Today I noticed something fresh; the sound of the human voice floating freely in the air. There is little traffic, no hum of tall buildings. I hear children’s voices and women’s voices and the men, too. Calling out to each other, singing fragments of song. Not competing with anything but the birds and the wind and the […]
For two days, all the staff helped me with the preparation of nearly thirty kilos of carrot chutney, for the coming season. Just the peeling and chopping of all the ingredients took seven of us nearly four hours. Twenty kilos of carrots, six kilos of tomatoes, six kilos of onions, a kilo of garlic, […]
Just another sunny November day at Basunti – Poinsettia and Bougainvillea coming into full bloom and Black Redstart, Great Tit, Oriental White-eye and Himalayan Bulbul taking a bath.
Andy Fish and Andy arrived after a very successful fishing trip in the Barot and Tirthan valleys, Himachal Pradesh. A tally of over eighty wild Brown and Rainbow Trout, caught in five days, made for two very happy fishermen. As the water levels have started to drop in the lake, they decided to try […]
It is bone dry Himachal Pradesh and most of the day at Basunti is now spent in the garden. The Monsoon is late this year and everything is desperate for water. The Indian Bean Tree though loves the heat and is presently in full bloom.
This is the time the Mango starts ripening and […]
Within ten days of hatching the Bulbul chicks were fully fledged and had left the nest. I do not know if this is a normal time span for the Himalayan Bulbul, or if it was helped by the fact that they had their own parents, plus the Oriental White-eyes feeding them…
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Having noticed over the past few weeks a distinct reduction in the number of Golden Mahseer in this part of the Maharana Pratap waters, we have decided that from now on all Mahseer will be on a strict CPR (Catch, Photograph and Release) basis at Basunti.
This decision made, we decided to spend the […]
The last yoga group of the spring season departed on the 15th April, hopefully everyone left feeling happy, relaxed and well fed.
After contemplating my four and a half coming months of total freedom, decided to spend the first few days in the garden giving everything a much needed watering. Also started preparing all […]