Our journey to Rishyap started from Lava. In the travel blog of Lava, I told about different kinds of beautiful birds and their activities. We got more than 25 species there and a few butterflies. It is always tough to get a large number of butterflies into the high altitude because of cold and moist weather but due to the greenery, we found a hell lot of moths there. It was a nice start indeed.
How to Go From Lava to Rishyap
We took the cab from the Lava Syndicate and it came in time just at 11 a.m. There are about two main roads to reach Rishyap from Lava. One is the old broken muddy road which takes less time but it is hectic to go to Rishyap by that road. Another road is the newly created 6 miles road which is a quite good concrete road. Though it is very good in terms of quality, we witnessed a large number of trees cut down to prepare this road inside the devastating jungle area but maybe due to the necessity of local people, it is now 100% prepared to serve the purpose. I have mentioned the cost of the booking in different ways from Lava to Rishyap in different ways in the YouTube video. You know the local Road trips in India and you never know what may happen on the road. So we took the new road to go to Rishyap. You can check the YouTube video of Rishyap to understand the quality of roads and the prices in different ways. We are so pleased in this journey that after a while we forgot the beauty of Lava and are mesmerized by the beauty of Rishyap. It took around 1.30 hours to reach Rishyap. You guys must have heard the words ‘on-the-way birding’. We could have stopped our car and tried for some beautiful birds on the way via 6 miles but we didn’t do that because Rishyap was way more exciting than this place. This was not the first time we were going to Rishyap. So we had a comparison in our mind will we be able to see the same beauty of Rishyap that we found a few years back? Truly speaking Rishyap is not as beautiful as before. Hundreds of restaurants, hotels, and homestays are there now for their guests to welcome.
Best Hotel in Rishyap
Good, better best….all our perceptions. Tourists tag some hotels as best or worst depending upon their requirements, expectations, and reviews. I have some expectations and at the end of the day, I met all my expectations in this hotel, so blindly address my hotel as the best in Rishyap.
Top Reason to Book Rosedell Inn hotel, the best in Rishyap
1) We booked the Rosedell Inn hotel in Rishyap after having some quiet research on Google based on their reviews based on their room quality, food, exact location, service, etc.
2) We found this Rosedell Inn hotel in Rishyap is absolutely near the tiffin Dara viewpoint starting point and Rishyap Syndicate both.
3)Rosedell Inn hotel in Rishyap is one of the best hotels in Rishyap just because of their room quality, food quality, and services. So we had no other option but to go with this property.
We immediately booked this hotel right from the beginning of our planning period around 2 months ago and found that it was a great decision. Immediately after reaching the Rosedell Inn hotel in Rishyap, we were served welcome drinks. We were so happy with the location because from the balcony of our room we can directly see Kanchenjunga and many other mountains very easily.
4)There is also an open space there in the Rosedell Inn hotel in Rishyap from where you can see a 360-degree view of the Himalayas. Being nature lovers we were curious to see a different kinds of birds and butterflies here immediately. So we just had a little bit of conversation with the manager of the hotel and ordered lunch and started exploring the nearby bushes and trails.
5) Right from the beginning, we found some commoners like Verditer Flycatcher, Ashy Drongo, Puff-throated Babbler, Whiskered Yuhina, Rufous Sibia, Chestnut-crowned Laughingthrush, etc. At the day’s end, it was already 15 nice bird species on our list just from the nearby areas of Rosedell Inn hotel in Rishyap.
6) There was a bit of surprise for our child too. There is a game room in this hotel where you can play table tennis, Carrom with your friends or families in the evening and take some evening snacks to spend the time. The game room is too good to spend some time there. It is a nicely covered glass room from where you can see different kinds of trees outside and we were just discussing all together the birds we found that day and what may be our target species on the next day from Tiffin Dara view point.
Set Your Target Before Birding
Just to let you know that we prepared a list of birds that can be found from Rishyap and the target list from Rishyap apart from the birds which we already found in some other places. This kind of target list can be prepared from the ebird website easily so that you can focus on your target species instead of running here and there chasing some common birds. This is important for hardcore birdwatchers and if someone wishes to start their birdwatching, they can follow this trick. It will help you to do everything in an organized way.
Night at Rishyap
Rishyap was very cold at night but the cozy rooms of Rosedell Inn hotel were so well decorated that we never felt any cold there. One more important thing we never knew before coming to this hotel was their dinner timing. They serve dinner up to 11:00 p.m. with actually allowed us so much time to take some photographs at night also.
There is a large space just in front of the hotel where you can light a fire and enjoy the moment with your friends and family. People coming here with friends as a tourist to enjoy only can use those two spaces and can make the moment memorable for a lifetime. We were pleased that we booked Rosedell Inn hotel in Rishyap at a cheap price.
How to Do Birdwatching in Rishyap
On the next day, we planned to visit Tiffin Dara early in the morning at around 5:30 am max and go to the jungle area behind the Syndicate in the second half. We woke up early in the morning and started our journey right from the hotel entrance. It was a very steep trail into the woods. We were taking some photographs of different kinds of birds and trees to take some rest in between the hike. In the beginning, we didn’t get any decent photographs just because of the bushes and a little bit of low light. But after a while, we clearly understood the terrain of this area. Moving upwards we face a lot of uncommon birds as individuals as well as in flocks too. I am mentioning the bird checklist of that birding area of that day here. You can also check my YouTube video to understand the terrain and the beauty of nature. It was a soothing place early in the morning when nobody was there. We were the only two people birding inside the jungle to explore the beauty of nature, for the documentation to let you know as you are also a nature-loving friend I believe. Though it is a quite high place to go to the top of Tiffin Dara, we didn’t go till the top. Our purpose was solved when we faced a lot of extraordinary birds on the way. We were super happy to take the photographs and videos of those beautiful Creations of God. To our surprise, we found some birds at a close distance which we couldn’t take photographs very easily in many places. Finally, we came down from near the top to the hotel at about 10:00 a.m. to take some breakfast.
You May Also Like : Lava Birdwatching Trip
A Walk in Rishyap Village
After having breakfast we planned to go to the secret place which is just behind the Rishyap Syndicate, a jungle-like place where we can find a lot more birds in the daytime. This is possible in that area because of the large canopy of the large trees which shelters the birds to stay for a long time to save energy from the scorching sunlight. We went to that area to move here and there and we covered around a few kilometers in the upper Rishyap village.
We met with a couple of villagers and chatted with them about their lifestyle, their home, their cultivation, their occupations, etc. As usual, they were so cool and way too simple-minded towards us to talk and brief us about themselves. You can find that there is no place as a sightseeing point here but we enjoyed this walk around the village of Rishyap to share the feeling. This helps me to energize when I come back to my city life with so much chaos and official routine work. We do really need some oxygen from this kind of off-beat Himalayan village so that our minds get refreshed and we get some energy to live long.
Coming back to the hotel at around 1:00 p.m., we took some rest. After being refreshed, we had our lunch in the restaurant area which is a nicely decorated place, and the guys who were helping us were very down to earth. We enjoyed their company and their food quality. We didn’t go very far after lunch as we were happy with the birds found in the early morning and we started enjoying checking the photographs taken all over the day. The next day early in the morning, we had a plan to go to the Tiffin Dara viewpoint again because of the richness of the area. We had a sixth sense telling us that we may get many more different kinds of birds in that area if we go again and again. So without wasting time, we went to that area from our Rosedell Inn hotel. Of course, we found a lot of new species again on this trail. I will mention the bird list of those areas on different days below.
Eventually, we found Rishyap is now a well-balanced birding destination with greeneries along with homestays. We think it is one of the bird watchers Paradise in March and April because you may get hundreds of uncommon Birds here very easily and in good perch. I would suggest you stay there for 2 to 3 days to do a good amount of birding so that it can be a fruitful birding tour for you. There are hundreds of homestays now in Rishyap but Rosedell Inn hotel is the best one right now because of the location firstly for the bird watchers. I do not recommend excessive development in the hilly areas or the villages but it is a need of the villagers. When it comes to their need, it is important to build some concrete homes or roads for them. So Rishyap is a must-go for the bird watchers still now.
Birds of Rishyap
| Large Hawk-Cuckoo (Hierococcyx sparverioides) |
| Ashy Drongo (Dicrurus leucophaeus) |
| Lesser Racket-tailed Drongo (Dicrurus remifer) |
| House Crow (Corvus splendens) |
| Green-backed Tit (Parus monticolus) |
| Whiskered Yuhina (Yuhina flavicollis) |
| Puff-throated Babbler (Pellorneum ruficeps) |
| Chestnut-crowned Laughingthrush (Trochalopteron erythrocephalum) |
| Rufous Sibia (Heterophasia capistrata) |
| Red-billed Leiothrix (Leiothrix lutea) |
| Verditer Flycatcher (Eumyias thalassinus) |
| Blue Whistling-Thrush (Myophonus caeruleus) |
| Green-tailed Sunbird (Aethopyga nipalensis) |
| Russet Sparrow (Passer cinnamomeus) |
| Barred Cuckoo-Dove (Macropygia unchall) |
| Common Cuckoo (Cuculus canorus) |
| Himalayan Swiftlet (Aerodramus brevirostris) |
| Great Barbet (Psilopogon virens) |
| Scarlet Minivet (Pericrocotus speciosus) |
| White-throated Fantail (Rhipidura albicollis) |
| Ashy Drongo (Dicrurus leucophaeus) |
| Gray-headed Canary-Flycatcher (Culicicapa ceylonensis) |
| Green-backed Tit (Parus monticolus) |
| Himalayan Black-lored Tit (Machlolophus xanthogenys) |
| Striated Bulbul (Pycnonotus striatus) |
| Ashy-throated Warbler (Phylloscopus maculipennis) |
| Yellow-browed Warbler (Phylloscopus inornatus) |
| Whistler’s Warbler (Phylloscopus whistleri) |
| Golden Babbler (Cyanoderma chrysaeum) |
| Streak-breasted Scimitar-Babbler (Pomatorhinus ruficollis) |
| Rufous Sibia (Heterophasia capistrata) |
| Rusty-fronted Barwing (Actinodura egertoni) |
| Red-billed Leiothrix (Leiothrix lutea) |
| White-tailed Nuthatch (Sitta himalayensis) |
| Rufous-bellied Niltava (Niltava sundara) |
| Common Rosefinch (Carpodacus erythrinus) |
| Olive-backed Pipit (Anthus hodgsoni) |
| Eurasian Tree Sparrow (Passer montanus) |
| Russet Sparrow (Passer cinnamomeus) |
| Green-tailed Sunbird (Aethopyga nipalensis) |
Rishop Episode 1 – https://youtu.be/ZEbIO6P48Eg
Rishop Episode 2 – https://youtu.be/doAn49aDZ50
Rishop Episode 3 – https://youtu.be/GxEK4srDfJA
Rosedell Inn Hotel
Upper Rishop, Dist. – Kalimpong, West Bengal 734319
Phone – 6291351029 / 9903009735
Email : info@rosedellinn.com / rosedellinn@gmail.com
https://rosedellinn.com/
Double Bed Room – 2750
Triple Bed Room – 3500 Food Package – 800+GST
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