Day1: After lot of snoring, we woke up at 5am with full of energy and got ready by 6am and were out in the road. Ravi was assigned to Sulliballe beat with forest officials (Appaji & K.Kumar) and Vinay and I was assigned to Barballe beat with forest officials (Mahesh, Kallappa). We were expecting a lot on the first day, when we entered the forest. it was full dark covered with fog, after entering the forest by 100mts there was a herd of deer which were staring us. On the first trail we saw the tiger trails (pug marks and scat)...seeing this we were so happy that for the first time and started to feel in our mind...yes we have a chance to see the Beast before leaving this census program. We also sighted some deers, samabar and elephants.
When we finished the trail and came to our base camp, Ravi and his team also arrived at 9.30am and they were very happy as they were the first team to sight the Beautiful Beast (Tiger). Myself and Vinay were happy for that and little bit disappointed...as we didn’t sight any. Had breakfast at Sumesh Hotel which is very close to the base camp and planned to visit places around, from there went to Bavli which is 8km from the base camp towards Kerala. We took bath in the river papanashi with the cold water and then after finishing the bath when step on the shore, we were surprised to see that there were some else too who was having bath next to us (snakes 7ft), after the bath then we moved towards Kerala and reached Kuruva Island which is just 6km from the border.
Visited the place and on the way back had lunch there itself (fish curry and rice) reached the base camp at 17:30 and at 18:00 went on a walk on the roadside to see if we can sight any animals. Saw a jeep coming and it stopped near us told us to get into the jeep..it was RFO jeep and dropped us near the check post. at 20:00 had dinner and slept around 21:30.
Day 2: We woke up at 5:45 and got ready for the transact line. In this we are supposed to travel 2km in straight line and every 200mts,400mts,800mts we need to count the trees surrounding of 15mts and count the droppings of animals on the line and come back in the same line and note down the animals found. Our guard Mahesh came at exact 6am and we started to the line, on the way he gave us some tips like as today we will be doing this transact line in the thick shrubs, so there could be a chance of elephant attacks...if there is a elephant attack..just run in different sides or else you can just lay down where you are. So this was our escape plan when there is an elephant attack.
We started further towards the forest and we walked inside to the transact line, it was 6ft and above thick shrubs both side ..we where walking in the small walk path and every 200mts counting the trees and animal droppings, it was really scary and everyone was on alert when were noting down the details as this was bit dangerous job in such a place with full of thick thorn shrubs and middle of no where to run sideways. We didn’t record any carnevous animals on the day and marked as dry day. In the afternoon we thought of going to Irrupu falls, some how this message had reached the Kumar (FO) we made a plan to escape from him, when he had gone to fresh up Ravi, Vinay and myself went to the check post and informed the guards over there that inform Kumar (RO) that we have gone to fill diesel for the car in HD Kote, and went on the Nagaraholle side. Reached Irrupu falls around 12:30 and took bath in the very cold water which flows and left at 2:00pm to Kutta had Fish meals and shopped some energy drinks (KF&McD).
Day 3: We started our trail at 6.20am and on the start we decided to roam in the places where the tigers are sighted more, on the way we also informed Mahesh to take us to different places rather the same old route. On the way around 7.00am RFO (Hiremat) also joined our trail and asked Kallappa to show us some tigers, Myself and Vinay thought today also it is dry day as the RFO is there and Mahesh will take us in the normal route :-( after walking for more than 30minutes we stopped for some rest and took the Devaragudi betta route walking in the route for not just 2minutes..Mahesh > Manju Sir Tiger nodi nodi nodi..every one walking in the straight line started to look around elli elli and Mahesh pointed out it is just opposite to us around 300-400mts away resting under a tree having early morning sun bath. I started to adjust the camera lens and all others came in my way and I thought better to see the tiger than capturing on camera. The tiger which was resting heard the noise and turned back to us ..this is where we came eye to eye contact with the tiger in the wild for the first time in our life. The movement was amazing..Seeing the beast is a beauty and the eye contact was creating nervous in our body still the contact was there..then it stood and took a leap into the woods by keeping an eye on us all this just took place in 20seconds. Myself and Vinay were very happy and feeling like jumping and shouting..but didn’t coz we were with in the forest. Immediately I wanted to share this with my loved ones, then I took my mobile and SMS all of them :-) Came out in the river banks of Kabini and on the way back saw the Arjuna elephant which was getting a bath from his trainer (mahvutha) took some snaps of it. Reached the base camp and informed all of the guards and people around of the sighting of the tiger, every one was feeling happy for us. Ravi and team also arrived and we ran to him and informed about the sighting and jumping. It was really a different experience watching the tiger in the wild than which is captured.
This moment will be remembered in our life :-).
Today we didn’t plan for anywhere just went on road side while starting got information that there was a road kill near Uddbur chain gate, followed the RFO jeep and reached the spot; sadly it was a Giant Squirrel which had met his last day. RFO noted the GPS reading and filed a report and informed to the senior officers from the spot and we continued till Uddbur gate for some sighting.
Team which were there with us for these 3days:
We reached the camp and had some black tea in Sumesh Hotel our Taj Hotel and got a call from RFO, rushed immediately to the office and RFO was in his chair with lot of people around and he wanted me to help him in distributing the new comers to the spots. I took the chance and did as he wanted and every one was happy. In that we also had to move to a different spot which is on the way to Bavali. Around 5:30pm we also moved to a different spot with Shivanad Hombal to Hosur (machur), everyone in the Balle was little bit sad as we were moving to a different spot. We reached the new place at 6.00pm and got settled over there. Had a walk with Shivanad around 8:30pm in the dark near the borders of Kerala, where he informed there is lot wood smugglings happen in this area so he had a habit of visiting the river banks on random time/days. Had dinner at 9:30pm and slept in the new place.
Day 4: Every one had good snoring sleep till 5:00 and started our transact line in the new place hoping to see some animals. Before coming to this place we had heard rumors that this is a anitpoaching camp rather animal sighting is very poor. With our hopes we thought let us see the new side and started at 6:30am and it was really thick forest with lot of plantation of teak, matti, betta trees. did some counting of the trees and literally we were not in a mood to do the transact line and we reached soon the base camp had breakfast and came back to our Taj to have some tea and breakfast. Reached back the base camp early as today we were moving to a different spot which in deep inside the forest spending rest of the two days over there, hearing this we were excited and geared up and started our journey at 4:30pm the walk was nearly 5km from the road, reached the spot (Suthna halla camp) which means camp is surrounded by water ditches.
It was really the best place to be there with no connection to the outer world, where ever you see it is only the trees and sound of birds and sound of the stream which was flowing near the camp.
The stream was our pool and Jacuzzi; we decided to have a bath over there. The water was nearly 3 degree and we wanted to be like that ..after so much of walk and sweat..we needed that to be like that. By the time we completed the bath. the guards had started preparing for dinner (rice, brinjal sambar) after the bath we were resting..we started to realize that there are some intruders which have attacked our body..which are biting generously almost every where, then we started to act like monkey..searching for the intruders (unni) on our body.........we found N number of unni's climbing our body to the thickest forests on our chest and were drinking blood coolly. We found N number of unni's climbing our body to the thickest forests on our chest and were drinking blood coolly. Today we realise roaming in the forest is not a easy tasks..where we need to bare all these and move forward.
Day 5: Woke up at 6:30am and started our trail line roaming in the forest, this was our first trail line in Suthnahalla camp. We were excitied as well and started the trail.... we walked and walked after 1hr we spotted an elephant and one sambar in this trail line. We decided to come back to the camp early and had our breakfast and also packed the breakfast for the way. We started to walk around 11am towards the famous camp DB Kuppe camp.
Video of packing the breakfast:
The camp is really a very good place built in 1932. This is camp is very near to Kerala border and accessible by jeep taxi from Kerala border. After resting for some 30minutes we left the Kaymara camp and headed towards the kudare sath halla camp which is on the way to our camp (Suthnahalla Camp). the camp was okay and the team which stayed there told that they also didn’t sight any tiger/leopard. We had black tea over there and headed towards our base camp (Suthnahalla Camp). We reached the camp around 1800hrs and were exhausted as the total walk around 20+km, this was really the best walk in the forest. We had bath in our pool in moon light which was really amazing. Then rested outside till the dinner was ready, we started to search for unni which was allover our body like the monkeys do....searching for something in their body. Slept at around 2100hrs, this was our last sleep in Middle of the jungle. We all decided that we leave early in the morning and reach the Machaur camp early, so that we can start early too.
Day 6: Woke up at 5:50am and every one got busy in packing things, had some black tea..and did some photo shoot near the pool and with the guards.
Reached the machur camp nearly at 8000hrs, as we walked lazily in the forest, coz it was our last day so. Then packed all things and put in the car which was left out, greeted every one and started towards Balle camp at 8.30 and had our Breakfast first and waited for other guards to come from the trails...in the mean time we did a photo shoot of Ramani (baby elephant) and Vinod and shared our telephone numbers with Vinod. We left the camp around 11:30 and headed towards the Concrete Jungle (Bengaluru) with lot of memories and new friends and the experience within the forest and the moments spend with.. this was the ultimate experience which will not get all the time.
