Probably most people who have heard about Varanasi, have heard about it in association with burning of the dead. And to be honest - city offers little besides ghats (steps to river). Still - that is enough and Varanasi is a must-see city for everyone visiting India.

In a store, where I bought teas to send back home, we did some free tea degustation.

Darjeeling. City of tea. I expected rural town with lush gardens of tea all around, but instead got bustling city with no visible tea bushes around. Still - I enjoyed it a lot and Darjeeling is now among my favourite places in India.

Note about Artur: last week he decided to stay longer in Assam to do some work, so I continued alone. We will meet again after 2-3 days.

Tourists need permit to enter Sikkim, fortunately, this process is relatively painless and can be done in an hour. While here, I visited 2 cities - Gangtok (capital of Sikkim) and Pelling (main tourist attraction).

Chennai-Assam express. Longest train we have had... ~60 hours. Train is good way to find new friends and to communicate with other peoples. In this train we have eaten allot of different types of sweets that was offered to us. We also made at least 4 new friends from various places - Kolkata, Darjeeling, Barpeta (Guwahati).