By IANS
Darjeeling : The Queen of Hills was blessed Saturday night. Visitors, who had prepared for a cold walk in the clouds, warmed up to a white Republic Day evening Jan 26 as flakes of snow covered the Himalayan hill station in West Bengal, nearly 800 km from the state capital Kolkata.
Darjeeling does not get snowfall too often. “I did not expect snowfall in Darjeeling this year. I am enjoying every moment. It is beyond our imagination. We will remember this experience forever,” said Pulak Bera from Kolkata, who is honeymooning in the hill station with her husband.
Places like Jalapahar, Ghoom, Jorebungalow, Tung, Dali and Three Mile in Darjeeling district in northern West Bengal were covered in ten centimetres of snow and the temperature touched two degrees Celsius. A severe cold wave has been sweeping through Darjeeling and Kurseong towns for the last seven days.
A shower Saturday evening brought the mercury down and the first report of snowfall came from Tiger Hill, at an elevation of 8,497 feet. The snowfall continued for over six hours till the wee hours of Sunday.
Places like Sandhapu and Falut, located at an altitude of more than 12,000 feet, lay under 30 centimetres of snow, reports said. “We cancelled our return and decided to stay back for some more days,” Bera added.
“I visited Darjeeling earlier this winter, but never experienced such snowfall here. The trees and the roads were decked in white,” said another tourist Asim Chatterjee. Last year, Darjeeling witnessed snowfall mid-February.