Ranthambhore's Tigers (Part Four)
Arrowhead in glorious light, just after sunrise. An image I'm proud to say has been selected as Wild Planet magazine's cover for July!
After the mornings epic battle, we searched the park in the afternoon to see what was going on in the aftermath. We found a couple of Ghost's cubs back in the 'green waterhole', one of the man made waterholes, a distance away from where the fight had happened earlier. We eventually found Noor and the cubs, now well away from the other side of the boundary - clearly she was happy to leave that area and find her cubs, who had wisely retreated hastily from the action earlier. The guides told us she would continue to patrol and lay claim to those newly-won areas, cementing her dominance. Noor and cubs happily reunited, we left the park after another remarkable day, stopping to capture the setting sun over a nearby temple.
That next morning we found Noor's cubs in the same spot, lounging around. After spending so much time with them, we decided to head off in search of tigers new!
After a brief encounter with Arrowhead, we headed back to see Noor's cubs by the waterhole, partaking in a few rounds of 'The Drongo Challenge', all adorned in our tiger shirts for the inaugural 'Bad Shirt Day' - I actually quite liked mine! Another day and two more drives seeing tigers were complete. We'd seen tigers on 13 out of 13 drives - so, so lucky and way beyond anything I could've possibly hoped for. Our very last drive was the next morning, so fingers crossed for the clean sweep!
The clean sweep was complete, with my best walking photos of the trip so far - Arrowhead in perfect morning light. Enough said.
Arrowhead was clearly walking with purpose; she was hungry and on the hunt. We hoped that we might add to our already incredible run of luck and see a tiger hunt but sadly, it wasn't to be. I'll save that for next time!
Following Arrowhead took us further into Zone 3, a definite contender for the most picturesque zone we ventured into. The ruins of the maharaja's temples and garden palaces making a truly stunning backdrop. A black-winged stilt and more spotted owls gave us good views along the way.
Arrowhead crossed the lake towards the interior of the ruins of the garden palace and our Indian adventure came to a close.
It's probably pretty obvious (if you've managed to stay with me to this point!), that Ranthambhore has left a lasting impression on me! It's a truly magical place and if you ever get the chance to visit there, just do it! If you want to see tigers, there are simply no better team to be led by than Andy, Dicky and co. The more the week progressed, the more we all came to realise we were with the best team in the park, by a country mile.
I'll be back, hopefully next year, and already can't wait for my next adventure in Ranthambhore!