Near Kolkata

Near Kolkata

Weekend Getaways

The delta, the Digha coast and the first foothills of the Himalaya.

2 places

West Bengal
Kolkata
Kolkata is the one Indian metropolis that still feels like it belongs to the people who live in it rather than to the traffic. Do the north first and on foot. Kumartuli is the potters' quarter where the Durga idols are built from straw and river clay through the year — go in the months before the puja and you will find workshops full of half-finished goddesses. College Street sells second-hand books by the mile, and the Indian Coffee House above it has been arguing about politics since before independence. The trams still run, barely, and the ferry across the Hooghly to Howrah at dusk costs a few rupees and gives you the bridge from below. Durga Puja, in September or October, is the reason to plan a trip around this city. For five days the streets fill with commissioned temporary architecture — some of it genuinely ambitious — and nobody sleeps. It is also completely full; book months out. October to February. Summer here is humid and heavy, and the monsoon floods streets to the knee.
Jharkhand
Panchet Dam
Panchet closed out the first phase of the Damodar Valley Corporation, the last of four multi-purpose dams the DVC built in that round, opened in 1959 across the Damodar at Panchet in Dhanbad district. Go knowing what it is. This is working infrastructure from the early years of the republic, not a monument with a ticket counter, and how much you take from it depends entirely on whether mid-century Indian engineering holds any interest for you. If it does, it is a straightforward detour from anywhere in Dhanbad district. If it does not, skip it.