Tiger spotting in Bandhavgarh

You can barely imagine the insincerity with which I cheerfully accepted an invitation by a friend at Syna Tiger Resort for a two-day visit to Bandhavgarh National Park in Madhya Pradesh. I am known among friends for my fear of wild animals. But I had genuine reasons for the cynicism; one being that I saw no amusement in meddling with the business of fellows who won't think twice before shredding me to pieces, and having me for lunch. But I packed my bag and was off to Jabalpur, about 170 kms from the resort in Bandhavgarh. As I stepped off the plane on a chilly Jabalpur evening, I realised my first mistake. While I was carrying warm clothes, I had missed a very crucial detail - what is warm enough for Mumbai, is not nearly warm enough in MP. Not even close. The drive to the resort was pleasant. Had it not been so cold, I would've stuck my head out of the car and taken in the cleanest air I have chanced upon in years. We tore through the hills like, a Formula 1 car on a circuit, and the credit goes to our 20-year-old driver. On hindsight, had he not told me his age, I might have enjoyed the ride a lot more. The resort was grand with the quintessential house-amidst-wildlife feel to it. It added to the experience, perhaps. The structure was all-natural with a lot of wood, predominantly sal and teak, incorporated into the design. A short walk around the resort led us to 15 luxury cottages, themed after 15 of the 25 Indian states. The host later told me that artisans from each state were specially brought in to carve in the teak wood furniture. With a jeep coming in for our safari ride at 5.30 am the next morning, it was time to call it a night. Area 1, 2, 3 Next morning, as I struggled to make it on time (fighting intense grogginess and six degree temperatures outside), we finally headed for Area 3 — the newest of the three forest areas accessible to tourists. Right outside the area, we saw a tiger's pugmarks. Our guide, (whose complicated name I just couldn't get a hang of), told us that the famed beast is close by and that luck is on our side. That was the closest 'sighting' of the day. For six hours, with a break in between, our jeep circled around Area 3 and 2 looking for the tiger to step out for a snack or a stroll. By the end of it, everyone on the jeep was suffering from tiger vision: loosely defined as everything that moved in the forest - from spotted deer to baboons to trees - be accused of looking like a tiger. Bandhavgarh is surprisingly wellconserved. The forest officials take care to ensure that everything that grows in the forest, stays and eventually decays in the forest. The guides and drivers - mostly tribals from nearby villages - treat the tiger with utmost respect. Each beast is part of local folklore and treated like royalty, and why not? The economy of the entire area, including about a dozen five star resorts in the neighbourhood, is single-paw-edly run by tigers. The driver, in his bid to cheer us up, said, "You always find a tiger at Bandhavgarh in three attempts." Tiger kill I woke up next morning, determined to put the disappointment of not spotting the elusive stripes behind me. On our way to Area 2, I was imagining a tiger, if not an an entire royal tiger family, passing by and posing for my camera as I went trigger happy with it. The thought that it might choose to jump on the jeep and tear me down didn't really feature around then. Within half hour at Area 2 and day-dreaming, I heard a warning call — made by monkeys to alert others that a tiger was on the prowl. After 15 minutes of driving around, we came across about a dozen jeeps with them excitedly pointing in one direction. It was a tiger kill, a barking deer which were in abundance at the national park. One of the guides said that it was a tigress and her two cubs, waiting for us to calm down so that they can come out and feast on the kill in peace. For more than an hour, we waited for the tiger family to show up, ready to burst into a frenzy of camera flashes as soon as they showed up. Some of us, namely me, were ready to burst for other reasons too, read — bladder. Then, about 100 metres from the jeep, the celebrities emerged. The kids were playing among themselves, running around but never too far away from the mother. They noticed us taking their pictures and maintained distance. The sight of the family left me speechless; my very first sighting. Some like me were admiring the sight and looking enviously at those with large cameras with lenses the size of an elephant's trunk. Colourful spiders, spotted deer, barking deer, and other unidentified flying objects, scientifically classified as birds were easy to capture, but the tigers were just too far for my eight-megapixel camera. After half an hour of watching the cubs running around the place, taking bites from the kill as and when they pleased and slowly dragging it towards their mom to please her, it was time for us to leave as it was turning dark. I wasn't ready yet and begged the driver to wait but, better sense prevailed.