Corbett - My first Expedition

I have to explain the above first…this is my first trip with a friend and other acquaintances without my family. Dad never sent me on the fun school trips, this time, he had to..!!

A group of 12 journalists including myself got together to go to Corbett National park. This trip was fully organised by a group of hotels, for me it was an official assignment. I took a friend along (she) before you get any wily doubts..!I left Delhi on 11th Jan 2006 early at 7am. We all assembled at Claridges and left for Corbett…Delhi was freezing then (Corbett is in Uttranchal, half hours drive from Nainital).
With just one breakfast break in between at Tadka, a restaurant on NH24, we entered Kashipur in about 5 hours. The food here doesn’t have to be given special mention at all as you probably know. Dal makhni, aloo gobi muttur gajar..sabzis, parathas with less aloo and more oil, cold raw sandwiches are pretty much what the whole of North can offer tourists.

I was really paranoid because the last time I visited Corbett, my sis and I cursed out fates, flies and insects of all sizes and colours grouping with jumbo roaches infested out dinning hall all the time. This time I hoped to God, he had squeezed and frozen the lives out of them. I was granted my wish!!

We were booked in their resort – Corbett Hideaway, nicely tucked in a big mango groove overseeing the Kosi on one side and forest on the other. We all settled in our rooms and went for a nature walk, trekked across mountains. Came back and had formal press meet at the bar of the hotel with the Director of Forest dept. – Rajiv Bhartari. We all grilled that guy quite a lot. Besides, he eluded my two fundamental questions: - - "why do you ply 30 vehicles in the morning and 30 at night that use diesel, wont it affect the fauna and flora of the whole jungle?" 2. "Why is NH 24 so badly maintained? Don’t you have nay initiative or roleto play?" (It was a hell of a bumpy drive through there!!).....mum...shared some irrelevant dumb joke for the first and ignored the second! Scandalous unscrupulous forest officials as they all are! I was truly annoyed as I get attached to these environmental issues far more than I should.Had some wine and boring dinner. My mistake, I was bored of the above mentioned menu, I wanted a change and asked for pasta. Must the Sicilians taste that….god forbid… And then we slept off to wake up next day with the phone ringing...just came out of my world of dreams to hear a dull voice on the other side of the phone .." wake up call ma'am" damn! What time is it, glanced at my cell...5.30 am! ‘They’ve lost their mind!!’, I thought…Woke my friend up, ordered for lemon teas, got ready to go on the safari, and wore some layers of woollen. Reached the lobby, no one was there on time, we retired in a wing of the lobby to play some carom with no powder on board. It was a dark cold morning. The game drove me and my friend to no end of glory, after a while I realised there was no voice or noise in the lobby. What happened? Did every one just leave? It was going to be a loooong day!

I rushed out to the lobby, no one was around, the guard says, “they have already left." I looked towards the gate; the 3 jeeps were almost gone. My friend and I rushed to stop them and picked our seats in two jeeps. Who cared about who accompanied us, getting a seat was the big deal then! In the dead of the night, we could hardly see faces or attires; they were all sitting like conically shaped snow man clones tucked into a woollen quilt. Thank god for that quilt, am alive today. As the jeep accelerated, the icy wind cut across our faces robbing us of all the heat resistance in our bodies. My cap felt so loose, like it was devoid of friction with my head, I knew it was going to finally slip away, the cold had gotten into my hands, pricking them and causing pain, in spite of my mittens. One sock strategy for that trip was ignorance on my part!The beautiful tall green trees now looked like cruel monsters hounding, staring down at us forcing the wind between them to attack us with all its vengeful desires. Literally, there was no 'ee' or 'kaakaa' (tamil) or the way up there. The drive seemed endless when finally; the jeep came to a life saving halt. At that moment I knew that I was driving my self into insanity paying 400 bucks at the gate for entry into the cold heartless asylum. (Hehe..the hotel paid though!!) As we passed by the gate, we entered the tiger arena. We drove to a tree house at the beginning of the dense jungle where souvenirs were available and for me most importantly, a properly constructed loo existed. Nature had been calling me for too long now. The pressure was really mounting due to the multiplicity of cold and tension around me. The guys in my jeep were cold to their groin, so cold that one of them said “constructed loo mein jane ki kya zaroorat hai, yahan to sara loo hi loo hai…” Guys never change!

After a while, they were grounding… all the words and expressions that are considered unparliamentarily started to flow, what was more fun, they were freely flowing in Hindi! First time, in my life I heard the 'boys talk', that really was the fun part. It was as if I was glassed! (This was the only fun part)As we went into the denser jungle, we could spot ice on leaves. Ahead was white mist. Who knew if it were a mammal or a reptile was strolling along? Although I know for a fact that this is pure hypothesis and hallucination for the amount of rattling that the jeep has been material in producing, no animal would dare come near us. The Jeep I believe was sitting literally on some loosely fitting iron rods, because every time the diesel engine started, it revealed itself so loudly that the animals by now must be making calls to refrain from the jeep's pathway.One of my jour friends was standing on the jeeps rear to look for animal movement very enthusiastically and then was the time, he saw it. It was huge, massive, mind blowing, wild, Tiger…he used many other words!!. The rest of us lost its sight...The naturalist and the driver were gassing, they didn’t even hear him say he saw it. At that moment I so wanted to feed those guys to the hungry carnivore!After that we just kept going around the jungle where the naturalist showed us the variety of vegetation, showed us how to identify calls and yes, he did show us the Pugmarks. My sincere advice to all travellers - Go to safaris in India, if you want to spot pug marks, you can find enormous variety! Just don’t expect more than that from our reserve authorities...they are helpless you see!! They only get a fraction of all the poaching benefit….if you push them, they might just get a caged emaciated mammal from a nearby poor zoo. Oh yes! You can do one thing; become a driver for a month, you can be sure to spot the mammal at least once! Yes!!For some time we did bask in front of the handsome Apollo - Sun God. He was really a saviour then. The dunderheaded driver tried hard to keep us going. It was 9.30 am when we found ourselves lamenting like losers, one of the guys started to feel really hungry and we had to head back. Thanks to the poachers, the forest authorities and the sleeping beauty - the naturalist!We then arrived in the hotel, with all our heads hanging down, in defeat, in shame. I made sure I asked all the people who went if they spotted him, they all said no, I was relieved! We went straight ahead to the breakfast lounge and gulped down some tasty pineapples, rocky idly, rainy sambar and cheese rolls. It was so late, we wouldn’t have spotted the tiger even if he were sitting and eating with us! We were asked to come back to the lounge after a warm bath. The bath was ggooood…What do you think they had in store for us after that uneventful patch of such disastrous morning!

I have to tell you this; I had washed my hair the day I left home. My hair was soft and shiny on the safari day. After bath, I did my hair really well. I was really happy with the outcome. I changed into a good pair of corduroys and a nice sweater with a muffler to keep me cosy in the day. I carried my new blue reversible jacket along. To remind you - in hilly areas, the days are pretty warm in the winters.

I had to hurry along with my friend after I got a call in my room from the reception to assemble. I thought I was late. As we proceeded to the gate at 12.17, late by seventeen minutes, we were disheartened by the fact that my friend and I were the only ones around. The herd started to assemble lethargically; everyone looked fresh and tucked up in decent nice clothes smelling fresh. Vibhas, the owner of the hotel, led us to something called a canter. We were going to ride in that. Do you know what it is? Ok. Imagine an army truck. Take off the rear covering on it and fix some iron rods on the top just like it would do to help hold a cover. That is a canter. It was really cool to climb in and sit inside.

All of us settled and the driver started to drive after that hot water bath and food, sleep conquered most of us. Now the wind was pleasant and not chills adding to our sleep comfort. All I know is that I woke up to see the Durgadevi gate, another such gate to enter the reserve again. In between was pure blithe. The Canter stopped. The wicked jeeps stood there again…..

We all climbed in out of compulsion, not freewill. Then I heard voices, these guys had a property somewhere up the hill where they have established camps with fishing facilities. It was to get operational in the next 6 months. We entered the Lohachur arch into the new Jungle. How new is it? It has got new Sal trees, new bushes, new path and it gave a new “ No animal sighting experience” Oh this one did have new deer! The path was the most exhilarating to drive on. It was made up of a ghastly combination of fine sand and rocks. And the road couldn’t be more mountainous. The rods of the jeep awoke me of a drowsy sleepy dreamy feel with a strike. The bump was so serious, my head felt dark with sparkling stars shining in my eyes for a few seconds. Then I held the rods very tightly for the next 1 hr of horrendous driving. Was I going to have concussions?!@#$%#%^!

I looked at my friend sitting next to me it felt like she was on a roller coaster. She wasn’t just sticking her self to the seat; she kept shifting, sliding and jumping up and down. Why? I thought. I realised I was undergoing the same tension. Oh God! NH24 wasn’t bumpy at all, Well, the definition of bumpy just got better and better. What was more, every time the path ahead was straight or downward, the driver would pull a knob near the gear box and the vehicle would jerk to move ahead, when it was inclined he would push the same knob again with same effect.

I was starting to concentrate in vain to look for movement and calls. Suddenly I realised I was hearing something that no one else seemed to notice - a cooing. Astounded, I asked the driver which animal it was, or was it a bird?? The driver seemed not to have heard me properly; he started to explain the knob ordeal to me, a non science person! I thought he didn't know. However, I was wrong again. The cooing was produced by our dear rattler! The jeep! Frustrated, my mind started to switch over to some intellectual pondering when suddenly the vehicle drove down a massive slope of about 40 degrees into the river banks.

This was an amusement park! We were now driving on mossy rounded pebbled and Oh! We were going straight into the big stream. Holy Christ! The jeep was inside the water, splashing it all around, the mossy pebbles made it even more bumpy and painful to drive on them, but wow! There was no stopping there even for pictures. The tyres were buried well under the water. We did miraculously got to the other side, without drowning! But wow! What a spectacle that was!

And then there was another such ride up the mountain, by now it was drudgery to me already. Finally the vehicle stopped sparing our back bones for sometime. When I climbed down, my muscles felt a terrible relief as if they were all going to thank me one after the other for that break. Ahead was an electrically fenced enclosure with 5 tents. As we approached we saw that they were all well made with a furnished bedroom and loo. We all saw them and came out to find a laid out lunch for us with drinks. I found a good table for us and laid my jacket on it.

As we all approached a nice spot to sit down, I observed that Vibhas who otherwise looked smart, looked as if he had dirty highlights, like the clichéd blue-line bus goons. What was the matter with him? I saw another journalist; her thick black hair had turned brown. Oh god! I knew what had happened. Each jeep that followed another was victim to the cloud of sand dust that its successor’s tyres produced. It had infested in all our heads by now. I remembered my dad saying, “Your head is full of fertile soil!” that day, it sure was! I ran my hands on my hair with apprehensions, they felt rough and worn out! It was a bad hair day for all of us who weren’t bald. My blue jacket had turned brown too!

Fishing for some reason was cancelled. The lunch was heavy and the fresh lime I had was rather sour. For desert the guys served us with ‘kheer’. Imagine – Kheer means ‘Pal Payasam’. This one tasted something like this. Basmati rice half cooked and mixed in thickened milk. Wow! But someone had really tried hard to smash it down!

Then we trekked a little bit on the mountain, spoke one of the two families that lives alone on the forest, surviving on agriculture. Apparently these guys have taken the land to construct the resort there; no one knows what clarity in transactions exists. We all then got back into the shake-it-baby jeep, to drive back into our haven. We had to digest our food, you know! I believe strongly and also recommend that people stick to their environment and not intrude into other mammal’s territory.

When we went back, our muscles were not ours anymore! They felt distant. My friend and I couldn’t wait to get back and bang the bed. We were to come back for lunch at 8 pm. Who knows when that will come! We both slept after a soothing hot lemon tea on the bed, like it is never allowed at home. I knew the formula of staying out well. Dirty the place as much as you can, coz parents aren’t going to instruct here…!

That night when we went for dinner, I was so cold after getting out of my warm bed that I needed a glass of wine. I was around a bonfire for some time, but the idea of burning fire gives me creeps and guilt, so I went in the bar for a while, had to endure a really boring conversation with one of the journalists. It was so difficult to pull away from his company but I finally did and then proceeded to dine. The DJ was good, Vibhas had an Ipod. At dinner, we were to be treated at the grill and as I said vegetarian”, I was served a plate that looked something like this –
Rice in the shape of an inverted cup, made with spinach (I love any green). Big pieces of cottage cheese that were hard and flavourless, one soggy kabab that had uncooked cold corn inside of it, and a lot of other veggies mixed in a sought of tasteless red gravy, each one of the veggies tasted stale. I kept it all away and finished my dinner with that rice and dessert – strawberry soufflé and bread pudding. The next day, we finally left – for good!