Debasis Bose
01-09-2016, 08:58 AM
It was early winter morning of 25th Dec with temperature hovering around 4°C, ours was the first jeep on the beaten forest track, looking for the pug marks. We decided to give a try for the dominant male of Khinanouli, we crossed Ramsingh road and proceed towards a place called rohini padao, when all of us on the gypsy had a feeling that some strange noise was floating in the air, the driver of gypsy stopped and switched off the ignition to hear the sound. OMG, the silence of dawn in the forest was broken by a long deep roar tapering off into a guttural sound…...... ‘aaaaaaaaooun…aaaaaaaoungh’… unmistakable roar of a tiger, followed by silence. With the magic sound that needs to be heard, felt and appreciated........had pumped up our adrenaline vigorously; at one moment I could hear my own heartbeat. All of us on the gypsy suddenly went motionless in the posture we were in and started staring in the direction of the sound. After few seconds we saw her striped majesty slowly softly padding through the rock bed of seasonal stream called sot in local language.
For me time seemed to have stopped when was woken up by an urgent excited call of the guide “woh raha ek aur tiger” and there he was his royal majesty staring at us from about a distance roughly about 50 to 60 plus minus meters.
The reason Corbett national park is a forest older than time itself because…. if one carefully observes the dead standing tree branching off towards the center of the frame, at the bifurcation on the top an cm below the upper side, above center of the frame is holding a rock bigger than a size of football that may have rolled down the mighty Himalayas many years ago. Inferring that the tree during her growing days have caught the rolling stone from the sot during rainy season in her bifurcating branch, when the water level may have been quite high. The rock has seen the tree through her lifetime, and many hundred of tigers. It was a sight to behold, still can recollect the moment that cannot be described in words, one needs to be there to get the feel.
Nikon, Nikor 70-200 F 2.8, ISO 2500, 1/250s
For me time seemed to have stopped when was woken up by an urgent excited call of the guide “woh raha ek aur tiger” and there he was his royal majesty staring at us from about a distance roughly about 50 to 60 plus minus meters.
The reason Corbett national park is a forest older than time itself because…. if one carefully observes the dead standing tree branching off towards the center of the frame, at the bifurcation on the top an cm below the upper side, above center of the frame is holding a rock bigger than a size of football that may have rolled down the mighty Himalayas many years ago. Inferring that the tree during her growing days have caught the rolling stone from the sot during rainy season in her bifurcating branch, when the water level may have been quite high. The rock has seen the tree through her lifetime, and many hundred of tigers. It was a sight to behold, still can recollect the moment that cannot be described in words, one needs to be there to get the feel.
Nikon, Nikor 70-200 F 2.8, ISO 2500, 1/250s