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A Birthday Safari in the Jim Corbett Tiger Reserve and National Park

I convinced my new friend, Diego (from LA who I met at the ashram in Rishikesh), to join me for a few days in the Jim Corbett Tiger Reserve and national park. There was a car waiting at Ram Jhula bridge to take us on the eight hour drive to our destination.


Best day for a Birthday Safari!

As we were driving into the national park, I could not help but have some concerns of the type of accommodation. The name of the place we would stay was “Tiger Camp Resort” – and every accommodation we had passed in the car were straw bungalows, with what I would assume would have been straw mats on the bare ground.

Much to our pleasant excitement, the accommodation was an oasis away from the dustiness and noise of the outside world. It was a resort in all senses of the word – our apartment was a stand-alone house, equipped with a massive bathroom and functioning shower!

A private safari jeep just for the two of us, would pick us up at 5:30am and we’d drive 12KM out of town to the Tiger Reserve – don’t worry, there are 4KM of buffer zoneto ensure that the population surrounding the national park have ample space between the wild and their patch of civilisation. Although, there have been reports of wild tigresses and her cubs to venture into built up areas (for god knows what reason!).


‘Tis the nature of the ninja-like tigers

I wore my army green hiking shirt, which suited quite well to the themes of jungle and safari. Our guide was well-versed in English and all things technical/detailed of wild animals.

Diego and I were really quite impressed with how our guide and driver were tracking animal paw prints and using all of their senses to ensure we had the best chance to get a glimpse of as many animals as possible.

Here’s a photograph of tiger paw prints, and here we waited some time to try and see him! There are ranger stations scattered throughout the national park and there is a special ‘call’ or ‘alarm’ to alert the jeeps of tiger movements in the park. I really think the tigers were sitting right near us and even if we had waited the entire day, they would not have come out of hiding – ‘tis the nature of the ninja-like tigers.

We spotted fresh elephant dung and followed a dirt trail to a spot where a family of about five elephants were eating. What a sight to see! No photos though, I have them stored in my brain – these experiences aren’t really conveyed well through images and must be experienced in person.

There were no tiger sightings that day, however we did see many other wild animals: jackal, wild boar, peacocks (we saw a few of them fan out their amazing feathers AND even saw some of them flying!), peahens, forest fowl, many colourful types of birds endemic to India, Bee-eaters, deer, monkeys, langoose, monitor lizard (which the guides kept joking was ‘man-eater’ lizard).

The jeep ride itself was a thrill and we were able to stand inside the jeep while it was in motion and to feel the wind in your hair and blowing past your skin was really quite refereshing.

Best day for a Birthday Safari!

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