At the beginning of the year, we went up to Coonoor, the less noisy and crowded brother of Ooty. The idea was to work during the days and spend time walking, photographing and meeting friends in the mornings and evenings.
Coonoor and the Nilgiris are renowned for their tea. However, most tea gardens in the area where we stayed had turned fallow, so the owners had sold them off for housing and other redevelopment. On one such plot was our little cabin. While our part of the area had become a spread out housing project, there were plenty of tea gardens on the other side of the road that neatly bisected the small valley.
After a week or so in the cabin, we went over to a friends beautiful place a little above Coonoor. There was much good company, delicious food and long walks in the woods nearby.
We also drove upto Ooty one day for lunch, and on the way back, stopped at the beautiful Fernhill Palace for a coffee.
That morning’s company: an unmoving mountain, streams of clouds, three cups of ginger tea, Landmarks by Robert Macfarlane, school buses on distant hills, Waffle & Honey for company and a growing sense of gratitude.
I was rearranging a few folders in my Capture One library and chanced upon these pictures of the amazing Pamban bridge. I am fairly certain I’ve shared a couple of these before, but I’ve never them on the blog. So here they are.
Opened in February 1914, the 2km bridge connecting mainland India and the island of Rameshwaram shortened the journey between India and Sri Lanka considerably.
The bridge features a double-leaf bascule section roughly midway to enable fishing trawlers and barges from nearby islands to passthrough.
I’ve crossed the bridge on a few occasions and each time it is a thrill to be a train window or door and watch the sea crash against the piers while you trundle on, swaying gently.
All photos were shot with a Pentax K100D with a DA 50-200mm f/4-5.6 ED lens.
I can never call it Chennai, to me the city is always Madras.
Over the past few months, my work has taken me there a number of times. More than half my team sits there, and try as much as I want, I don’t think I can ever fully get into all-remote work, so these visits are a welcome distraction and much needed energy boost.
A few days ago, I happened to visit, just in time for Madras Day. I missed the official (and unofficial) events because of work, but found time to take a few train and bus rides, walk around a bit and photograph.
I didn’t carry my Fuji X-T20 this time, but an iPhone paired with the Halide app shooting in ProRAW is a very good substitute.
I’ve always considered Egmore to be the prettier railway station. It is feels a lot less intimidating than Central, thus allowing one to walk more leisurely and take in more of the wonderful architecture.
Departing Velachery on the MRTS line. I wish I had good things to say about this line, but about the only charitable thing I can say is that it does its job, nothing more.
Things one notices when looking down.
These old cement benches still remain on the platform and retain the old name of the station. I’ve always wondered about the placement of these. Baking in the hot sun the whole day, with no shade or cover. I can’t imagine even trying to rest on them at 3pm!
One evening, we went to dinner at the fabulous Taj Connemara, a hotel that’s been around in some shape or form since the early 1800s.
Followed by a nice long walk around Mount Road and its iconic sights.
I hate they’ve put up that garish modern sign across the front nowThankfully, Higginbothams have been much more tasteful
I am still in the middle of a prolonged writing slump, so once again, instead of something meaty and substantial, here are some pictures from a recent trip to the Sariska Tiger Reserve. A trip that had its fair share of drama even before it started. Originally, Shashanka, his wife and I had planned to do this over the long Easter break, but unfortunately, COVID interfered during that time and we had postpone.
April would have been a tad cooler, which meant there might have been more wildlife out and about rather than hiding in the deep shade of the jungle as was the case now. But it is what it is and we take what we get.
Sariska has a bit of a torrid recent history. Until the early 2000s, it was one of India’s most population dense tiger reserves, but rampant poaching aided by poor security meant the entire tiger population had been wiped out. In 2008, a couple of tigers from the neighbouring Ranthambore National Park were relocated, in hopes of reviving the population. A couple of more relocations happened in 2009. These efforts have slowly borne fruit and now there are about 21 tigers in the reserve. The park is also home to more than 100 leopards, but they are more elusive than the tigers, and you’d be hard pressed to spot them!
Sariska’s landscape is predominantly scrub, thorn and dry forests. It is very arid and hot most of the year.
Of course, tigers and leopards aren’t the only interesting wildlife around. Sariska also has a fair diversity in its avian population.
Perhaps the most ubiquitous inhabitant of the reserve, the Peacock. Here’s one in a classic pose, hoping to impress a female.A pair of young Indian Scops Owls are interested briefly in our camera shutter sounds.An Indian nightjar, confident in its camouflage A White-throated Kingfisher
Forests are never short of drama, and one morning by the large watering hole, we found this Painted Stork and Crocodile perilously close together. All of us had our money on a Crocodile ambush, but it turned out that a hunt was not on its cards and it simply ambled past after a couple of minutes.
Our first day and a half of wandering about, we didn’t find any signs of a tiger, but on the second day in the afternoon, there was a lot of chatter among the forest guards and rangers that the dominant female of the Baghani area was out and about. We waited and waited, almost gave up twice, but in the end our patience was rewarded when the tiger named ST-3 decided a drink and some rest was in order. ST-3 has a storied history; she’s a daughter of perhaps India’s most famous tigress, T-16 (Machhli), and was the third tiger to be relocated here. For an older tiger, she seems in great shape.
On the final morning, we went in search of another tiger that had been spotted near a smaller watering hole, but despite an hour of waiting, he didn’t turn up. But still there was some entertainment, when a peacock decided to play power games with a bunch of bees who were none too happy to be trampled on. The Langurs, on the other hand were uncharacteristically demure, possibly because they had better memory recall of what the bees can do.
We rounded off the trip by visiting the grounds of the ancient Neelkanth Temple, built sometime in the 8th century AD and dedicated to the god Shiva, though it also has a large statue of a Jain monk. From a distance, with the columns arranged they way they were the ruins felt like Athens, rather than anything from India!
A few photos from a quick trip to Chennai and back.
The initial plan for this post was to make it a long photo essay combining two of my favourite things: a train trip and one of my favourite cities. But as with most of my recent writing endeavours, it felt flat. I am still in that weird rut where I want to write, but can’t seem to put any decent words to screen.
A few weeks ago while my friend Shashanka was capturing the beauty of Demoiselle Cranes in Rajasthan, I was walking the crags surrounding SRS Betta, an important hill and religious place for locals who live in the area. Betta in Kannada means hill.
The hill in question, with a lovely lake full of lily pads. At the top of the hill is the main shrine.
Once past the small rice fields at the base, the crags surrounding the hill are truly wild. They are absolutely perfect for those interested in rock climbing and bouldering, both of which I am slowly getting back into after a prolong absence (mostly due to sloth and some health issues). A short climb and down towards the main hill is a lovely little lake where a couple of friends I’d gone with decided to inflate their paddle board and go for a gentle explore.
This area also forms the buffer zone for the Ramadevarabetta Vulture Sanctuary, the only one such in India. True to form, I spotted a couple of Egyptian vultures, including one juvenile who decided to fly quite low. Sadly, I’d only taken my wide angle 23mm lens, so couldn’t capture pictures of this magnificent bird.
A few years ago, I had a chance to spend time with a small family from the Agariya community. The Agariyas are a nomadic people that move about the Rann of Kutch and farm salt. Theirs is a very harsh life in very difficult conditions.
I arrived at the two-hut encampment in the blazing mid-day heat. A day earlier, I had met Raju bhai, who along with his wife, young daughter and a sister, lived in the encampment and farmed the nearby flats. The only conditions he had for me visiting was that I bring packs of Marie biscuits and a couple of sheets to lie on because he had none spare.
I walked around talking photographs and showing him how a digital camera works. We talked late into the evening in broken Hindi, eating those biscuits first and then a very simple meal cooked under the darkening sky. I slept fitfully that night, cold, shivering and raging at the world and its inequities.
The Agariyas share their land with the Indian wild ass. Beautiful, bright creatures.Getting around on the flats isn’t easy. Tracks are rutted almost all the time and distances between farms are vast.The land is either flooded or parched. Life here is mostly in binaries.The encampmentThe family.
Surrounded by the Rann of Kutch, one would think Khadir Bet is a nearly impossible place to live. Yet, people have lived here for millennia. Dholavira is proof.
On a visit in early 2013, walking the smaller roads and tracks, we found ourselves temporarily stopped by this local and his huge herd of Kankrej cows.
Sitting down at the edge of the long colonnade and waiting for the sun to hit the right spot. I want a perfect silhouette of the gopuram. A few minutes later, a stream of birds, high up, flying towards the wetlands that ring the town. Egrets and herons mostly. I wonder about the same scene from more than a thousand years ago when the temple was rising up from the ground. The birds possibly following much the same route as they do now. What did they think of the giant intrusion that was coming up in their path? I wonder about these birds. Do they still carry lessons from those that flew before them? What do these birds think of the temple? Do they think about faith? Are they even capable? Do they care? Can they even care? Do I?
