A FULL HOUSE of members and guests were at the camera club meeting on Thursday (Apr 7), to once again be enthralled with the images and stories, and the travels of Roy Packer.

It was September last year that Roy gave an evening’s talk and showed members images of his tour of India.

This evening was a return to India ‘Amazing India’. Roy explained to members the equipment he carried which included his EOS – 1 DX Canon camera, 200-400 F4 lens and 1.4 extensions and various other lenses, chargers, cards and a laptop. He gave us a fact file of flight details and the 4187 miles he covered to get there, what Visa’s were required together with the medical requirements.

India has 17% of the worlds population an estimated 1,203,710,000 and covers and area 1,148 million square miles.

Using both still images, video and music Roy transported us firstly to understand the street life and through his eyes showed the rubbish and people sifting through it all, the animals and traffic to the sacred cows and finally to the luxury of hotels.

Roy’s passion for tigers was next shown to the members with some tiger tales, he explained that all the tigers were in the wild and each one was given a name and almost every tiger has a special story or reputation, such as ‘Machali’ the lady of the Lake and ‘Ustad who had killed three forest workers.

We were taken now to Keoladeo National Park sometimes called ‘Bird city’. The area is of international importance with over 375 bird species being recorded, not only were we shown spectacular images of Kingfishers, Cranes, Storks, Cormorants and Pelicans, Roy explained that getting around the area needed pedal power, using tri-cycles two to three people were transported.

In the Agra District, Roy visited the Taj Mahal, one of the Seven Wonders of the World, built by Mughal Emperor Shahjahan in memory of his third wife, Mumtaz Mahal.

To conclude the first half of this exciting and captivating journey, Roy put together an audio visual of images taken in Calcutta.

Following the tea break and with the aid of maps, Roy introduced everyone to the Mangrove forest, the ‘Sundabarns’, one of the largest such forests in the world which lies on the Delta of the Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna rivers all running in to the Bay of Bengal. Again Roy spoke of time and methods of transportation to get to his destination the ‘Ducki’ village on Gosaba Island.

We were told that the local inhabitants loved having pictures take this was evident from the images shown. The audience were shown the typical living conditions and homes made from mud and cow dung. Images were shown of Crocodiles, Lizards, Wild Hogs, Spotted Deer and of course the elusive ‘Bengal Tiger’.

The Kazirawga National Park in the district of Assam, famous not only for its’ tea, but also the home of the One Horned Rhino, known as the National Park Giant.

This remote National Park is also home to large herds of Elephants, Water Buffalo and Black Neck Storks, images of which we were privileged to see. Our journey with Roy continued to Jaipur were the images of Amber Fort once know as Dhundar, the Palace of the Winds known as Hawa Mahal and finally the Water Palace on Mausagar Lake.

The evening concluded with Roy visiting a new destination the city of ‘Varanasi’ where cremations take place daily on the steps known as the ‘Ghats’ alongside the Ganges. The ashes are then swept into the river to continue their life.

Roy’s passion for tigers and India was summed up in his final audio visual with numerous images of the tigers and the many characters that make up this vast country. Not allowing us to leave, a short presentation of his recent safari in Africa was shown – ‘But that’s for the future’.

The members thanked Roy for yet another memorable evening displaying not only his skill as a photographer, but also his passion.