Welcome To The Kingfisher Wildlife Diaries – John Bailey
November 16th 2009
A World of Colour
Of course, it's not only big cats that make any expedition out to northern India so thrilling. Everything out there is in Technicolor. The difference between northern India and the UK is like watching television first in colour and then in black and white. That's especially so when you land back at Heathrow on a dour, misty, early mid-winter morning.
The flowers are spectacular. The saris the women wear. The birds. The endless streams of butterflies. Even the elephants are decorated with lines of dye.
Even at night the sky is extraordinary and the constellations so bright you can hardly believe them. Shooting stars, too. And the amazing colours of dawn as the sun creeps up over the first of the Himalayan mountainsides. Or go deep into the Himalayas themselves and see the crystal snow.
But then again...I return home and turn on my computer. The emails are endless but one is a jewel. A friend has sent me a photograph of the River Wensum at sunset. It's magnificent. A cauldron of golden mist. A pair of swans looking quite prehistoric on the flood plain. I'll ask Phil's permission to put the photograph on the website. Look out for it. If it doesn't make you want to visit Kingfishers this winter then nothing on earth will.