We went to Gangtok in june and believe me northeast looks so mesmerising in monsoons. We stayed in hotel sonam delek It is a good hotel and the rooms are around 3k per night. With a good view. We stayed for 5 days. We hired a car from siliguri. There are several cars and bike renting shops near east of bus stop. We visited several places such as rumtek monastery, the mall road, tsogomo lake and many more. Just do one thing hire a driver also it will help you to explore more. I hired a driver in Gangtok and he was a local. He drove me to all the places and worked as a guide also. In gangtok there are very less places to eat good food. As a chef i visited a lot of places and almost every restaurant in mall road but none of them was upto mark. what i found very yummy and good are the food of roadside stalls which came on the way to tsogomo lake. I found several good local food serving restuarant beside stairs of mall road. To be percise the stairs which connect the mall road and taxi stand. There are several small food joints which serve authentic north eastern food sikkimese thali and some nepali food also. And if u are a flavour freak then must try sikkimese thali. So this was about food.
Now the FINANCE matters.....
driver will cost you 1000 per day.
Cars on rent will cost you 2500 plus your fuel per day that is small cars.
Hotels will cost from 500 to 20000 per night.
Food in a good restaurant in mall road will cost around 1200 for two. And one more thing momos are very affordable chicken for 60 veg for 40 and mutton for 80 in each portion there are 8 to 10 momos.
Gangtok to tsogomo lake taxi will cost 5500
Gangtok local sightseeing 2500 covers all the local parks zoo and viewpoint.
Temi garden sai mandir and chardham will cost upto 4000.
Siliguri to gangtok is 2500 to 4000 depends how you can bargin to cab drivers. This is for reserve cab. If you take the shared one it will he 200 per person. But pls dont prefer that if u r with family or couple.
Thats it...have a nice journey...enjoyyy
