Tiger Safari

It was an early start today so we could go in the jeep and see the Tigers. Because the best time to see them is first thing in the morning and last thing in the afternoon or early evening.  

There are zones 1 to 13 and they randomly select the zones you get to go into. We got zone 6. It was a bumpy ride to get to the place where we got our guide.The reserve is so huge that it can be up to an hours drive between entrance gates to get in.

You have to sign a piece of paper saying that is anything happens to you its not their fault.

Then when we got through a pink gate our guide instantly saw tiger foot prints that I just thought were puppy paw prints.  They were really fresh and the guide got really excited.

We followed it to an area that looks like a swamp, but unluckily for us we didn’t get to see it.  But we knew it was there because a deer was saying it was.  It was probably because everyone else knew it was there and there were big big trucks without roofs there.  And the people were making too much noise so the tiger wouldn’t show.

We hired a private jeep so we could get a chance to see the tigers.  But no one saw a tiger today.  There are fifty five tigers in the park cause it cant support any more.

We saw three different types of deer.  Sambal deer, spotted deer and Indian deer.

We also saw monkeys.

We saw a spotted owl.

When we stopped for the toilets one Indian said could I have a photo with you and then other people started to come and ask.  But appearently when they say one photo they mean a thousand photos.  I felt famous.

The town we had to drive through to get to zone six  has a lot of camels.  Everyone thinks of camels as pains in the arse because they spit but when you are there with them they have their head held high and they look like they think they are better than us.

The cows in India are very holy.  In fact on our drive to the reserve there was a very holy cow that was hitchhiking a ride.   It was actually in the trailer being driven.  They sit in the middle of the road and walk accros knowing they wont get hit cause they are holy cows.  And some sleep in the middle of the road.

We went back to the hotel and then went on our next safari in the afternoon.

The next safari was a really long drive and was bumpy and windy.  We were driving to zone 8.  The road went through a village.  We saw more cows.  There were a lot of women walking to get water and there was a pump that they were using to get the water.  They were also doing washing around the pump.

We got to the gate of zone 8 and got our guide.  We drove through and there were heaps of monkeys and deer at a water hole.  And I think there should have been a tiger there.

This landscape was really different to the morning one.  It was dryer and had trees that weren’t so green and was a lot bumpier and steeper.  We went right up the top of a mountain and by the time we reached the top we realized how high we were when we looked over.

There were animals everywhere because they tigers don’t hunt at this time of day.  It was about three in the afternoon.  But our safari went to six oclock and it was dark when we finished.  I thought the view was spectacular.  There were less people in this zone and and there were no big trucks.  The only access was for the jeeps.