Sundarban Mini-trip

[Rishi]

Day 2: 25/12/2017

Photo of the fogged forest taken at 6:15am in the morning as we reached the jetty, while some of the team were still sipping bed-tea!

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The vessel finally left at 7:00. We were late even by winter standards. By this time you are supposed to be already halfway inside the forest...

Anyway, the Sajnekhali Wildlife Sanctuary makes up most of the tourism zone of the Sundarban Tiger Reserve. The forest office is just on the other side of the river from the hotel's & rest houses, where you make a stop to issue permits.

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In the complex there is a hatching centre of the critically endangered River terrapin turtle (Batagur Baska)...

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And a mini botanical garden to acquiant people to the mangrove species.

And then, onward to the Sundarbans.

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First stop... the Sudhanyakhali camp.

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Although right at the edge of the reserve, the watch-tower here is famous for famous sightings like THIS & THIS.

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The camps basically consists of a watch-tower and a elevated, fenced approach to it, similar to a canopy walk.

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In front of the tower typically a fresh water pond is dug & holding rainwater. This draws the animals towards it as they prefer drinking it over the saline water or the canals & creeks.

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Also there are ong 20-25 metres wide stretches of artificial clearings, called "observation lines". The idea is that the wildlife, that would otherwise be inside thick jungle would be sighted as they cross there open stretches.

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By the time we were there or was already almost 9:00am. 

All i could sight was this water monitor...

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But the mud below was dotted with literally hundreds of deer hoofmarks, not more than a few hours old. They'd been there that morning itself. Even the mud they kicked off was still wet (the area floods at high tide).

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Also, the camp was visited by a male tiger 2 days ago at dawn. The pug-mark got faint, but still was recognisable.
They kept a brick (Indian standard: 10×15×25 cms) to its left. Compared with that, it should be some 13-14cms in dimension.

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From there we headed for Dobanki camp, through the forests' channels (The wider ones. Entering the narrow creeks is forbidden as boats might get stuck in mud).

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The journey is meant to take the whole day as you reach it by afternoon, another drinking time for animals.

This is the part where you actually get to feel the Sundarbans. It was nothing like my previous experiences in the fringe forests!

What especially struck me was how very quiet it was. @SuSpicious @Pckts @Apollo & whoever have been in safari at India's mainland jungles can confirm how loud it is there. You'll hear birds & monkeys on every other tree, shrieking at the top of their voice & decoding those sounds decide your sighting chances. But not here...
It almost felt like a haunted forest, shrouded in a veil of silence. You can hear absolutely nothing other than the faint rumble of the boat's engine.

Here you don't just have a sighting, you earn it...
The vegetation is too thick for anything beyond a metre inside to be seen...

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The leaves on the trees form a perfect line, indicating the level to which the water rises during the high-tides. When we went was just after Vora Kotal, the time of full/no moon when Sun-Earth-Moon are aligned resulting in the water rising higher with tides, almost 2.5 metres!

See that one metre odd gap between the leaves & the land? 
That dark shadowed part is what you keep scanning until your eyes ache.

I would say the "safari" itself was extremely dry. Saw a few crocs, but too far to be caught in my 10-years-old 8 Megapixels, 5X zoom. 
There were birds, almost a dozen species i could identify.. & more importantly, locate. But their frequency of occurrence was very underwhelming & they kept their distance. Only this fishing eagle was in the open...

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Same for deers. We sighted multiple, but either alone or in groups as small as half a dozen, munching inside the undergrowth.

I guess they know the designated route for the boats to pass & don't frequent that area.

Little after noon, the tides started coming in & the rivers began to swell.
You could feel the sea-water backflow into the river as the vessel under you swayed.

The trees & mudflats got engulfed by gushing waves.

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Soon we moved into a wide river and you couldn't see either sides from the middle.

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The motor-boats that i thought was too big really felt tiny now...

A bunch of monkey greets at the Dobanki camp.

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From the watch-tower i saw a majestic Cheetal stag, grazing along the pond. Was a bit too far for my camera though...

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It was dusk when we reached Pakhirala back along the wide river along the outer edge of the forest.

While i've been typing this the clock had ticked past 12:00. So, HAPPY NEW YEAR to all! Reply