Day 4: Bandhavgarh National Park
We got up early the next morning to meet our jeep so we could be one of the first to enter the park. This would guarantee us a spot on one of the elephant safari. We waited for an hour and our jeep never arrived! We were really angry. We saw many other jeeps from other lodges heading towards the park while we were outside freezing in the cold. Pavan, our driver, finally arrived and said the jeep had broken down and he had to fix it. It was tough to blame him since these things happen. But we felt luck was against us. Instead of being at the head of the line to enter the park, we ended up last in a very long line of jeeps! There was no hope for getting on an elephant safari. Also, as you enter the park, you are assigned a route that you must take. The first jeeps to enter are given the more promising routes. Since we were last we were given what was considered a less promising route for seeing a tiger. Although tigers roam all over and you really never know where they will be. It also took a very long time just to enter the park since each jeep in front of us had to get through the paperwork process to enter. It was torture standing there in line. We were very distraught and were already thinking about getting things right for the next day. We finally made our way into the park as dawn was approaching. Amazingly, within 10 minutes, we stumbled upon the Chorbehra tigress and her two 8 month old cubs! She had just made a kill (probably within the hour!) of a large Sambar deer right next to the road that we were assigned. Only one other jeep was at the scene. This had to be one of the rarest, luckiest things that had ever happened to us! Since the kill was right next to the road, and the fact that the mother and cubs had just fed, they were very relaxed and wanting to hang out near the kill. They ignored us. The mother was just resting after her monumental effort in taking down an animal that must have been twice her weight. The cubs were happily playing with one another. We got to spend an entire hour observing them which is pretty much unheard of. The new camera lens really paid off. It was still quite dark but since we had so much time, we got many amazing shots. After this experience, we felt we really had to do our part in protecting wild tigers. We started volunteering for an organization called Saving Wild Tigers and gave some talks in town to inform people about their plight. Here is the majestic Chorbehra Tigress keeping an eye on her cubs.
Here is a rare shot of the Tigress with her two cubs. The kill is near the bottom right hand side of the picture but really isn't visible.
This next shot is probably one of the best pictures I've ever taken. The male cub was feeding at the kill and then looked at me through bamboo. You can even see blood on his whiskers. When I took the shot it was so dark I had no idea I had captured this moment!
This is the female cub, who was smaller than the male, relaxing.
The male cub bounded around majestically making incredibly athletic moves. We have two kitty cats at home and it was fascinating to see these tigers jumping and playing in a similar manner. Obviously they were so much bigger than our cats so it was a sight to behold.
The cubs were not at all affected by our vehicles. Here is another one of my favorite shots as the male cub approaches us. At just eight months old, he was already so impressive. It made us wonder what his father B2 must look like! We were told the Chorbehra Tigress probably weights 300 lbs and B2 probably comes in at over 500 lbs!
After an hour of observation, the park warden made his way to the area and cleared it out. A few more jeeps had heard the news and they were lined up behind us. But we had the best view. The warden wanted the area cleared since the kill was so close to the road and the tigers should not be disturbed. We heard, that later elephant safaris had come to this area in the hope of seeing this scene but Chorbehra had moved the kill and the family couldn't be located. It was quite a lesson for me. After feeling so unlucky with the jeep breaking down, getting into the park last, etc. things couldn't have turned out better. One just never knows what is coming around the corner! But we really felt we owed the tigers something after this experience. Once we left the area, Pavan said it was time to look for birds since they would have started becoming active. We saw two adorable spotted owlets. The one at the bottom is at the entrance of her nest. At the time I didn't realize this scene was also remarkable due to our close encounter with the tigers. But looking back, this is also an amazing scene.
The second day at Bandhavgarh has to go down as one of most amazing days for all of our travels. Seeing wild tigers for over an hour as close quarters cannot be described in words! I hope our son Aditya gets the chance to see them when he is old enough to appreciate it and hopefully tigers will exist in the wild for generations to come.