—Categories: travel photography

Images from 2017

Sunrise over Nanda Kot peak, Uttarakhand

The year is almost coming to an end. Here is that customary post with a bunch of images as I look back into the year.

I did not travel much in the first half of the year, but became slightly more active from August onwards. In August, I went on a trek in Uttarakhand Himalayas where the landscapes were just out of the world. In September, I visited Kyrgyzstan in Central Asia, driving through its highlands and spending days with the semi-nomadic shepherds. My tryst with shepherds continued in October, this time at the highlands of Ladakh. My next rendezvous was in Andaman islands in November, leaving December for some quiet time at home. Here is a collection of images from these journeys.

Sunrise at Dochula Pass, Bhutan

Sunrise from Dochu La Pass, Bhutan.

A portrait from Bhutan A portrait from Bhutan Gangtey Monastery, Bhutan

A few more images from Bhutan that I enjoyed making.

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—Categories: kyrgyzstan

The Eagle Hunters of Kyrgyzstan

For many years now, I have had a wish to meet and photograph the falconers of Central Asia. The falconers, also called Eagle Hunters, train eagles to hunt small animals and are usually found in Mongolia, Kazakhstan and neighbouring countries. I was in Kyrgyzstan last September, where I had an opportunity to spend a few hours speaking to and photographing an Eagle Hunter. 

The eagles–a golden eagle in this case–are usually picked up from the nest at an early age. A falconer keeps them for about twenty years and subsequently releases them in the wild. This is a practice that perhaps helped perpetuate their population in the wild during the times when eagle hunting was a common practice across Central Asia. 

Continue reading The Eagle Hunters of Kyrgyzstan…