The overnight bus from Siliguri left spot on time, and turned out to be a very comfy bus, with loads of legroom and a seat that reclined way back. It meant I slept really well for most of the journey, and in fact it meant I slept all the way through a major cyclone!
The cyclone (Alia) swept up through Bengal, right along the route of our bus, and actually initiated a very early monsoon (12 days earlier that expected). The monsoon resulted in major landslides and flooding, and at least 60 people were killed, many of them in the region of Darjeeling. We saw on the TV, and read in the local papers, over the following couple of days that hundreds of tourists had been stranded in Darjeeling, as the access roads had been cut-off. It turned out we got out just in time - literally.
Although we didn't escape completely unscathed. At about 6am, when we were due to arrive in Kolkata, our bus suddenly stopped in blocked traffic. After about half-an-hour our driver realised that traffic wasn't going to get moving any time soon, and so turned the bus around, and dropped us all off at a very nearby train station (Krishnanagar). We'd gotten a cheaper bus, less than half the price of the luxury bus, and as we turned around, we passed that 'luxury' bus stranded in traffic.
Very luckily for us, Krishnanagar turned out to be a major train hub, and within 5 minutes of getting tickets (after queuing up in the huge, but quickly moving line), our train pulled out of the station and heading off toward Kolkata. We got seats straight away (as Krishnanagar was the starting point for the train), but of course it was completely packed well before the nearly 3 hour journey to Kolkata. Along the way we saw hundreds of uprooted palm trees and lots of general damage caused by the cyclone - it was just so weird that I'd slept all the way thought it (a French guy beside me on the train couldn't believe I hadn't noticed the bus being buffeted about!).
So it meant we arrived about 4 hours late, but I didn't mind that in the slightest - I realised we had been blessed to get out of Siliguri at all, and to be arriving at Kolkata at all. Kolkata had also been hit badly by the cyclone - I saw lots of uprooted trees, and apparently people were protesting about power cuts and stuff (I read that loads of ATM's where out of action too, but the first one I went to worked fine - luckily, as I really needed to get money to pay for our accommodation).
At Kolkata's Sealdah train station I decided to try and walk to the tourist area of Sutter Street, where we'd stayed before, and although I thought I'd screwed it up a couple of times, we eventually arrived at our destination of one of the best little local restaurants in all of 3 months in India (can't remember the name, but just down from Sutter Street towards Park Street).
That evening we went back to the restaurant Peter Cat for dinner. I'd seen Fried Chicken Liver on menus a few times, and had been keen to try it (Sarah hates liver, and as we always share it's awkward for me to order it). Anyway, seeing as how we were early to the restaurant and this was one of our last meals in India, I ordered the liver as a starter, and my god it was amazing! I reckon it was one of the most delicious things I've ever tasted. It came with a really tasty sauce, and was perfect with the slightly pickled red onions you always get in Bengali restaurants. It was a big serving though, so I asked if I could just eat half and take the rest away, but I just couldn't stop nibbling away at it, and so finished the lot. It had an amazing texture, like the best foie gras I've ever had, and was just so melty. Sarah tasted a tiny piece, but I swear she went 'Yuk!' before it even went into her mouth.
So given all the cyclone problems in Kolkata, I decided to play it safe the next day and make sure we could get to the airport in plenty of time for our 9:25am flight to Bangkok the following day. So it was back to our usual Kolkata breakfast spot for more of the delicious local fish dish (white fish fillet coated in tangy sauce and cooked in a banana leaf), before using the internet for a bit. Then it was on the metro to a famous restaurant called Kewpies for lunch.
Kewpies is a lovely fancy restaurant, and the food was great (Sarah getting a thali and me picking-and-mixing), although quite overpriced really (Peter Cat was a fancier place and much cheaper). Then after a relaxing coffee it was back to collect our rucksacks and head out towards the airport. This involved the metro, and then a local bus, which got well and truly snarled up in rush-hour traffic. We were in no rush though, and once out by the airport Sarah found a decent place to spend the night. After a light dinner I strolled over to the airport, just to see how far it was (it was only a 10 minute walk), and to see if I could re-confirm our flight. After a bit of mad running around I couldn't get any confirmation at all, and so rushed back to the hotel area to find an internet place to print off my online flight confirmation (online bookings usually just need a reference number, but Air India Express didn't give me one, so I was a bit worried).
Anyway, all was well the next morning, and we checked in no problem. The flight left Kolkata early, arrived in Bangkok early and we even got feed onboard. So we were back in Bangkok for a couple of days and needed to work out where to go next...
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