Posts Tagged ‘India’

New Delhi – was that a holi water balloon?

Wednesday, May 4th, 2011

The "holi" gauntlet

As our tuk-tuk driver led us on foot down this seemingly innocent looking alleyway to go see a temple, the people that occupied the alley when we entered had disappeared when we were walking back out.  I didn’t think anything of it at first but then as I was walking ahead of Miki with our guide, I head a loud noise and then an ear piercing scream.  I instantly turned around and saw Miki had stopped dead in her tracks and was looking skyward.  She wasn’t hurt.  No one was near here…

What happened, I yelled.

I was hit by a water balloon she replied.

What?  A water balloon?

Our tuk-tuk driver interjected with a big smile on his face and said, “don’t worry… it’s holy”

Huh?  A holy water balloon.  The balloon is filled with holy water? That makes it’s ok that Miki got hit by a water balloon that someone threw off a 4 story building.

No, no our tuk-tuk driver replied.  It’s for the festival called holi (with an i not a y).  The kids are just practicing.

Still confused as ever we shrugged it off and kept on exploring the market in the old part of Delhi.  We later found out that India had a festival coming up where they throw colored powder and colored water at each other.  The main day of the festival was 2 days from now and kids were already honing their water balloon throwing skills on unsuspecting tourists.  There weren’t many other tourists around so we became high value targets and had multiple attacks during our short walk.  Those kids are very quick and this was the best picture I could get of two of them.

2 holi attackers

We had to leave Delhi the day before the festival which is to bad.  I would have like to prepared myself for battle and gotten some revenge :)  Lot’s of people were getting ready for the festival and the street vendors were there to help.

Street vendor selling colored powder for holi

Colored powder for the holi festival... it gets everywhere.

Our tuk-tuk driver continued to take us around the old delhi markets.  The sights, sounds, and smells you experience are what travelling is all about.  This was a different planet.

Old Delhi market tour

Drivers in India are some of the craziest yet most skilled drivers we’ve had the experience to ride along with during our travels.  Our driver could easily talk on his cell phone while a motorbike was speeding past a truck that was heading right for us.  Our driver didn’t flinch and mildly steered out of the way continuing his conversation as our knuckles turned white hanging onto the railings for dear life.

Delhi's crazy drivers

The best part of visiting markets around the world is mixing with the locals.  Miki is an expert at that and always love trying her hand at new professions.

Miki the vegetable seller

Miki the tricycle driver

Miki the nut and spice merchant

You know those immigration cards you need to fill out when you enter back into your home country.  There is usually a check box that says have you handled any livestock during your trip abroad… or something like that.  I wonder if this counts.

handling livestock?

A final panorama of Delhi…

Our hotel concierge, taxi driver, and even a few blogs recommended to stay away from this area of Delhi because it’s too dangerous.  I’m glad we went and explored a little even though we had a few scary moments with some water balloon attacks.  All part of the fun of travelling.

One last thing, you know what a mid western, meat and potato boy craves after eating nothing but indian curry for 2 solid weeks… a Big Mac.  Luckily there was a Mc Donalds close by so off we went.   We entered the golden arches and I stood patiently in line waiting for my turn to order.  While waiting I took a look at the menu and…. WHAT… no Big Mac.  No double quarter pounder with cheese.  In fact, no meet at all.  Duh… cows are sacred in India which means no beef.  Not a problem though.  The Chicken Maharaja Mac to the rescue.  Not as good as beef laden Big Mac but it still hit the spot.

Chicken Maharaja Mac

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Bandhavgarh and Kanha National Parks… more than just tigers

Sunday, May 1st, 2011

Bandhavgarh Landscape

Bandhavgarh and Kanha National Parks have much more to offer than just tigers.  The tigers are the main tourist draw and it was the main reason we came here but they aren’t the only attraction.  Both parks are different and I’ll go over some of the best non-tiger things that Bandhavgarh has to offer first.

The most obvious non tiger things to do in Bandhavgarh is to photograph the many other animals.  My favorite pictures came from the plethora of bird sightings which I posted about earlier but there were also plenty of deer, wild boar, and langur monkeys to search for.  Sometimes you didn’t have to search that hard as was the case in the langur monkey roadblock.

Langur Monkey Roadblock

There is also the Bandhavgarh fort which makes for a nice afternoon hike (or a extraordinarily strenuous climb if you asked our guide Talat).  You can have your guide arrange to visit the fort in between your morning and afternoon game drives.  It can get pretty hot in the middle of the day so be prepared.  Also have you lodge pack a lunch for you because the views from the top of the hill are the perfect backdrop for a picnic.

View from Bandhavgarh Fort

Talat struggling on the long way around to Bandhavgarh Fort

The climb to the top of the fort wasn’t that bad but it was a little bit of hike.  For my marathon running wife she bounced up like it was nothing.  However, if you’re an out of shape photographer that spends most of his time sitting in the back of jeep taking photos of tigers then it could be a bit of a challenge.

If you hire Talat from Wild Life Photo Tours for your India safari make sure to say Nathan recommended to hike to the top of the Bandhavgarh fort.  He’ll think that its a great idea :)  If he doesn’t thank you then I’m sure his wife will thank you for giving him som exercise… sorry Talat… I just had to mention this.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Talat passing out after finally making it to the top

The views from up here were great.  There was also a vulture nest on the side of the cliff I tried to take a photo of.  Unfortunately, it was just a little to far away to get a decent shot with the lens I brought up with me.

Nathan at the top of Bandhavgarh Fort

There were also some pretty cools ruins to explore on your way up to the fort.  The first one is a big statue of Lord Vishnue reclining on a seven headed serpent.  You can see the pics of the others below.  All in all, it was a nice break from the game drives and I recommend a trip to the top of Bandhavgarh Fort.

Read more about Bandhavgarh and Kanha after the break.

(more…)

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Tigers of India – Photos and Action Packed Tiger Encounters

Saturday, April 16th, 2011

Tiger crossing road in Bandhavgarh

The main reason for our trip to India was to see the royal bengal tiger. These are the biggest of the big cats. The national parks in India have a lot of other wildlife as you saw from my previous posts but the main attraction are the tigers.  I didn’t have high expectation to get a lot of great photos of tigers but with a little bit of luck, a bit of skill, the right equipment, a little patience, a good guide, and some crazy drivers we were able to get some of my best wildlife photos to date. Professional wildlife photographer Talat Khalid of Wild Life Photo Tours arranged this trip for us to visit his two favorite spots for tiger photography.  Bandhavhargh and Kanha tiger reservers.  As you can see below, there is a good reason these are his favorite parks.

Tigress - Aama nalah (our first tiger sighting)

We saw a total of 13 different tigers over our 10 days in the parks.  Some we saw on multiple occasions and every one of the sightings was an amazing experience.  The tigress pictured above is named Aama nalah for the area of Bandhavgarh that she claims as her territory.  She was the first of our 13 tiger sightings and it was amazing.  She was huge!!!  (most girls probably wouldn’t want you to say to them that but I think its ok in the tiger world).  She came so close to our vehicle and eventually walked right in front of us.  If the trip would have ended with just this one tiger sighting it would have been worth it.  They are truly magnificent animals.  It didn’t stop there though… it only got better…

Tiger - "New Male"

Tiger - New Male profile

“New Male” pictured above, is the son of “B2″ who is the son of “Charger” who is arguably the most famous tiger in India given his many appearances on national geographic, BBC, etc.  Charger passed away several years ago after his son, B2, killed him.  B2 is 17 years old now, the same age as his father when he killed him.  Sadly, history is about to repeat itself.  New Male is expanding his territory and needs to kill his father (B2) in order to get the mating rights to all the females in the territory.  We witnessed one such encounter.

All of the sudden we saw B2 run out of the woods and our guide knew that New Male must be chasing him.  A fight was almost sure to happen, he said.

Tiger B2 running from New Male

B2 ran across the road dangerously close to a vehicle.  A few years ago one tourist got mauled when a tiger jumped into the vehicle when being chased.  A very simliar situation to today.

Tiger B2 running close to vehicle

Then out of the corner of my left eye I spotted another tiger.  It was New Male.  My camera was still focused on where B2 ran across the road so I just kept the shutter pressed and captured the action at my cameras maximum 9 frames per second as he disappeared into the trees after B2.

Tiger New Male chasing B2

We feared the worst.  We thought it was over for B2.  New Male was sure to catch him.  He was only 50 meters behind and catching up.  We quickly moved our vehicle to where the guide thought they might come out of the woods… if B2 would even make it out.  About 10 minutes later we found B2 walking along the road.  Looking back to see if he son was still close behind.

Tiger B2 looking for his son

You could see the fear in his eyes.  He was worried.  He knew what was about to happen.  However, what happened next surprised us all.

Tiger New male got lost?

New Male came out of the woods but he seemed to be confused.  He was walking in the wrong direction.  He was still very close to his father but he seemed to have lost his scent.  He walked up and down the road around our vehicle but then eventually found a nice spot in the shade to lay down.

Tiger - New Male laying in the shade

B2 was safe… at least for today.

Tiger - New Male

While we were all sympathetic for B2, there was no denying that New Male is a magnificent tiger.  He was much bigger than he father, younger, and more muscular.  Just look at those canines.  Every part of this tiger was massive.  Even though they are pure breed killing machines they have a lot in common with tame house cats if you watch them long enough.

Tiger - New Male winking

Tiger - New Male (thats a lot of tiger drool)

He had a lot of foam-ish looking saliva hanging on his mouth and just like a ordinary house got he got rid of it with a couple little head flicks.

More tiger pictures after the break…

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Kingfisher Fishing in Kanha National Park and other birds of India

Sunday, April 3rd, 2011

Common Kingfisher ready for take off

My favorite birds to watch during the safari were the kingfishers.  They have beautiful colors and watching them fish was amazing.  It required a lot of patience to get these photographs because they are very quick and pretty small targets to shoot.  However, after studying their behavior for a while you could sense when they were about to fly off to attack their prey.  They also had a tendency to return to them same perch to start a new attack run if the previous one wasn’t successful.  With a lot of patience, a little bit of skill and a lot of luck I got one of my favorite shots of the trip (above).  I was also able to get this amazing sequence of a common kingfisher catching a little fish.

He missed that time around but he kept on hunting and eventually got the little fish.  He didn’t share it with his mate hanging out next to him though.  Selfish bird :(

Common Kingfisher caught a fish (but didn't share it with his mate)

I also got a very sharp shot of a white breasted kingfisher with its third eyelid (nictitating membrane) closed.  Obviously is was pure luck I got this shot because there is no way you can time the shutter with a blink.  I looked online and I haven’t been able to find another picture of this bird with its third eyelid closed.  I’m sure I’m not the first to capture this photo but I can pretend until someone shows me another pic :)

white breasted kingfisher with 3rd eyelid closed

Another cool trick in the bird world comes from the owl.  Wouldn’t it be cool if we could do this?

Owl Head | No Owl Head

A trip to India wouldn’t be complete without a picture of a peacock.  These things were everywhere and they are very, very noisy.  This was mating season so we saw a lot of displays like this.  Males in the peacock world sure do go through a lot of trouble to attract a mate.

Peacock

Some more favorite bird pics from our trip to India.

stay tuned because I’m almost finished processing the tiger pictures.  They will be posted shortly.

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Tiger Safari in Kanha Tiger Reserve time lapsed to 2 minutes

Wednesday, March 23rd, 2011

Another time lapse video but of another Tiger Reserve in India, Kanha.  This is a much different park than Bandhavgarh which I posted a time lapse video about earlier.  It’s much bigger and has wide open plains which gives it a more Africa type feel.

Front view time lapse of one of our game drives at Kanha national park.

0:05 – Driving through the city of Tala (don’t blink. It’s only about 3 frames)

0:47 – watching the elephants bathing in dust

1:17 – Indian bison sighting

Lots of stopping and starting. Waiting and watching. Sometimes game drives are like that. A lot of waiting and watching and not much action but its not a zoo and wildlife sightings aren’t guaranteed.  The park is still beautiful and having a nice drive through a beautiful game park is a great experience.

You can view the video on youtube here (soundtrack had to be changed due to copyright restrictions).

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The Oberoi Amarvilas in Agra

Monday, March 21st, 2011

The Oberoi Amarvilas Agra

I didn’t have to do much research on hotels to stay at in Agra.  The Oberoi Amarvilas frequently wins awards as one of the best hotels in the world and is famous for its view of the Taj Mahal.  It’s a little on the expensive side (especially for India) but we were only in Agra one night and we really wanted the view of the Taj from our balcony.

View of the Taj Mahal from the Oberoi Amarvilas balcony

After a long day of traveling and visiting the sights around Agra, it was very nice to sit on our balcony with a cup of tea and watch the sunset over the Taj.  Not a bad life.

The only minor complaints is the rooms are very plain and small. Their also wasn’t much of a selection at breakfast and what was there wasn’t all that good. Not really acceptable for a 5 star hotel but none of that really maters because you can’t get the view of the Taj like this at any other hotel.

Here are some more pics of the hotel…

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Zardori silk embroidery

Sunday, March 20th, 2011

Miki trying her hand at Zardori embroidery

We went to another shop that had a vey unique type of embroidery called Zardori silk emroidery.

This style of embroidery has been in existence in India from the time of the Rig Veda. It prospered during the Mugal Emperor, Akbar, but later a loss of royal patronage and industrialization led to its decline. Today, it is popular in the Indian cities of Lucknow, Bhopal, and Chennai.[1] The name zardozi is from Persian and means “sewing with gold”.  from wikipedia

The detail of this work was incredible and the late Shams was considered to be one of the best.  Here are three of his pieces that took him over 5 years each to make.  They aren’t for sale but they do have smaller pieces but even the prices on those are very high.  A 16×20 piece was over 12,000 rupees (or about 260 USD).  They were interesting but not interesting enough to buy one… at least not now.  A couple of pictures suited me just fine.

The name of the store in Agra that sells these pieces is called “Imperial Gems”.  I’m sure any hotel can point you in the right direction if you are interested.  They also have a shop to that sells some locally made jewelry.

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Overnight trip to Agra and the Taj Mahal

Sunday, March 20th, 2011

We had a few days before our India Tiger Safari started (to be posted about later) and needed something to do near Delhi.  Since Agra is close to Delhi I thought it would be a good idea to see the Taj Mahal.

A quick google search turned up a company called Delhi Magic.  I e-mailed them to ask about doing an overnight tour to visit the Taj, Agra Fort, etc.  After a few e-mails back and forth I asked the question.  ”Does this also include all entrance fees?  Taj, Agra Fort, etc…”.  To which the owner of Delhi Magic responded, “No they are not. It’s a substantial amount of money and if we had wanted to include them, we would have specified it.”  That response really put me off as being very rude and unprofessional.  She could have simply said no they are not and then simply listed the various entrance fees.  Maybe its a language thing but either way I wasn’t about to give my money to them.  I’m glad they ticked me off because the guide I found in the end was fantastic.

I then went to the tripadvisor forums and found a bunch of glowing reviews of a local guide in Agra, Sunil Gupta.  He was an excellent guide and helped arrange everything for our overnight trip.  If you are heading to Agra, look no further for a guide.  Sunil is your man.  You will be very happy with your choice.  You can contact him via his tripadvisor profile. Sunil arranged for us to visit the following during our overnight tour: the Agra Fort, Baby Taj, Taj Mahal, Fatehpursikri, and Akbar’s Mausoleum.

After a pickup from our hotel in Delhi at 7:30 am we made the 4 hour drive down to Agra.  Our first visit, after checking in at the amazing The Oberoi Amarvilas, was the Agra Fort.  For a little history of the fort check out the detailed wikipedia article.

View of the Taj from the Agra Fort

The detail of the inlaid semi precious stones on the walls of all of these sights are amazing.  It’s hard to imagine the amount of skill and manpower needed to create all of this. Given that a small table top with this type of detail can easily cost over $10,000, I can’t imagine what it would cost today to replicate some of these sights.

inlaid semiprecious stone carvings

Which one to buy??

Since we were so intrigued he took us to a shop that still does this type of work.  I’m always a little skeptical when a guide takes us to “a shop he knows”.  However, with Sunil, he wasn’t pushy and only took us there because we wanted to go.  There was never any pressure to buy anything… even though we did buy a cute little elephant.  Actually it wasn’t so little… of course she chose the biggest one on the left.

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