The mysterious mangroves where the maneaters rule: Sundarbans
This was my last trip before the pandemic lockdown started, and boy am I fortunate to get to do this trip. Heard a lot about the maneaters of Sundarbans, saw many documentaries about them, to be honest, it was scary, stories about tigers jumping on the boat and killing people, a few years back I had decided if I am going to Sundarbans I will do it last so that I will have had traveled a lot by then and I won't regret it even if I die there, but I was a kid back then. I got a call from a friend saying they are planning to visit the mangroves in February, and I don't know why but instinctively my brain said yes! I'm in!
It was a 4-day 3-night trip. We met at Kolkata Airport and from there a car took us to Sundarbans. As usual, flights got delayed, people waited at the airport for others to arrive, but finally, everyone made it there by 5 am and we left immediately. It takes about 3 hours to reach there, and the adventure started as soon as we entered the vehicle. People were driving so weird that at one point, I felt I would never reach my destination. Everyone was speeding, and driving too close to each other.
The moment you reach near Sundarbans, you can feel humidity and saltiness in the air. With no further delays, we hopped onto our boat and got settled in. First, the crew introduced themselves, and we got a tour of the boat. It was a small cozy double-decker boat, the lower deck had a washroom, few beds, a place for our luggage, and a kitchen. The upper deck had chairs to sit in, a lot of open areas, and the helm.
We started our journey. Everyone was ready with their cameras, excited to see different birds and animals, and just within 5 minutes, we saw 3 different species of kingfishers, off to a great start eh?
30 minutes in and the most unexpected thing happened, we saw a tigress; she was sitting on the banks of the creek. The moment I saw her, I was speechless. She made eye contact with me; I was so lost in the moment that I completely forgot to take pictures, and when she turned I realized I need to take pictures, I barely got 4 shots and she disappeared like a ghost, we tried to track for hours later, but she could found nowhere. Yup, they are masters of stealth.
We spent the rest of the day tracking the tigress, but with no luck. Although we got to see a lot of different birds and animals and got to learn a lot since this was unfamiliar terrain for me, it was interesting to see how animals behave here.
Did you know the tide changes every 4 hours? So the landscape changes every 4 hours, all the pugmarks on the shores get washed away, the mangroves are so thick that you can't see over 30 feet inside the tree-line, the population of animals is very less here which makes tracking by alarm calls even more difficult. You learn something new every day, right?
We used to spend all day on the upper deck and had our breakfast, lunch, and dinner on the deck itself. They cooked the meals on the boat. I have never had fish so fresh in my life. It was delicious, and the prawns were massive!
Usually, people spend their night at some resort and then resume their boat ride in the morning, but we wanted a bit of thrill. We slept on the boat. Terrifying right? Sleeping on the boat knowing you are in an area where the maneaters rule? Don’t worry, we took all the precautions. We all sat together after dinner and had lovely conversations about wildlife, and when it was time to sleep the boat crew used to ensure we have locked the lower deck from the inside, there was one special knock which the boat crew showed us “knock-knock pause knock”, in case there was a need to get out of the deck at night, we were supposed to open the deck only if we heard a knock on the door in this pattern. It was an endless day so everyone slept immediately, except for that one time at 3 am when we heard jackals calling nearby. It was kind of thrilling.
The mornings are gorgeous, waking up on a boat, foggy everywhere. You can see the sun slowly breaking out of the thick mangroves. Can never forget that. That's how the next few days were, tracking tigers and other birds and animals all day long.
After spending a few hours in the morning tracking animals we went to a watchtower in the tiger camp, there was a beautiful canopy walk, it's a small walk bridge built over the mangroves so that it won't hurt them and people can reach to the watchtower, the view of the vast mangroves was spectacular from there.
Over the next few days, I photographed 6 different Kingfishers. I saw small-clawed otters, which were an amazing sight to see, running along with the shore, hunting crabs, and looking at us as they were walking. A leucitic saltwater crocodile, which was a pretty rare thing to see. A pair of Irrawaddy Dolphins, so amazing to watch them swim in unique patterns, so difficult to photograph as you can't tell where they are going to pop out from.
The rarest of the rare, I got to see a leucistic collared kingfisher. The last photograph of this leucistic kingfisher was 3 years ago, such an honor.
Over 4 days, I saw a tiger only for about 30 seconds, which is a lifetime when you think about photographing a tiger in Sundarbans. I came back with so many pictures, so much knowledge about the wildlife there, and so many memories of the new friends I made on this trip. It's an indispensable experience in this magical land.
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