India

Pench is the place where Rudyard Kipling composed The Jungle Book. He was inspired by the natural beauty of the park and the book is based on many real locations of the park. I made the plan to visit Pench and nearby Tadoba national park in five days. Achal Mehra, who owns two resorts at these places prepared the itinerary for me that includes seven safaris in total.

I flew from Kolkata to Nagpur, there is only one direct flight run by Indigo in the evening. Arrived Nagpur airport around 10pm where Vilas, the driver was waiting for me. It was a two hours’ drive from the airport to Mahua Vann at Pench where I’ll be staying. The facility is well maintained with 26 cottages within a beautiful natural environment. Achal also maintains a gym and swimming pool at the facility.

Pench is a natural habitat for tigers with dense forest, plenty of food and favorable environment for tigers. India Government allowed tourists only for 20% of the vast forest, leaving 80% for wild animals. There is also division of buffer and core zones within this 20% area. There are few villages in the buffer zone where people live mainly on farming. Read more

My safari started next morning at 6am with Surendra the driver. We went to Khursapar gate core zone, the first animal I saw was a peacock collecting food over the dense forest land. The next one I saw a Sambar. It’s a huge animal, I didn’t have idea about its size and color. The complexion is very dark, blackish brown and the height could be 5 to 6 ft from ground. Sambar is the main food source for tigers in Indian forests. Surendra followed the pugmarks of a tigress name Bindu who occupies the region and finally I saw Bindu at around 7:40 am. She is a beautiful nine years old tigress walking along the road and provided enough opportunity to capture the moments.

Next, we went to another area which is occupied by Bindu’s daughter B2. Tigers mark their areas with urine, marks on the tree and generally don’t enter others area. Surendra explained that B2 has four cubs of around seven months old and it might be possible to see her with the cubs. However, we couldn’t see them, though saw their pugmarks. We stopped at a rest area for breakfast where I got few photos of birds like Rufous Treepie, Parrots and monkeys.

Came back to the resort at 10:30 for some rest and lunch. Walked around the property, cottages are mostly occupied. The afternoon safari started at 2:30pm, Achal and his friend Aswin joined me. Now we are going to Turiya gate which is one of the main gates at Pench. At the entrance we saw jackals running in different directions. We followed tiger pugmarks but didn’t find any, took some pictures of spotted deer, Sambar and towards the end found a leopard resting on a tall tree. The posture of the tiger was amazing, a perfect relaxing mood.

Next day Alankar joined us, we had morning and afternoon safaris at different parts of Turiya gate but didn’t see any wildlife worth mentioning.

On the morning of our last day at Pench, we went for an hour walk along the walking trail behind Achal’s property where wild animals visit. It was through forest mostly large trees including Teakwood. We saw deer, sambar and also tiger markings for their territories. We saw Leopard pugmarks around a small creek where it came to drink water. We left Pench around 9:30am with Ashwin’s SUV for Tadoba which was about three hours drive.

Our first safari at Tadoba was at Pangdi core area in the afternoon. We tried to follow few pugmarks leading to water holes but didn’t find any tigers or leopards.

Next day we took the morning safari at Belara buffer zone. Alankar was not feeling well, he skipped the safari. We had an experienced driver and guide here who followed each and every pugmark and soon we found a massive Indian black bear eating something from the ground. We followed him a while to take few pictures. Then came the best moment of my trip, met Weera the beautiful tigress at 7:30am walking past the long grassland. She was pregnant, expected delivery in a week. Tigers have a gestation period of 105 days, then the litter goes on hiding with their mother for 4 weeks. We went following Weera to take some good pictures, however she didn’t like it. She looked at us from behind a bush, the look at her eyes were really scary. We maintained safe distance so the tigress took her own path. It was a thrilling lifetime experience, can’t be repeated. Soon many other safari jeeps arrived at the location, Weera slowly walked away in deep forest where humans can’t bother her.

We went to Alizanja buffer zone for the afternoon safari, Ashwin didn’t come with us – he left for home after lunch. We saw Chota Matka, the massive eight years old male tiger here. He had a typical habit of killing cattle only, he developed a test for cattle from adjoining villages and never hunted a deer or sambar or killed humans. He was lying in a muddy creek with belly up indicating full meal when we found him. He was sleeping with face was open showing his fang and other teeth, a broken tooth was clearly visible which he lost probably with a fight. Chota Matka is such a powerful animal that locals call him as CM of the jungle. He killed several tigers to keep his territory intact and remains the undefeated king of Tadoba.

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