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| One side is Jaigaon, India, and other side is Phuentsholing, Bhutan. Guess which side is Jaigaon. Wikipedia image. (video below) |
The road that divides the Indian city of Jaigaon and the Bhutanese city of Phuentsholing is one of the most intriguing border crossings of the world.
On one side of the road is the messy West Bengal town of Jaigaon. On the other side is Phuentsholing, the gateway to Bhutan, the Shangrila in the vicinity.
A blog Keep Walking shares an account for the crossing over the from the Indian side.
You get a bus from Siliguri, which figures prominently on the Indian map, to Jaigaon.
There is not much to see in Jaigaon, a typical Indian town. From the Jaigaon bus station, you can take a shared auto to the crossing gate, which has separate checkpoints for pedestrians and vehicles.
Indians, Nepalese and Bangladeshis can enter Bhutan without a visa. They need to get a permit, however, for which they require a passport and one more official photo identity card. Admission formalities for other nationalities are more complex.
Phuentsholing is 20 times cleaner than Jaigaon, which has bad hotels with dirty toilets and bed bugs. Travelers are advised to not stopover at this town..
You get far better hotels at Phuentsholing for the same money. You enter and stay at a typical Bhutanese town, with friendly people in unique attire and traditional architecture. People speak Bhutanese, Hindi, Nepalese, English and Bengali.
From Phuentsholing, you can take a mini-bus to Thimphu, about 6 hours away.