Wonder Where The Lions Are
Apprehensive about super-touristy Rajasthan, we dove deeper into Gujarat to visit the village of Sasan Gir – a few hundred meters of road lined with shops selling tea and thalis – and the nearby national park protecting the last wild, asiatic lions. Our hotel proprietor lured us to his cheap accomodation and then overcharged us for our safari, but we were happy to pay $3.75 per night for the best room we’ve had in India, which more than made up for the safari costs.
The next dawn we set out through the teak forest, which made me dream of warm summers days visiting my friends and their thousands-of-dollars-worth of dog chewed teak patio furniture. A birder couple from Victoria joined us, keeping us informed on the birds in the park, such as the bulbul, the common kingfisher, the white breasted kingfisher, the grey heron, the cattle crane, the cormorant, the woodpecker, the green bee-eater, the treepie, the peacock/peahen, the laquin, the parakeet and the myna birds. The park was filled with chittals, a kind of spotted deer, and we saw two sambar, an animal similar to an elk. Though the lions proved elusive that day, Janet spied two leopards. The first was just 30 feet away and we were able to watch it for several minutes while it hunted chittal. Unfortunately, the photograph makes it seem a spec on the horizon, rather than a close encounter. Can you spot the leopard?
