Tracking the Wild Tigers of Corbett

Our wake-up call or rather I should say wake up knock came at 4:30 am and we headed out in the cold morning air to get our permit. This being India, once we got to the ranger station, it turns out that they didn’t open until 6:15 am. So we sat around for an hour and complained of boredom and the cold. Once we got our permit, we drove for 30 minutes to get to the right gate which certainly was a bracing trip in an open-air jeep.

There are a range of animals in the park including three types of deer, monkeys, elephants and innumerable birds. However the primary goal is to see a tiger. The guides love to show off pictures and videos of tigers walking along the roads and there was plenty of evidence that tigers were around. We saw fresh tiger tracks in the dirt and trees where tigers had scratched the bark in order to mark their territory. Early on we heard the barking deer sound their warning call but no one in the dozen or so jeeps that were waiting around was able to see anything. So we drove around spotting monkeys playing around in the trees and other wildlife but nothing resembling a tiger.

Mid-morning we stopped for some eggs and cookies as a makeshift breakfast. By that point most of the jeeps had finished their safari and we continued on. We saw elephant prints and fresh elephant poop but apparently wild elephants are surprisingly stealthy. I’m not sure how a fifteen foot tall, two ton animal can be so sneaky but they are. Our driver took us off-piste and we climbed up a rusty, shaky observation tower. We saw a jackal but not much else. Then as we drove on we ran across another jeep that had stopped. They had heard a deer’s warning cry and we could hear the monkeys in the nearby trees screeching. A big male sambar deer came bounding out of the forest and three females followed him shortly thereafter. Then we heard the tiger strike. The deer gave a blood curdling cry, birds flew out of the trees, the monkeys screamed even louder and we heard the tiger’s deep roar. It was like something out of Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom. Only the tiger remained safely hiding in the forest. We sat around for about half an hour waiting for a tiger to amble out of the forest but to no avail.

We drove back and forth to a nearby creek hoping that the tiger would go down for an after-meal drink but he was clearly smarter than that. When we drove back, we saw that the other jeep had driven off the road to within 10 feet of the edge of the forest. So we bounced along the grasslands until we were next to them. Then there was a flurry of activity as our guide saw the tiger deep in the trees. Lisa and Nora were able to catch a glimpse but I didn’t see anything. We continued to wait but the tiger had moved on and there was nothing to see. Oh well, I had a great time and enjoyed the scenery so I couldn’t get hung up on my lack of a tiger sighting.

Later that afternoon we were headed out for an elephant ride through the forest by our hotel. With the four of us and his driver on his back, the elephant walked up the road for fifteen minutes before turning into a break in the woods The forest was beautiful in the late afternoon sun and we saw some deer and monkeys. Then as we were heading up a creek bed, we heard the warning bark of the deer and our elephant driver quickly turned the elephant around. At first, I wasn’t sure what he was doing but I quickly realized that he was heading toward the tiger and not away from it. The elephant continued through the underbrush and we heard the tiger’s roar filling the air. I quickly turned to the hill where it came from and there not half a mile from my hotel room, I saw the tiger stealthily creeping through the underbrush. So while it only lasted a second or so, I did get my glimpse of a wild tiger. We continued to try to track him but didn’t see or hear any evidence of the tiger. Once the sun started to set and we lost of daylight, we turned around and headed home, tired, happy to have seen a tiger and not thinking about the fact that the tiger was prowling not very far from where we were staying.