Sunderban With Friends

I have been to Sunderban a number of times. Normally we do a day trip. Go early in the morning to reach Gadkhali at around 7.30/8 am. Park the car there. Get into the boat right away. Travel the whole day. Come back to Gadkhali by night fall. Reach home by 10 pm. I had stayed there only on two occasions. This time when Suranjan organised it, he made it a point to make it a 2 nights and three days affair. 

We would start Friday morning (6th November, 2020). Reach Gadkhali as early as possible and travel the entire day in the tiger reserve. Come back to a hotel in Dayapur to spend the night there at a resort. We would travel the next day the whole day in the tiger reserve and again come back for the night to Dayapur. On Sunday also we travel the whole day but by evening we go back to Gadkhali from where we go back home. It is hectic but with friends it is doable. After all we need not walk or sit still in a vehicle.

The arrangements would be done by a guy called Surajit Sarkar (9007820752) who runs a nature travel and tour company called Ichhe Dana (we organise the day trips ourselves). So we need not bother about anything like driving our own car or hiring the boat, food, guide, organising the hotel etc. Despite my initial skepticism and cynicism, Surajit turned out to be a nice affable guy. He is fairly knowledgeable about birds and animals, being a photographer himself and he also seemed to know Sunderban fairly well. He charged us Rs 13,000 per head for the entire trip, which I think is quite reasonable. If I was planning a similar trip I would ask Surajit for help. I can quite endorse the guy. But he doesn't seem very business savvy, which might be bad for his business, in the long run.

The Innova picked us up one by one, starting with Suranjan. I was the second to get in followed by Sumit. Next to be picked up from Peerless hospital was Sujoy Bala. Partha meanwhile came to Metro Cash & Carry from where he got into our car. Shyamal dropped him there and drove back. This was my first trip with Sujoy. He turned out to be a very nice and friendly companion, though much junior to us. I was the only non-doctor in this group. But by now I have got quite used to the endless chats about Calcutta's medical malpractices, discussions about various wrong procedures and treatments done on hapless patients by other doctors, and of course the various CNMC student or professor stories. If I wanted I could easily bluff my way out of any situation where I needed to prove that I was a student of CNMC from mid-80s. The four of them were equally divided between CNMC and CMC.

We had one small tea break on the way to Gadkhali after Baruipur. The car did not have enough boot space for the luggage of all 5 of us. Each had a camera bag and a medium sized suitcase. But Sujoy was very accommodative. He sat on the last row with the rest of the seat stuffed with the suitcases. Partha was also very accommodative and took the hopeless middle seat without a grudge.  

We reached Gadkhali in good time, despite the terrible road conditions after Canning. After reaching Gadkhali we got into the boat right away and the journey started in right earnest. We all noticed that the boat had an unusually quiet engine. By Sunderban standards it was almost quiet.

Those who may not know about Sunderban - during the first hour or so from Gadkhali the launch travels through inhabited islands. This part of the journey is quite boring for us. There is no trace of any forest here. Gosaba island is on your left hand side and Bali island is on the right hand side. You might see some birds on the banks but no chance of any tiger or crocodiles here. We saw several Pacific Golden Plovers and a striated heron on this stretch. I tested my camera and realised that some error was being caused and the camera was asking me to switch off and on again. This was working for a short while and again the problem would crop up. This problem persisted for the entire duration of the trip. The camera was trying to get back at me for not using her for such a long time. The problem hasn't recurred since I came back. I think I will just have to shoot with it more often. Somewhere during this journey through the inhabited islands the two guides got into our boat. I had noted down the number of Himangshu Mandal because he stayed with us for all three days. 

If you are curious about village life in Sunderbans you might catch some glimpses of the villagers going about their daily life. Mostly you can see people walking or cyclings on the roads on either side of the river. You might even see a family getting into a boat to go to the other side. Fisherwomen can also be seen catching "min" with their nets. Life looks boring and dull. These are also the villages - you must know - from where a very large number of unsuspecting young girls are unfortunately trafficked to the red light districts of the country. But that's another story for another day. We will not talk about sad stories of human existence. We will talk about nature, birds and tigers.

We entered the reserve forest at around 11 or so. The reserve forest is on the other side of the huge river Bidyadhari. Here there is no question of any human habitation. This is a huge area of small delta islands criss-crossed by river channels. Some are wide while some are narrow. The reserve forest area has some rules. The launch as well as the passengers need to have permission from the forest department. This was done in advance for us. During the journey the engine of the launch cannot even be switched off and the launch cannot be kept stationary anywhere. The launch can only cover the wider rivers and not enter the smaller, narrower channels. 

What are the chances of tiger attacks on the launch? Extremely unlikely. There is no known history of any tiger attack on a tourist launch in Sunderban. Because tigers cannot jump out of water. Do the tigers come to the villages? No. The sides of the forest facing habited islands are all covered by strong nets. Tigers cannot cross these nets. Since this practice was started there have been very few tiger attacks in the villages. They have happened only when storms have destroyed the nets. 

Then how do so many humans get killed in Sunderban? 

The villagers enter the reserve forest in small hand pulled dinghy to collect crabs which have very high market value. A few successful trips can make you rich enough to afford your own house. This activity of entering the reserve in small manual boats is completely illegal. So they take the chance and enter the small rivulets and channels. These are so narrow that the tiger can jump from the land and grab at least one human. Some survive the fight (I once met a guy who survived a fight with cut marks all over his body) but most cannot fight back and are therefore killed.  

There is another legal way to enter the forest. That is to collect honey. I do not know how it can be legal but apparently it is. Groups of eight nine people are allowed in during certain seasons by the forest department. Tiger attacks on such teams is also quite common. 

The boatmen and the guides all told us that the urban conception that poverty drives the people of Sunderban to take such high risks with their lives is completely wrong. It is greed that drives these people to take such risks rather than poverty, they said. No one is so poor as to not have any other means of livelihood. I am quite ready to buy this theory because these people who go to catch crabs are not employed by anyone. They are all entrepreneurs. No one would take this risk for someone else driven by poverty. We love to believe that poverty is the root of all our miseries. I think lifestyle, greed and lack of proper education is the root problem of many of our miseries. Of course they are not a very affluent society but not so poor as to risk dying for food.

Our first day's safari yielded nothing much but the usual suspects. A few crocodiles (you get to see crocs only if there are less boats and this time due to covid there was hardly any tourist boat), a few black capped kingfishers, collared kingfishers, lesser adjutant storks etc. The big cat eluded us once again. We saw some waders also. Our wish list had white-bellied sea eagle, fishing or jungle cat (preferably both), brown winged kingfisher, peregrine falcon and of course Dakshin Ray - the other name for tiger (villagers don't normally take the name of dangerous animals - they say Dakshin Ray for tiger, or Lata for snakes etc). 

Actually seeing a tiger in Sunderban is a rare privilege and happens purely by chance. It should be on the radar of everyone. You cannot do anything special in Sunderban so that you are guaranteed to see the tiger. You just need to be in the right place at the right time. Lady luck has to smile on you. There is no guaranteed spot, there is no strategy, nothing. It just happens or does not happen. I know people, including very famous naturalists, who have been to Sunderban more than 40 times and have spent days on end yet haven't seen a tiger. Dhritiman Mukherjee, the famous internationally awarded wildlife photographer, hasn't seen one since 2006. 

Arrangements for food in Surajit's boat was grand. Breakfast was luchi, tarkari, boiled eggs and bananas. Lunch was rice, daal, prawn and fish curry. All cooked brilliantly well on board by a cook from Gosaba. 

By sun down we came back to Dayapur and anchored the boat near the hotel. Riverside Hotel. It is a large sprawling resort with two large buildings for rooms and a separate office building. We were allotted three rooms for the three of us. I chose to be alone. Partha and Sumit took one room (they work in the same hospital) and Sujoy and Suranjan took another room. My room was in a different building where I was the only occupant. There were few other guests but the resort was definitely not fully booked.

I thought the room was decently large with a nice bathroom. The geyser was good. The resort had good physical infrastructure but the people were very unfriendly it seemed. Untrained locals. I took a long hot shower and went to Partha's room for the evening party where we had an authentic Russian Vodka brought by Partha. Surajit had sent a large container full of chilly fish to go with the Vodka which like the morning breakfast and lunch was absolutely delicious.

We had our dinner cooked by Surajit's cook in the boat. We retired for the night at well past 10 pm to wake up early next morning so that we could go out by 5 am.

Ranthambore Jaipur Road Trip 2016

A note for the unknown reader. 
This is a long and perhaps boring account of our family road trip of 2016 to Jaipur and Agra. While you are most welcome to read it, it is written for the few of us who took the journey. These memories stay on if we jot them down. I don't expect anyone else to read this personal account of a rather ordinary journey. If you came here trying to look for information on the road or a similar journey please feel free to drop me a line at sudiptoroy17@gmail.com . I shall certainly help you with up to date and important information about the route.

We had planned this trip well in advance. Quite a few months in advance in fact. I do not normally do this but given that we wanted to stay in Ranthambore's high demand RTDC property Jhumar Baori we thought it would be prudent to book it as early as possible. Arijit, my forester friend in Rajasthan, asked me not to worry about the jungle safaris at all and it would be taken care of. Otherwise I was worrying about how and when to book them. These days one has to do these bookings exactly 90 days in advance. The safaris become "house full" almost instantly in the middle of the night when they open. My worries about safaris doubled when my friend Dadu announced he would come with his family to join us and made it my responsibility to book the safaris. It is an extremely welcome decision but now instead of one jeep we probably need two !!!  

As I discovered later - Arijit is the king of Rajasthan forest. Everything got taken care of. In fact on the last safari of our stay we were allotted a forest guard with walkie talkie. He even unlocked a few locks in the forest to move from zone to zone. We really felt like VIPs :-) I am not giving any details here in public but I guess short of bringing the tiger in front of you with folded hands, Arijit can get anything done. And my fears were completely unfounded.

Our Vehicle

Pic taken in Delhi Zoo, 2014

Our trusted friend - the white Duster - performed flawlessly over the entire journey of 3300 km, including a 900 km+ almost non-stop 16-hour drive. Of course it's a relatively new car with the odo showing only 21K plus when we started. Since absolutely nothing happened to the vehicle there isn't anything much to say really, except that this itself is a big deal. Not even a puncture. No one stopped us to check the papers. No nothing. We just filled diesel and kept driving. Prior to the trip I scrupulously learnt how to take off the spare wheel and put it back on. Not a very easy thing to do, given that the wheel hangs in a cradle under the body of the vehicle. Even bought a 12 volt Goodyear tyre inflator on the last day. That's a good long term investment though. 

Now back to the road trip. 

Our route. 
The route to Jaipur from Calcutta is very simple and straight forward. You just follow NH2 (now it has been renamed as NH19) to go right up to Agra. On the way you have Burdwan, Asansol, Dhanbad, Pareshnath, Dehri-on-Sone, Benares, Allahabad, Kanpur, Etawah, Shikohabad, Firozabad. From Agra you turn left towards Jaipur. Many in Calcutta think that you have to go to Jaipur via Delhi probably because that's the normal train route. For road travelers the left turn from Agra goes to Jaipur and right turn goes to Delhi via superfast Yamuna Expressway. The entire stretch of road from Calcutta to Jaipur is a four-laned modern road. Except when you are entering the cities for the night, there is absolutely no way you could get confused.

Day 1. Calcutta to Benares. 21099 km to 21797 km

So on day one our plan was to drive till Benares, as we always do. It's a reasonable distance of 675 km which we normally do in 10 hours or so. This time I was aware of some road construction work so estimated a couple of hours more.

We started off at 4.30 am from home. We knew there would be bad roads from Durgapur to Asansol due to widening of the four laned road and construction of numerous underpasses. But what were not prepared for was the jam on NH6 from Kona to Bally. It took us three long hours to clear the Dankuni toll plaza - a distance that normally takes half an hour. It is one of the worst traffic jams I have ever faced in life. There is nothing you can do in such situations. You have trucks all around you. No one knows why the jam is or how long it will take to come out of it. You just wait patiently and take every opportunity to move ahead by ten feet or more. We finally realised the jam was due to an extremely clogged Delhi Road near Dankuni. But that's of little consolation.

Due to this delay when we hit Panagarh it was already 9.30-ish and peak hour traffic was just about starting in this heavily populated and urbanised part of the road which was already going through road expansion related diversions and dislocations. Movement was at a snail's pace through the Durgapur-Asansol corridor due to huge truck volume and local traffic was also heavy. To further aggravate the situation Mampu started feeling nauseated and requested me to stop the vehicle for a while to throw up !!! Luckily for her and me it was in a place where I could afford to stop.

In the diversion confusion at one place (what was earlier known as Chowringhee Morh near Sitarampur) I even started going towards Chittaranjan by mistake !!! We came back to the highway via Kalyaneswari temple resulting in a short detour and a loss of about 20 minutes. The entry into Jharkhand over Barakar bridge was surprisingly smooth.

The stretch of road through Jharkhand and Bihar was smooth as silk. But it started getting bad after Dehri-on-Sone. It was already getting darkish. The D-o-S bridge is being repaired and on the up side only one lane is open. Again speed suffered. More underpasses under construction came along the way. From Mohania, where you enter UP, the road widening work and diversions started in right earnest. On the way back we counted some 30 underpasses under construction between Mohania and Benares.

We hit yet another truck jam near Chandauli. Pitch dark and trucks everywhere. The most uncanny feeling on the road. I never felt threatened in terms of security for the girls but I was really feeling tired and sick of it. There was an army truck in front and a few private cars behind me. We could see other private cars using the wrong side of the road to move ahead. A young helper boy of one of the trucks who was going somewhere to fetch water with an empty bucket told me, take the wrong side sir. If you stay here you will never be able to go anywhere. These are all sand and morrum carrying trucks and they will be released by the police one by one.

We took the first opportunity to go to the other side. Driving carefully on the wrong side I found my way out of the madness again. Next challenge was to find out the right entry into Benares. Most people turn left immediately after crossing the river. I have never taken that road. I usually take the old GT Road which people normally use to enter the city as they come from Allahabad. I find this road very easy for navigation inside the city. You reach the station absolutely straight if you follow this road. No left or right turn anywhere. There is a flyover there and a huge petrol pump on the right hand side.

When I saw the first such large petrol pump I went there and asked how to reach Cantonment Station. They showed me the way. This is not the GT Road route but the old route which we had taken the first time when we came to Benares. We found it very confusing back then because there was an under construction flyover on it back then and you had to take numerous right and left turns. That flyover, thankfully, is complete now and it makes the route to Station fairly straight forward.

To cut a long story short we arrived in our hotel at around 9.30 pm. Hotel Janki International. Not that we were booked here or we had any clue as to where it is. We first went to our old favourite Jahnavi in front of the station. They said their room tariff was Rs 3300 now. We have stayed here at Rs 900 before. So off we went and with the help of an auto driver we checked into Janki at Rs 1600.

Janki is a fairly decent hotel for a night in transit. The room is small but the bed is large enough for the three of us. The AC is strong enough and there is running hot water in the bathroom. In fact the bathroom fittings are very upmarketish. The TV is functional with all the sports channels subscribed to.

It has two problems. There is no covered parking and you have to park on a very dusty road outside. Of course security is not an issue as they have guards posted throughout the night but your car will definitely need good dusting after an overnight stay. The second issue with Janki is food. It is extremely expensive for a hotel of this size and stature. Dal, for example, is Rs 130 for a pot !!! But the quality of food is good. Decent homely food.

At around ten I tried to find out if it would make sense to go to Biswanath Gali for the customary malai - the main reason I choose Benares over Allahabad for the first night. I was told that it might be too late. This I later learnt was a completely false alarm. Pagla, the most famous malai shop owner of Benares, told me he is open at least till 11.30 pm every single day !!!!

To my utter frustration I discovered Monisha had forgotten to load the electric kettle in the car. She had the temerity to ask the hotel boy to loan us one. Normally such small hotels make a decent amount of money by charging exorbitant amounts on tea. Here they were okay to give us the kettle.

Day 2. Benares to Agra (nay Firozabad) 21797 km to 22360 km 

We started from Benares after an early breakfast. The road is decent now. No more underpass nuisance. We breezed past Allahabad and Kanpur. The Kanpur Etawah 6 laning is now complete. And coasting on this road is now a smooth affair. One issue with driving in UP's 4-lane roads now is the presence of ubiquitous biker who is always riding with a pillion at 40 kmph. He is taking the first lane. You cannot scare him enough to make way for you. The second lane belongs to the slow truck - moving either at 35 or 45. You wait for one to overtake the other and then pass. On 6-laned roads this nuisance is avoided.

We stopped for lunch at a street side restaurant before Etawah. Pure vegetarian restaurant but the food was good. When I first crossed Etawah a few years ago I was very scared. The name of Etawah is etched in my memory with news related to dacoits. All those stories in the 70s and 80s of dacoit surrender or dacoit atrocities had Etawah or Bhind as dateline. But now having gone past the town several times it has become just another dirty UP small town. Thankfully, due to the new highway, one does not need to go through the extremely congested town.

After crossing Shikohabad we started debating as to which Agra hotel to take. We even booked one Gayatri through Booking.com. But we could not get through to their desk on their official phone number. Called SS-Traveler in Delhi. He said, why not stay in Firozabad and avoid Agra traffic in the evening? I lapped up the idea when he said there were two decent looking hotels right on the highway. We promptly cancelled the Gayatri booking. Firozabad is less than 40 km from Agra.

I have very nightmarish memories of driving through evening Agra traffic. So while crossing the Firozabad flyover, when we saw hotel Monarch and hotel Garg almost side by side we were more than certain we wanted to stay here. But entering those hotels from the highway can be a little tricky. Because they are on the service road and there is a railing separating the service road from the highway. The moment I found a cut in the railing I entered the service road on my left hand side and traced the road backwards. Monarch was found to be Rs 3400 for a night and Garg was Rs 900. No prizes for guessing which one we took :-)

The AC in Garg works perfectly fine. So does the geyser in the bathroom. What else do you want at Rs 900? They serve you only vegetarian food which is decent. They even gave a separate mattress for Mampu to sleep on. It had to be laid on the floor though. Parking space is more than adequate for at least 20 vehicles. Not covered but within their premises.

We went for a walk down the main road in the evening to check out the glassware stores of Firozabad.

Firozbad, we had discovered during one of our earlier trips, is the center for churis (thin glass bangles) and other glass products like lamp shades, wine glass etc. The town is extremely dirty. There is a big truck parts and spares market right on the highway and a huge Jain Mandir which is the kind of center of the town (despite the town being predominantly Muslim). The shops are lined beyond the Jain Mandir on either side of the highway. Some of them are two storied high buildings. I thought of buying some decent glasses for home but to my surprise realised the quality of finish is not up to the mark. The lamp shades are nice. Some are very colourful too. Monisha bought some glass bangles for the daughters of our maids at a throwaway price.

Mampu was shocked by the filth and squalor, not to speak of the dust of Firozabad. She had never experienced anything close to this filthy in her life. I explained to her that this was what real India looked like. One has to experience it in real life and not just zip through such towns in an air-conditioned car. I don't think she quite liked the idea though.

But one thing must be mentioned - we never for a moment felt intimidated or threatened by the locals. If you read the newspapers you would think every woman in UP is raped every day. That is not quite how it works in real life.

Day 3. Firozabad to Jaipur via Agra and Bharatpur 22360 km to 22645 km

Next morning we were a little relaxed as we started for Jaipur via Agra. The distance is short and no major jams are expected except while going through Agra. The Dayal Bagh area of Agra through which the highway passes is now quite crowded. To make matters worse, several underpasses are now under construction. So movement was slow.

We ignored the google maps instructions and turned left from Sikandra. This is the least jam prone section. From Sikandra you go straight to a junction called Bodla from where you turn right. The roads are well marked here with street signs showing you the way out towards Bharatpur.

At Bharatpur we stopped for a couple of hours and took two rickshaws for a short trip. We found thousands of painted storks nesting. They had deserted the park last year but are now back with a vengence. The rickshaw pullers were so slow that we got disgusted and cut the ride short. We had an average lunch at a heavily advertised dhaba called Highway Tadka. We reached Jaipur in the afternoon and could very easily navigate to Hotel Trident by following Google maps.

Traffice in Agra by Mampu

The stay at Trident, at complimentary rates, was organised by Monisha through her connections in Mr PRS Oberoi's office. Needless to say it's a very nice property with a fantastic view of the lake, in the middle of which you have the Jal Mahal.

Not only is the location great in terms of views, it is also close to the three forts of Jaipur. We had decided to stay in Jaipur principally to see these forts. Mampu went out to enjoy the gardens with her mother, I decided to sleep in the soft bed of Trident and forget all the agonies of the two-day long drive.

While the Trident is a fantastic hotel, its food is atrociously priced. One roti, for example, costs Rs 175 plus taxes (God only knows what percentage of tax). For this you could possibly get 10 kilos of flour to make hundreds of rotis. So we decided to go to MI Road's Niros. The Mocambo of Jaipur.

Trident, Jaipur; Pic Monisha Roy

We hired an auto and off we went to Mirza Ismail Road - which is a much larger version of Calcutta's Park Street. Perhaps not as many eateries but very glitzy high street kind of place. I have fond memories of Niros from my Tal Chhapar trip few years ago. It was absolutely empty with just a few foreigners. The waiter explained that it was empty because of Ram Navami when the locals stay strictly vegetarian. We had a delightful meal of mutton and chapatis.

The Jaipur roads are chock a block full of traffic. There is Metro Rail work going on and some traffic dislocation has happened. Of course MI Road is one way which complicates matters for the auto drivers. We had a nice evening walk on MI Road looking in vain for an electric kettle, which Monisha had left behind at home at the last moment.

Mampu at the Trident lawns. Pic by Monisha Roy

The Jaipur Stay 

Mural in Nahargarh Fort

We were booked in Trident for the first day and in Gangaur of RTDC for the other two days. We started the second morning in Jaipur with a hearty complimentary breakfast at dining hall of Trident. Mampu went berserk, tasting almost everything that they had on offer. She said she wouldn't probably need a lunch. I stuck to my toasts and sunny side ups and sampled some of the chicken preparations. The previous morning at Garg, Monisha had to storm the kitchen to teach the cook there how to make a sunny side up after he made scrambled eggs from her verbal instructions on how to make a sunny side up.

After breakfast we checked out, loaded the car again with our luggage and off we went in search of Nahargarh fort. Tourists to Jaipur mostly go to the Amber Fort/Palace. I was more than certain that if I had to see just one fort in Jaipur it would be the Nahargarh Fort. It was this fort where Kamu Mukherjee pushed Dr Hazra down the hill side and made him "vanish" in Satyajit Ray's Sonar Kella.

Dr Hazra was pushed down these slopes

We discovered that all the three forts of Jaipur - Nahargarh, Jaigarh and Amber (locally pronounced as Amer) are in the same vicinity. They are also very close to Trident. Finding them out was quite a breeze. Nahargarh I think has gone through a lot of restoration since Satyajit's shooting in the early 70s. We could not locate or even understand the precise place where Dr Hazra was pushed down. But you certainly get a very panoramic view of the city of Jaipur from all these three forts.

We took guides in all the three forts who are very informative. It is not possible to retain any of that information. But at that moment it feels great to be told the old stories.

A queen's room in Nahargarh Fort

Amer Fort was really crowded with tourists. Even finding a decent parking space was very tough. But in the end we managed everything smoothly and then came back to the city to reach hotel Gangaur safely using Google maps, despite the one ways and no entries.

Nahargarh Fort by Mampu

The switch over from Trident to Gangaur was quite a come down. Not a single plug point was working. The sofa was dirty. The walls had patches of repair work still unpainted. A terrible mess. We sought to change the room after a couple of hours. We were told they were seriously under staffed and that's why this is the situation. The location is great and parking is more than adequate. Food is also decent.

In the afternoon we went out and located a Pizza Hut close by where we gorged on pizza and pasta. Before this we had located a Bajaj Electrical showroom. Bought a small electric kettle from there for tea on the rest of the way.

Inside Amber Fort

In the evening we went out to Johri Bazar to buy a bandhni saree for a colleague. This is in the Pink City which is essentially a series of shops. We spotted LMB there, the famous vegetarian eatery of Jaipur. Had some Amriti and bought some Kalakand. The amriti when cold is simply heavenly. We had planned to come to LMB the next day for some traditional lunch. But that did not happen ultimately. I also bought a pair of traditional slip on sandals for myself.

The next morning we went in an auto to the City Palace and Jantar Mantar, which is a huge astronomical calculation center. These are both open sort of places and the sun was strong. By the time we were done with these and was preparing to go see the Albert Museum Mampu started feeling unwell. We headed straight for our hotel.

In the evening Monisha went on a window shopping spree on MI Road. Mampu and I decided to just laze around in the hotel room.

Day 6. Jaipur to Swai Madhopur

We started after breakfast and exited Jaipur using google maps. I think Google goofed up a little but in any case we got out of town and were on the highway soon enough. Dadu had already arrived in Jaipur and proceeded to Swai Madhopur by train. We had a brief whatsapp chat and since their train started at 7.30 they would obviously reach before us.

There are two routes to Swai Madhopur from Jaipur. One goes through Tonk, which is suggested by Google. But we took the Dausa-Lalsot route (Google suggested routes are not always practical in India because they don't consider the road or traffic condition but suggest the shortest route). Dausa is on the Jaipur Agra road. Hema Malini famously had a road accident somewhere here on the highway recently. The road from Dausa to Lalsot is fairly bad old state highway. After Lalsot the road condition improves quite dramatically.

There are two entries into Dausa from the highway on either side of the town. Having used both it makes sense to take the road which is on the Jaipur side as it does not really enter the Dausa town. So if you are coming from Agra, turn left after crossing the town by taking the second exit. If coming from Jaipur take the first exit on the right hand side before the town. The town's interior is quite crowded.

We reached Jhumar Baori quite easily using the google maps directions. But the town of Swai Madhopur is so small you don't really need all that jazz for navigation.

Jhumar Baori has a fantastic location. It is high up in the hills and surrounded by forest. In the evenings you can hear agitated alarm calls of deer and sambar around the guest house. The road to the guest house is quite steep. The guest house itself is an old heritage building. We (Dadus and us) got two very nice rooms on the top floor of the hotel. They have their own exclusive small balconies that overlook the forest. Of course the old styled stair case is a pain but the house has very nice lawns (frequented by peacocks and rufous treepies) and large open terraces for adda sessions in the evenings or winter afternoons.

They offer breakfast lunch and dinner on the house and it is included in the tariff. The quality of food or range of items on offer is nothing great. But in a jungle you don't expect luxury on the dining table. The service staff is friendly but getting very prompt service on the second floor of such an old building with very high steps is a little difficult. The geyser in the bathroom wasn't working either. But they got me a bucket of hot water when I asked.

Holidaying with Dadu's family is always a pleasure. Not only is his wife Srabani very pally with Monisha, his daughter Gobo, is also a great friend of Mampu. They can spend hours in each other's company without uttering a single word.

After a quick lunch that afternoon the six of us went out for the fort. It is a little more than 10 km from Jhumar Baori inside the forest. Though in the core area, to go to the fort one does not need any permission, ticket or any special vehicle. There are several temples there and the Ganesh temple in particular is pretty famous with local pilgrims. Many pilgrims on foot frequent the fort throughout the year. In fact Ustaad, the tiger, was removed because it had killed a forest guard close to this road. The authorities didn't want to take chance with the safety of the pilgrims.

We parked the car before the fort's main parking area on the main road, little realising that in two days we would be seeing a tigress precisely at the same spot !!!

The walk to the top of the fort can be quite back breaking if you are elderly or weak in the legs and lungs. It's a very pleasant place if there aren't too many tourists. We weren't so lucky. Hundreds of noisy students had swooped down upon the fort and spoilt the atmosphere of tranquility.

Although we did hire a guide I didn't listen much to his stories. The panoramic views of the forest from the fort are fantastic. You can see the forest for miles. The fort is quite ancient though. There is even a Digambar Jain temple on top of the fort.

The trip to the fort was completely uneventful. I saw an Indian Robin. Mampu took some shots of the fort. There is a certain tranquility about the fort. But it was sadly broken by millions of school students who swooped down upon the fort just as we were climbing it and made things extremely noisy. I believe the fort has quite a rich ancient history.

The evening was spent in a grand adda session among the six of us. This is the best thing about travelling with friends. In a National Park the evenings can be really boring with absolutely nothing to do (we do not watch TV). But when you are with friends you can have a meaningful adda session and we fully utilised this opportunity.

Ranthambore Day 7 and 8 

The Gypsy for our morning safari came a little later than promised. The hotel boy had given me four slices of bread with butter and a couple of boiled eggs. Normally they don't do this because breakfast is on the house upon return. But they obliged me when I said that I am a diabetic and need food in the mornings. The seating arrangement in the jeep is such that six adults can comfortably sit together. The front passenger seat is taken by the forest guide. After that there are two rows seating 3 passengers each.

We were allotted zone 5 which is behind the fort. The journey started with the sighting of two Indian scops owl sitting in the hole of a big tree. But after this we did not see anything much in the form of wildlife. The general ambience of the forest here is very nice though. Dark and deep with lots of small streams and rivulets. One problem with the drivers and guides of Ranthambore is that they are very focused on tiger. They will turn the whole forest upside down in search of the tiger. In the process they ignore the smaller birds and animals. Thus we were almost driving into a juvenile leopard which was sitting in the middle of the road. Initially I thought it was a fox. When the jeep finally stopped, it turned around and I thought it was a jungle cat. The guide said no it was a juvenile leopard !!!! We didn't get a chance to take even a record shot. After this we went to a river where we saw a huge crocodile basking in the sun. 

We took another afternoon safari when we were alloted zone 3. We had requested for zone 4 as that is where some sighting had happened in the morning. But the request wasn't kept. So we had to be happy with just hearing alarm calls of monkeys and deer. But I love these anticipations when the forest seems still and you know anything can happen any moment. Unfortunately, nothing happened :-)

Around dusk when we came out of the Jogimahal gate and crossed the parking lot to come to the main road, we saw terribly agitated monkeys and peacocks on the trees above. It was more than obvious there was a tiger in the vicinity. The peacock particularly had gone berserk and was constantly jumping up the branches, giving out alarm calls. But we didn't see anything. 

But the next day this is exactly where at exactly the same time we saw this. T85 is her official name. Fondly called Arrowhead by tourists and forest officials. Light was very low and I could barely manage this just one somewhat acceptable shot.

Approaching dusk in Ranthambore. Pic by Geetanjali Roy

Later Addition Saturday, 5th March, 2022: I do not know why this travelogue could not be completed. On the last day of our trip Dadu went off to Delhi by train and we drove off towards Benares. I did not realise it would be such a backbreaking and long journey. I think it took us a good 16 hours to reach there. Actually my speed suffers when it gets dark. I cannot remember where in Benares we stayed. Perhaps the same hotel.