December 25, 2023

Monday, 11:30 PM

Club Mahindra Derby Green Resort,

Fern Hill, City Ooty (Ootacamund),

District Nilgiris, Karnataka, India

Mudumalai Tiger Reserve is not big on tourist activity, so there are limited permits and for some reason a lot of people have been visiting tiger reserves and wildlife sanctuaries for the holidays, which is a bit odd because I have the impression that people generally tend to celebrate festivals such as Christmas at home, or celebrate in happening clubs in the urban centers or go to the beaches or mountains. But maybe my impression is a little off and some people prefer visiting the wildlife on holidays, and that’s good news for ecotourism. 

However, it did put me in a great deal of trouble with finding places to stay and obtaining safari permits. I cannot book permits or places to stay much in advance because we tend to extend our stay wherever there is an opportunity to shoot wildlife or birds, or there is something else that is interesting (like the Geminid meteor shower I shot some time back). So the most I can do is plan two destinations ahead, but not any more than that. And that has been a source of a lot of problems of late because this is festive time and new year is also around the corner. 

The difficulties are not going to take a break because we’ll be traveling almost every other day to a new location and we are likely to continue facing such problems because new year celebrations start around December 29th and continue through January 2nd. And we’ll be looking for a place to stay every other other during this period. 

There were no safari permits left for us at Mudumalai, so with difficulty (after standing in a queue for more than an hour, that is) I got two bus safari tickets and boarded a safari bus for my first experience of the kind. It was fun to be on the bus with so many wildlife enthusiasts but there was nothing much to find in terms of wildlife. So except for a few reasonably good pictures (nothing spectacular), I do not have much to show for my maiden bus safari experience.

We checked out from Safari Land Villa Resort and came to Ooty (Ootacamund) in the evening.