Tuesday, July 29, 2014

The Great Indian Summer Tiger Trail - Part II - Jim Corbett National Park

Wildlife trips are never short of uncertainty, excitement and, at times, disappointments. Sometimes, however, uncertainty can turn the excitement in to a big disappointment even before the trip starts. While Ranthambore was an all boys escapade, Corbett was going to be a family trip. One fine morning, a few days before leaving for the trip, the missus called from office, and in a very low voice, informed that she would have to cancel the trip due to some last-minute commitment at work. After a lot of deliberation (and some persuasion) we finally decided that she would stay back and the rest of us would carry on with the trip (part of the reason behind this decision was that none of our bookings were refundable!!). This led to another problem though!! While the two couples and their kids were booked at Club Mahindra in Corbett, the missus and me had planned to stay at The Wild Crest which was around 5kms away from the Club Mahindra property.

As it turned out, this was not that big a problem after all. One, the couples were more than accommodative and hosted me at their place for a couple of nights; and two, I like having some space to myself. We had pre-booked our safaris through a gentleman who is supposedly well known for his knowledge and tracking skilss - Mr. Ramesh Suyal. I had read about him online and was really impressed with what people had to say about him; plus his charges were reasonable and in line with what the hotel and others had quoted. I had left the choice of the safari timings (morning/afternoon) and zones (there are five). He advised that we do mostly afternoon safaris as the chances of spotting are higher around evening, and that we focus on the Bijrani zone that has the maximum density (the best zone is Dhikala, however you cannot enter that zone unless you are staying in the Government-owned Forest Rest House there - highly recommended that you stay there; we couldnt as bookings are done well in advance and we were late). We ended up booking two morning safaris as we also had interests in birding and early morning would be the best time to spot these little beauties.

Tuesday, July 22, 2014

The Great Indian Summer Tiger Trail - Part I - Ranthambore National Park

This year was going to be an exciting summer. Not only had I planned my jungle trails in advance, I had not one but two jungle trips planned. One would imagine what a summer it was going to turn into with trips planned to two large Tiger abodes - The Ranthambore National Park and the Jim Corbett National Park.

Well, to be honest, the original plan was to go to the very famous Tadoba Tiger Reserve, however, do to unavailability of safari permits, we decided to go to The Ranthambore National Park. A tiger lover paradise, the Ranthambore National Park is one of the largest national parks in northern India. This approximately 400 sq km forest is said to have housed around 50 Tigers once, however, that number is lower now due to poaching - an activity witnessed in almost all big and small forests in our country. Not just the density of tigers, but this park is also known for housing some of the most ferocious wild cats, that have fancy names and even more interesting stories. For instance, one of most recited stories of this park is how Machali (T-16), the royal tigress, fought with a 14 foot long crocodile. And mind you, this is not the only story that you will hear about Machali or the tiger reverse.

This was our first group trip to a jungle; hitherto we had always booked private jeep safaris for the two-three of us friends. However, this time around we decided to join a group being led by one of our most trusted wild life travel arrangers - the guys at Junglelore. Over a long weekend, these guys were taking two groups of around 25 individuals each in a canter (roofless bus) for a group safari. While we were a little anxious and apprehensive in going along with so many people - for a number of reasons: a) it is simply inconvenient to take photographs with 20 other people trying to do the same, b) the canter is generally higher than a jeep and thus you cannot photograph the animal from the eye level, c) more people = more noise (or chaos), and d) we feared that not everyone may be interested in wildlife other than the tiger and that would spoil our chances of photographing birds. Thankfully, none of that was true and it was a fun group to be part of, with enough opportunities to photograph birds and animals alike. In fact, we think that these group trips are a good way to ensure that you can do multiple jungle trips in a season on a tight budget.