Day 4 4th May 2012 – 2.30 pm
Within 10 minutes of entering the jungle and just within around a couple of kilometres of the Moharli gate, we saw the ‘Big Boss’ of Tadoba – a full grown male. As per our guide, when he was younger, he used to chase the gypsies, but now he has stopped doing those petty activities. He was going into one of the waterholes after a heavy meal.
He sat in the water for a long time, with only head out and he was watching the cars that were queued up, curiously but evidently he didn’t care.
After around 45 minutes or so, he planned to leave and disappear into the jungle.
As he vanished, we also moved on. A Sambar was really in a curious mood.
Another family were in a deep thought whether to cross the road or not.
But this family decided to cross the road.
Inspired perhaps by the deers, the sambars also crossed the road.
And once they did, they were still curiously staring at us, as if they are watching some strange animal, while they are on the safari!
Moving on, we came to the place where we got the glimpse – a long glimpse – of the tigers in the morning and the place again did not disappoint us. One tiger was sitting beneath a tree.
He was watching the group of spotter deer, sambar who came to drink some water from the lake, just besides him.
There were too many of them.
We hoped to see a chase, but in vain. The big cat was still sitting but he was not bothered by so many food items.
Almost for half an hour we waited, but no movement from him, so we checked out from that place and went to a nearby waterhole, where another tiger was on a playful chase to a couple of spotted deers.
But he returned in vain and we were more disappointed than him perhaps.
After so much diligence, he planned to take a bath and dipped himself into the water.
Bathing and drinking as well.
After some time he also planned to leave.
This safari made us really ecstatic. Even Bantu and Roshan, for whom the tiger sightings are considered almost a daily ritual, were in a jolly mood – anyway they are always smiling faces.
On our way back we watched a curious thing. A skull of a sambar was hanging from a tree.
The day was not over yet, returning back we saw the ‘Big Boss’ again leaving into the jungle from his waterhole – he spends most of his time here only.
We planned to take a round of Teliya lake, but couldn’t see anything but a spotted deer to start with.
The sky looked amazingly clear.
So was the surrounding under the setting sun.
The lonely watch tower, once again:
End of the day, the birds were returning to their nests just like us.
Grazing deers:
Amazing reflection of sun light:
A dancing peacock, who showed us its back only:
The sun was setting fast now at the horizon:
We returned to MTDC, literally speechless – today was indeed the day of tigers.
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