The Day of Travel - & - the first date with the Sarus!

I was nervous! It was the beginning of my first shoot in North India. I had heard a lot from fellow photographers that the light there will be amazing and one can shoot almost the entire day! I hardly believed that...until, I went to Bharatpur! Many of beliefs were lined up to get destroyed, without my knowledge! My understanding of many things were about to get changed, unknowingly!

After we landed in Delhi airport, once the waiting was over for all the other members we headed towards Bharatpur. After a sluggish start on Delhi road, thanks to the traffic, once we reached the Agra highway, the light started becoming soft. When I looked at time, it was still 2:30 in the noon. Never in my life I had seen that beautiful light at that time in the afternoon! We were tempted to stop at many small jheels where there were plenty of Black winged stilts and other waders, but because of time crunch, we decided to move ahead till we stopped for lunch. Then after a round of discussion the team decided to stop on the next best shooting location on the way as we all knew that by the time we reach Bharatpur it will be dark. So we were on a hunt for a place along the high way which leads us to Bharatpur.


Nothing very interesting came on the way and we were almost convinced that we had lost some of the very good opportunities along the way before we stopped for lunch! I was very much enjoying the mustard fields which are glowing in the evening sun with their yellow flowers. The color arrangement of the greens and yellow was looking fantastic in the evening light. I was just thinking how would it be if I see a Sarus Crane pair in this field, with their red head up among the green-yellow fields! I was in my own world, dreaming and looking both the sides and enjoying the evening, camly.....till... I shouted - 'Sarus....Sarus'.


All the three vehicles stopped immediately. There was a pair of Sarus Crane in the dry field. It was the first time in my life that I was seeing them...I always wanted to...what magnificent birds they are... truly beautiful. I was amazed. Always I knew that they are beautiful but never I had thought that they are this much attractive! 'Love at first sight' for me, even though I dont believe in that phrase!


After struggling to get some good images and a failure to cross a nallah to go into the field, I was returning to my Jeep then Nilanjan pointed me the way to get into the field and told that Ganesh and Nurdeen are already half way n the field! I reached 0-60kmph in just 3 sec (hehehe joking!) and joined them withing few min. Panting heavily, managed to shoot some frames handheld, as I dint bring the tripod in the hurry. Then after recovering for some mins we started approaching the birds slowly. Got some good images in the process before they prepared for a take off!


Ah! What an experience it was to go behind the Sarus. Felt worth every heavy breath after looking at those beauties from that close.

I was very happy that I saw that bird from that close. I never knew even in my dreams that there is a much more interesting stalking in the days to come!!



Reached Bharatpur at 6:30 and it was dark and cold.

Started dreaming about the next five days at 10:30PM!!

Much more to come!!

- Ash