Sultanpur Bird Sanctuary

  Sultanpur, India
Sunday, February 25, 2007

Early Morning Light

Sunrise at Sultanpur

Nilgai

The second weekend wouldn't be any fun without getting out to explore, the ladies decided to head down to Agra while I decided to stick around Delhi and go to the Sultanpur Bird Sanctuary and National Park. I took a packed lunch and breakfast and headed out there at 6:15 arriving just as the sun was rising. It was definitely a nice sight to watch the sunrise though the mist. I got to spot plenty Nilgai antelope hiding in the long grass. The park had a path that seemed about 2 miles, that stretched around the perimeter and looped around the lake. There were plenty of birds around, some species I saw were about Painted Storks, Wooly Necked Storks, Black Headed Ibis, Eurasian Spoonbill, Great Egret, Black Drongo, Red Wattled Lapwing with fantastic red beaks, Rose Ringed Parakeet, Indian Peafowl, Common Moorhen, White Throated Kingfishers, Little Cormorants, Common Teals, Northern Pintails, an Indian roller (actually outside park), Greater Coucal, the ubiqitous house crow, Oriental Magpie Robin, Common Myna and Eurasian Collared Dove. I chatted with a nice Indian family who helped me by calling a cab for me when I found me cell phone had died. The drive back from here made me remember that India certainly has some crumbling housing and is very dirty in places. A lot of garbage gets thrown on the streets where the initial clear up will be done by the local cows.
 

Rose Ringed Parakeet

Red Wattled Lapwing

I had a sudden brain wave that the reason I though roundabouts were so mad was that probably the rules of the road were to give way to the car entering the roundabout, but this theory fell through after a few more roundabout crossings and I soon realised it was really a big free for all. We also crossed the main Delhi-Jaipur road at some point, it took about 5 policemen to keep control. There would be one guy in the centre directing the traffic from one direction to go. The other cops would be placed on the other 3 junctions to stop the oher cards from pushing out from the junction too far so as to block the road!