Tiger reserve in off-season

Corbett is of course one of the best known tiger reserves around. You are certain to see tiger paw-prints or tiger poop if not the majestic beast itself. Off-season time in fact you gotta be happy with that. The grass is so tall you can barely see 10m ahead, however there were a few reports of some sightings. Dhikala of course is the best place to stay there. Right in the jungle, it overlooks a river and sits atop a cliff with plains to behold. The 2 hr drive to it also takes you across a varied landscape and deer and wild boar are of course in plenty.

In Dhikala, there is the platform overlooking the valley and as soon as we got there, someone pointed out a tusker in the distance. Further away was a herd of elephants barely visible because of the distance. Later as night fell, one of the workers there told us that porcupines would come down to eat the garbage thrown behind the worker mess. After waiting for an hour, sure enough a couple of baby porcupines came down to chomp on the leftovers, one of them even attempting to take a roti out of some guys hand.

Spent the next day mostly in jeep drives. The bird life varies quite a bit in each area and boars an different types of deer keep you company for quite a bit. The area near the river is the busiest. Caught a few pug marks along the way. The afternoon though was spent on the platform and that provided a fantastic view of the river, among other things managed to see eagles, vultures, tortoises and maybe a tiger. Maybe because everyone just caught glimpses and even the photos are inconclusive.


Wrapped up the final day with a nice elephant ride which took us down to the river. Birds, sambhar, chital and boars again but the chilly trip down was beautiful. A fish eagle continued to pose for us until it was time to leave. As a lady nearby put it: Must be the most photographed fish eagle around.