Thekkady wild life sanctuary

Some of the first pictures from my Nikon camera shot in Kerala in Feb-Mar 2009

I had never before seen or photographed wild life so close. So, it was wonderful to see it from such a close angle. These pictures are shot at Periyar Wildlife Sanctuary in Thekkady. The Sanctuary is spread across 777 km and has an artificial lake formed by the Mullaiperiyar Dam across Periyar River. Tourists are taken for boat rides where you can see birds and animals on both banks of the lake.

The biggest attraction of the sanctuary are wild elephants who come down to drink water and bathe. The ideal time of the elephant sightings is said to be either the first boat at 7 am or the last at 5.30 pm. But we went in the afternoon, and were lucky to spot two different groups of elephants. In the photographs below, one group is emerging from the clearing up in the hills on the left side of the bank. While the second group is down by the water on the right side of the bank when our boat returned.

I have always loved Kingfisher and its exotic colours in photographs. But I had never imagined that I would be excited like a child on actually spotting one. I missed a heartbeat each time I did.