Best time to visit Darjeeling, month by month

In Satyajit Ray's Kanchenjungha, a Calcutta family spends the last day of its holiday in Darjeeling without once seeing the mountain it came for. The film runs about a hundred minutes, roughly in real time, and the cloud does not lift until the very end, when the mist clears, the peak comes out and the father, busy with his own plans, hardly looks up.

Many people who have been to Darjeeling have waited like that at least once, at Tiger Hill at dawn or on the Mall with a cup of tea going cold, so the useful question is not simply when to go but when the cloud is most likely to lift. The India Meteorological Department answers it better than any brochure: its Darjeeling station, at 2,128 metres, has published thirty years of averages, and one column in them counts the mornings on which you can see a long way.

How to read the weather station's figures

The IMD's climatological tables for 1991 to 2020 give, for every month, the average daytime high and night-time low, the rain, the number of rainy days (2.5 mm or more in a day) and how far the observer could see at 08:30 and at 17:30. Treat that last figure as a stand-in for the mountain, not a promise of it. Kanchenjunga, at 8,598 metres, is 74.4 km north of the town, but a morning on which the station sees beyond 20 km is a morning with a chance, and a morning under 4 km has none.

Read down the last column and the year splits in two: from October to January the far view shows on 15 to 17 mornings a month, and from June to September on 2 to 6. Summer, in the plains sense, hardly exists here. The warmest month, August, averages 19.9 °C by day, cooler than an average January afternoon in Kolkata (25.5 °C at Alipore, in the same IMD tables).

October to December: the clear window

The best months for the mountain. The monsoon leaves Darjeeling in a hurry: September still brings 385.2 mm of rain, but October brings 78.8 mm, November 11.2 mm and December 2.8 mm, with less than one rainy day a month in the last two. The clear mornings climb just as fast, to 16.8 in October and 17.2 in November, and in these months the evenings stay clear as well (16.1 days in October at 17:30).

That is also why these are the busy months. A 2014 study cited on Wikipedia's Darjeeling page names September to November and April to May as the town's two peak tourist seasons, and a 2020 study there counts what the crowds leave behind: about 30 tonnes of solid waste a day, rising to 50 tonnes in the peak season.

Our pick, if you can choose, is November, and ideally the part after Kali Puja, which falls on Sunday 8 November this year. The days are mild at 17.2 °C, the nights cold at 6.2 °C, and on paper it is the clearest month of the year; the same IMD tables give Kolkata an average November high of 30.2 °C. Ray made his family wait a hundred minutes for the mountain. November's numbers say you should have to wait rather less.

December is almost as clear, with 17 good mornings, and colder at night (3.5 °C). It is the month for anyone who wants the view and does not mind a heavy jacket at dinner.

January and February: cold, dry and quieter

January is the coldest month, 11.1 °C by day and 1.7 °C at night, and the station's records go below freezing (the lowest on its books is -7.2 °C). It is also nearly dry, with 10.8 mm of rain in the month, and still clear on 15.6 mornings. February warms a little, but its afternoons turn hazy: only 4.2 evenings in the month see beyond 20 km, so if you go in winter, plan the view for the morning.

March to May: the second window, and the tea

Spring brings the second peak season and a different reason to go. The first flush of Darjeeling tea (the first leaves after the winter) is plucked from March into May, and the second flush in May and June. The mornings stay fairly clear, 13.6 in March and 13.2 in April, but by May the pre-monsoon rain has arrived: 160.3 mm over about ten rainy days, and only 6.7 clear mornings.

Is the monsoon worth it?

Not for the mountain. More than 80 percent of Darjeeling's year of rain falls between June and September; the IMD figures give 1,982.6 of the year's 2,373.3 mm. July is the peak, 648.5 mm on 23.4 rainy days, and the far view shows on 2.5 mornings. The hills are green and the tea keeps growing (the monsoon flush), but this is also landslide season. Wikipedia's page notes that most landslides here are set off by heavy rain, earthquakes or fast erosion by torrents, and that one rainstorm in 1968 cut the 56 km Darjeeling to Siliguri road in 92 places.

We would not send anyone up in the monsoon for Kanchenjunga. We would send someone who wants to watch cloud come up a valley and does not need to be anywhere by a fixed hour.

How do you get there from Kolkata?

The usual way up is the overnight Darjeeling Mail from Sealdah to New Jalpaiguri, then by road or by the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway, the narrow-gauge line that climbs 88 km from about 100 metres at New Jalpaiguri to about 2,200 metres at Darjeeling. It opened in 1881 and is a UNESCO World Heritage site as one of the Mountain Railways of India, and Wikipedia's page on the line calls its Ghum station the highest in India.

Take a story up the hill

Darjeeling is where Feluda began. Feludar Goendagiri, his very first case, ran in Sandesh from December 1965 and is set in the town; twenty-one years later Ray sent him back with Jatayu and a film crew in Darjeeling Jomjomat. Both are on our Feluda page, and both make a better train companion than a phone.

▶59:23Play: Feludar Goendagiri

Feludar Goendagiri

Mirchi Bangla

Feluda and Topshe on holiday in Darjeeling, and a threatening letter to an old man who collects curios. The case that started it all. Sunday Suspense, Mirchi Bangla, 59 minutes.

▶ Play hereWatch on YouTube · Mirchi Bangla

▶2:19:54Play: Darjeeling Jomjomat

Darjeeling Jomjomat

Mirchi Bangla

Jatayu's novel is being filmed in Darjeeling, and in the middle of the shoot there is a murder. Ray wrote it for the Puja issue of Desh in 1986. Sunday Suspense, Mirchi Bangla, 2 hours 20 minutes.

▶ Play hereWatch on YouTube · Mirchi Bangla

▶51:05Play: Dow Hill er Atonko

Dow Hill er Atonko

THRILLER LAND

Not Darjeeling town but Kurseong, on the way up: a teenager goes missing at Dow Hill, and Bhuban Thakur returns with the story. Karna Sil, on THRILLER LAND, 51 minutes.

▶ Play hereWatch on YouTube · THRILLER LAND

▶47:19Play: Darjeeling-er Bhoutik Ghotona

Darjeeling-er Bhoutik Ghotona

221B Harrison Road

A ghost story with Darjeeling in its title, from 221B Harrison Road, 47 minutes. Keep it for the hotel room after dark.

▶ Play hereWatch on YouTube · 221B Harrison Road

In town, look for one more thing. Sister Nivedita died in Darjeeling, at Roy Villa, on 13 October 1911, and her memorial stands below the railway station, on the way to the town's Victoria Falls. Its line reads "Here lies Sister Nivedita who gave her all to India". She died in October, the month the clear season begins.

Just inNew stories from the channelsWhat the Bengali story channels have just put up, played from their own YouTube.See the stories