel, Darjeeling, in a Superior room with breakfast and dinner, and its afternoon tea on day 2
  • The Elgin Silver Oaks, Kalimpong: a Premium room for two nights on breakfast and dinner, and the day 4 lunch cooked from your market bags
  • Two nights at The Elgin Nor-Khill, Gangtok, in a Deluxe room with breakfast and dinner
  • Breakfast at Keventer's and at Glenary's, and lunch at Kunga, Gompu's and Nimtho
  • A tea tasting at Nathmull's, tea at Margaret's Deck and a tongba at the Dragon Bar
  • Guided market mornings: Chowk Bazaar with a guide from Darjeeling and the Haat Bazaar with a guide from Kalimpong
  • Lal Bazaar with a Sikkimese home cook, then a cooking morning and lunch at the cook's home
  • Your car from the hills and its driver for days 1 to 5, then a Sikkim-registered car for Gangtok and the road down
  • For foreign and OCI guests, Sikkim's online permit, filed through e-FRRO with a registered Sikkim agent as sponsor (see Permits and visas); Sikkim's ₹50 tourist fee for everyone
  • A dietary brief from our chef to every hotel, restaurant and host before you arrive
  • A cool bag for cheese and chhurpi, and double-bagging for pickles before the flight
  • Our team in the hills on call 24x7 from landing to take-off

Not included

  • Flights to and from Bagdogra
  • Travel insurance
  • Drinks beyond the tastings named, and room service
  • Tips for drivers, guides, cooks and hotel staff
  • Tea, cheese, spices and pickles you buy to take home
  • The Gangtok to Bagdogra helicopter, when it runs
  • Add-ons such as Tiger Hill, the steam train or Tsomgo Lake

Make it more Arranged on request, priced in your quote

  • Tiger Hill before breakfastAway at 04:00 on day 2 with a vehicle token collected the afternoon before, back in time for Keventer's at 08:00.
  • Steam to Ghum and backA first-class seat on the steam joy ride, booked the morning the railway opens it, with a stop at the Batasia Loop.
  • A night more for Tsomgo LakeAdd a third Gangtok night for the lake at 3,753 m, with the permit filed the day before, children over five only, and a protected-area permit as well for foreign guests. Noodle soup at the shore.
  • Fly down from GangtokWhen the STDC helicopter is flying, seats from Burtuk heliport to Bagdogra; your cases follow by car.

Before you go

Before you go on this route

Choose another journey ifNot for anyone who wants dawn viewpoints and high lakes at the centre of the trip; for Kanchenjunga at every turn, choose Kanchenjunga at First Light.

  1. Best start day: a Sunday, or failing that a Monday. The questions below explain why the markets decide it.
  2. Papers: Darjeeling and Kalimpong need only ID or an Indian visa. For the two Gangtok nights, foreign and OCI guests need Sikkim's online permit, which we file about 30 days before you cross; Permits and visas, in our planning guide, has the rule.
  3. Diet: tell us about vegetarian, Jain, gluten or nut needs when you book. Every kitchen and the home cook in Gangtok get the brief before you land, and much Sikkimese food is meat-free by nature.
  4. Clothing: October to December runs about 4 to 19 °C in Darjeeling and warmer lower down; March to May is milder. Bring layers, a warm jacket for evenings and shoes that grip wet market floors.
  5. Luggage: leave room in a checked bag for pickles and anything in oil; we double-bag them on the last night.
  6. Money: Kunga and market stalls take cash or UPI, not cards; hotels, Glenary's and the tea shops take cards. There are ATMs in all three towns.
  7. Tipping is your choice; Before you travel, in our planning guide, suggests ranges for drivers and guides, and the Gangtok cook is best thanked as you would a host.

Questions

Five questions about Kitchens of the Hills

Ask on WhatsApp
Which day of the week should we arrive?

A Sunday, if you can. Kalimpong's Haat Bazaar runs on Wednesdays and Saturdays, so a Sunday arrival puts it on your fourth morning, while keeping Darjeeling's Chowk Bazaar and Gangtok's Lal Bazaar, both shut on Thursdays, off your market days. If Sunday is impossible, a Monday arrival puts your Kalimpong morning on a Thursday, when a newer haat on the same ground sells local food, from churpi and pickles to sel roti; we check it is running for your dates.

What is in the markets in autumn, and what in spring?

Autumn is the richer table. From October the tea shops sell the year's autumn flush, darker and mellow, and in October and November families make the new season's gundruk from the first mustard, radish and cauliflower leaves, so the Haat and Lal Bazaar have it fresh. In spring, from March into April, the first flush arrives, pale and floral, and you taste it beside last autumn's at Nathmull's. March to May is milder on the road, with more haze over the peaks.

Can vegetarians and Jain guests eat well on this journey?

Yes. Much hill food is vegetarian by nature: dal, gundruk and sinki, kinema, iskus and potatoes, and chhurpi. Our chef sends every hotel, restaurant and the Gangtok home cook a written brief before you land, and for Jain guests we ask for cooking without onion, garlic or root vegetables. The cook swaps the pork for kinema curry and iskus. For strict vegetarians we also ask each cheesemaker how that batch was set, since some use animal rennet.

What can we carry home from the markets?

Tea travels best: Nathmull's weighs it out by flush, and hard chhurpi and phing go anywhere in a suitcase. Kalimpong cheese, when a small maker has a wheel, rides to the airport in our cool bag. Kalimpong's milk lollipops, milk and sugar boiled down in a wok and rolled by hand into cigars, are the town's own sweet and pack flat. Pickles and anything in oil must go in checked luggage, because liquids over 100 ml are not allowed in the cabin.

How is this different from The Planter's Week or The Tea Trail?

Those two are tea journeys: nights inside working estates at Makaibari and Glenburn, factories at plucking time, and in The Tea Trail's case Sikkim's Temi garden. This one sleeps in town hotels, near the markets, and treats tea as one course among many: a Kurseong tea lounge, a three-flush tasting and a flask of Lopchu. Choose Kitchens of the Hills if you want to shop and cook; choose the others to follow the leaf from bush to cup.

Sources we checked for this itinerary (43)
  1. Glenary's founded as a confectioner named Vado by an Italian family around 1885
  2. Glenary's bakery on Nehru Road opens 07:00 to 20:30, breads, scones, jeera and ginger biscuits on open shelves, terrace over the valley, takes cards
  3. Glenary's restaurant upstairs, run by the Edwards family
  4. Keventer's Darjeeling, Nehru Road, since 1911, ham, bacon and sausages, founded by the Keventer dairy business
  5. Nathmull's, tea merchants since 1931, Tea Room on Laden La Road, over 50 teas from auction and estates
  6. Kunga on Gandhi Road: Tibetan family restaurant, about 20 seats, thenthuk, cash only, open 08:00 to 21:00
  7. Chowk Bazaar: lower market, about 15 minutes' walk from Chowrasta; most shops closed Thursdays except bakeries; village traders at weekends
  8. Street food at Chowk Bazaar: sel roti, alu dum, chhurpi, momos, thukpa
  9. Windamere room categories and meal plans on the 2025-26 tariff; afternoon tea on advance booking
  10. Windamere 2026 restoration works 10:00 to 18:00, afternoon tea continues
  11. Margaret's Deck, Goodricke tea lounge above the Margaret's Hope garden, 900 m from Kurseong station
  12. Margaret's Deck shaped like a ship's deck, menu includes Castleton and Badamtam teas
  13. Lopchu Tea Estate, about 1,500 m, established early 1860s, between Darjeeling and Kalimpong
  14. Gompu's, founded by Gompu Tshering as a bakery, confectionery and tea shop by 1920 (loan papers of 1921), beside the Maharani Chowk pavilion; a Tibetan restaurant later; centenary marked in 2020
  15. Gompu's pork momos, thukpa and chicken cutlet
  16. Phumbi (fumbi): mung jelly from the liquid left after making phing, tossed in chilli, sold at stalls and at the Wednesday and Saturday haats (February 2026)
  17. Kalimpong Haat Bazaar on Wednesdays and Saturdays: chhurpi, butter, phing, kinema, dalle, pickles of pork, tofu and dried fish; Lark's sells cheese and lollipops
  18. Lark's Provisions sells Kalimpong cheese and milk lollipops
  19. Kalimpong cheese started under Father Andre Butty; small local makers continue in limited batches (March 2026)
  20. Gyalo Thondup started the Kalimpong noodle factory in 1967; died February 2025
  21. Noodle factory at 8th Mile, Kalimpong, Taktser House
  22. The Elgin Silver Oaks room categories and meal plans (2025-26 sheet, checked September 2026)
  23. The Elgin Silver Oaks on Rinkingpong Road, main market about two minutes' walk
  24. The Elgin Nor-Khill room categories and meal plans (2025-26 sheet, checked September 2026)
  25. Nor-Khill dining: Dragon Bar serves tongba, Gazebo high tea 11:00 to 18:00
  26. Tongba: Limbu hot millet beer in a vessel, drunk through a bamboo straw; Sikkim and Darjeeling
  27. Nimtho, Gangtok: Sikkimese thali and Nepali Thakali, on MG Marg (2022)
  28. Lal Bazaar built 1956, named after J. Lal, Dewan of the Chogyal; now a five-storey plaza; chhurpi, butter, noodles
  29. Lal Bazaar closed on Thursdays
  30. Sikkimese meal pattern, gundruk, sinki, kinema, phagshapa (pork with radish and dried chilli), chhurpi, sel roti
  31. Gundruk made in October and November from mustard, radish and cauliflower leaves
  32. Hard chhurpi is kept in the mouth for 30 minutes to hours
  33. West Bengal taxis may drop in Sikkim but not do sightseeing there
  34. Foreign nationals obtain the Sikkim RAP only online via e-FRRO from January 2026
  35. Sikkim ₹50 tourist fee from March 2025, for visitors aged five and over
  36. STDC helicopter service between Burtuk and Bagdogra (November 2025)
  37. Innova Crysta with driver: daily hire rates in the hills checked for 2026
  38. Gangtok taxi rules and point-to-point limits (2026)
  39. Hero photograph: street vendor cooking noodles in Darjeeling (Pexels, Monojit Dutta, April 2026)
  40. Thursday haat on the Kalimpong Haat Bazar ground since 18 May 2023, with the municipality's support: churpi, pickles, sel roti, alu thukpa, alu dum
  41. Kalimpong lollipops: milk and sugar boiled down in a wok, cooled on tables and rolled by hand into a cigar shape; begun at Father Andre Butty's Swiss Welfare Dairy in the early 1950s; made now by former dairy workers and others
  42. Foreign nationals apply for the Sikkim RAP through e-FRRO at least 30 days ahead from abroad (Embassy of India, updated 18 September 2026)
  43. Autumn flush in October and November, first flush from March into April (our planning guide, When to go)

Checked September 2026. We confirm permits, fees and flights again for your dates.

Journeys like this

Also through Darjeeling and Kalimpong

All journeys
Tea garden workers carrying the day's pluck in sacks along an estate road at dusk, hills falling away behind Signature journey 6 nights

The Planter's Week

Kurseong2Glenburn Tea Estate2Darjeeling2

Mar to Apr, Oct to Nov from₹1,60,000
Kalimpong town spread along its green ridge in West Bengal, cloud lying low over the hills behind it Short break 3 nights

The Quiet Ridge

Kalimpong3

October to December, March to April from₹60,000
Snow dusted ridges above Tsomgo Lake in East Sikkim mirrored whole in its still water under a grey sky Long weekend, Sikkim 3 nights

Gangtok and the High Lake

Gangtok3

October to mid December, March to May from₹70,000
A road winding between clipped tea slopes and rows of cypress in the Darjeeling hills under cloud Tea journey 6 nights

The Tea Trail

Kurseong1Glenburn Tea Estate3Ravangla2

March to May, October to early November from₹1,55,000

Part ofTea, kitchens and marketsMonasteries and festivalsDarjeeling and KalimpongSikkim journeys

Plan my journey

Kitchens of the Hills, shaped around you

At its best October to December, March to May. Tell us your month and who is travelling, and we reply within 24 hours with this journey priced for your dates.

Length
6 nights
From
₹1,25,000 per person
At its best
October to December, March to May
Bases
Darjeeling, Kalimpong, Gangtok
+91 86178 24110 Message a designer Support 24×7, every day of your journey

AboutKitchens of the Hills, 6 nights

With country code if outside India. Either this or email is enough.
Who is coming, the pace you like, the occasion. A sentence is fine.
Add more detail
Their ages help: add them in your note
Permits in Sikkim and fees in Bhutan depend on it
This journey starts at ₹1,25,000 per person. Your band tells us which rooms to price.
Calls from our office, 8am to 9pm IST (GMT+5:30)
Darjeeling, Kalimpong, Gangtok, Pelling, Bhutan, Nepal

No deposit to begin, and nothing is booked until you say yes.