....Sikkim is known as the 'Hidden Land' and it's protected by both mountainous terrain as well as its legendary mystical powers. Sikkim is an impenetrable secret kingdom locked for eons behind the hidden gates of its highest mountain, Kanchendzonga.

The road is dramatic and winds around precarious edges of bottomless chasms and up endless steep hairpin turns to higher alpine forests of pine, fir, oak, flowering rhododendrons and magnolias, past tea plantations and pretty hillside towns with wooden houses built on stilts, painted turquoise and blue, perched on the side of mountains.

....Pelling (2,058 m) is fast becoming a popular tourist destination, but is still a quiet town perched on the edge of a mountain, with some of the best views of the Kanchendzonga range in Sikkim. I’m staying in Upper Pelling at the Garuda Hotel, a shabby Tibetan place run by Buddhists with great decor and atmosphere.