So has been correctly quoted “We travel not to escape life but life not to escape us.” Every small chunk of my journey makes me the newer me. The departure into the unknown lands, to awaken alone in a strange town, to see the moon shine in the other part of the world, to the voyage with a bunch of unknowns, to taste every bit of tradition, to tingle your taste buds with the most authentic dishes and then you feel the magicness of going faraway. Bit by a travel bug, my virus adds more impulses to travel.
Wanderlust, I join up the Sundarbans Pirates Party! Cross India Tourism provides unique and off-beat adventure tours in and around Sundarbans. To the adventure freaks out there, believe me this can be in your bucket list next for the ultimate venture into the Sundarbans & the intertwining Mangroves. It is a 2-day 1-night sail through the backwaters of Bengal and tearing away the creeks on a wooden pirate themed rustic cruise boat.
Our dynamic host had it even more audaciously planned up right from the start point of Kolkata. The sail starts from Namkhana (Cross India Ghats) around the time when mid-afternoon sun just starts burning bright red. Unleash the pirate within you and embark the venture into the sea. Rejuvenate yourself meanwhile with the welcome drinks on board along with a fresh brunch of fruits. Safety and Security are paramount with the Cross India Team. Been familiar with the term `Safety’, a flake of boredom ran in me but abruptly the instructions seemed expensive. For Pirates like me, the ignorant swimmers were expected to pay more attention.
Crossing myriad villages, waving to the unknown fishermen and the lullaby of the chirping birds in the background took me to a short nap. I woke up to the names of Mohan Bagaan and East Bengal lustily from a distant away. Bengal craves for Football, Fish and Fun, so clear in the expression of people. I popped up from my berth to find myself to be in a long stretch of sand on the bank and the ship anchored. The crew members were busy playing Football and to add an English edge to it they tried their hands on beach ball of Indian version!
We were in the Barren island(Not the Andamans though).The Barren island disappears in the night,Seemed so interesting and I was eagerly waiting for the same.We had a beautiful evening with campfire lit as the sun slowly hid itself in the deep waters of Bay of Bengal. The soft tunes of Guitar broke the loneliness of the island and the gossips of people. We helped ourselves for the readymade Tandoor dishes.As i send my eyes into the blue of the distant sky,i get deep engrossed into my thoughts of the other part of the world where my usual schedule just is shabbily returning from office and the moment i was living at that junction was fascinating. Drenched in the intoxicating evening,I realised that water had already touched our feet.I just was pretty sure i would regularly monitor the level of water and see how this magic could happen that the water would gulp up the island,but in vain i would say the nature around the beautiful Barren Island was so spellbound that this all went unnoticed.Slowly we boarded the ship through a make-shift bridge.
I lay on the deck to gaze the twinkling stars, a favourite of mine. One can spot the faraway shimmering lights of the fisherman boats. It felt as though i was flipping through some pages of a poem, sometimes deep into the thoughts of “The Rime of the ancient Mariner” and “The sailor Boy”, poems back from my high school days. We sailed and sailed chasing those shimmering lights.
As the daylight slowly crept through the curtains of my berth, a golden hue in the sky, I ran to the deck not to miss this one capture of a beautiful dawn setting in. We touched the fishermen boats to check in the different types of sea-fish they had caught. With bells on, I jumped into their boat and couldn’t decide which fish to exclude. I was just ecstasy on the different types they had, we had our baskets full. We were then lined up for Bhagawatpur Crocodile Sanctuary and a nature walk. Then we set sail for the next adventure of Jungle safari and creek adventure. The mangrove forests had buzzing sounds of crickets and insects. There are very negligible chances of spotting a tiger there. Every slight movement among the creeks just had Goosebumps in us. That was a time when the adventure freaks just prayed for spotting a tiger and the timid ones hoped to board ship safely. The prayers were with the timid ones and sigh, we couldn’t spot any.
It was time we head back from the Pirate experience back to square one. Crossing the picturesque villages of Bengal, in the land of Tagore and his poems of ‘Casting my Net into the Sea’, I am drowned in the beautiful journey I was engrossed in for two days. We have a call for Lunch at the deck with freshly cooked veggies and the Bengali-staple Fish picked up at the Fishermen`s boat. The perfectly home cooked meals made me gulp up to the full. The ship finally anchored to the shore and the inevitable part of parting pulled me down but for the rich experiences am carrying will be cherished forever. So the pirates say “I’m not a Pirate, I’m an innovator”.