Saturday : fine

Well judging by that picture we got on a safari. But believe me it wasn't easy.

The alarm went off and we followed the plan of getting up and being ready in the lobby by 4.45am and then drive to the ticket office.

It was 5.15 by the time we left! Yudhvir slept in, we tried calling his phone three times. We didn't know where his room was, and the reception was closed, so we had to walk through the hotel to try and find him. We did and I got him up rather urgently, Kim and I were well and truly peed off by then.

We drove to the ticket office and it was absolutely chaotic. The people in the lines were everywhere and all over everyone, it was a proper mess. Kim was furious, we hit up Yudhvir to help us, but I think in his mind he was just a driver, he was definitely no Surya (our Annapurna guide). So it was up to us, I waited in line for over two hours. Even then right to the last 5-6 people they were still acting like animals, I have never seen anything like it. Maybe there are similar scenes in a Chinese supermarket or a Metallica mosh pit. I was getting amongst it though, diving under people, pushing, copping and throwing plenty of elbows, having a blast, and after all that effort, it wouldn't of gotten us anything. The ticket office only sells group tickets not just one or two. I couldn't believe it, another piece of info we were never told. It's like scalpers buying all the good seats and charging more for people wanting to buy them, but even those people didn't want to sell us two tickets. This is when Yudhvir eventually helped out, he managed to find someone who did have two tickets for sale. and that's the end of that debacle.

Until the actual safari started that is. We boarded our botch job truck at the ticket office, and made the first pickup. An Indian family with young kids awesome, our second pickup was another Indian family with even younger children. It didn't take us long to soon think that this could be the worst $18 we have ever spent. The little brats were out of control, it was like a Mc Donald's playground on wheels.

Everyone was so noisy, even the parents. The guide told the kids to be quiet more times than the parents. We thought that we would have stuff all chances of seeing a tiger. Especially when they're a solitary and a very territorial animal. We were told that the males have a territory of 40-50 square km, females 20-30 km. The park is 1400 square kms in size and has 43 tigers, 13 of which are cubs. Also people have come to the park for 5-6 consecutive days and seen nothing, so with all the noisy kids and being giving that piece of information our hope was not high. We did have a slight chance though, the area we were entering today had a tiger sighting yesterday.

So we entered the park and immediately saw animals. We had the nice monkeys come and jump in the canter, we saw lots of birds especially peacocks, different types of dear, even crocodiles. The park was teeming with wildlife, and shortly after we saw the croc to our amazement we saw a Tiger.

It was a female tiger, and she was absolutely awesome looking. We were so shocked to she her just walking along the dirt track the way she was. Especially with all the yelling and whistling going on, even from the parents it was a joke, the guide had to keep reminding them to be quiet so many times.

We followed the tiger for maybe 50-100m and then she ran into the bush. Woo it was a rush. We continued the drive and the animals still were out on show, female and male dear and peacocks and monkeys were the main stars.

Then we couldn't believe it! Another Tiger! It just appeared through the shrubs from around a corner on the dirt track again. The guide said it was the same tiger that we saw before, so we kept our distance from her. She kept walking towards us, so we kept reversing. She walked right past the side of the canter it seemed like she was as tall as the trucks bonnet walking by, she looked big from this close distance. The monkeys were go 'ape' too, howling screaming sending out warning calls. She walked for a little further then she jumped into a pond for a swim, below the tree full of monkeys. We got to take some photos or her resting on the edge on the pond. She looked like she was eyeing off everyone in the truck, at anytime she could jump in to pick one of us off. To be frank I wish she did, some of these people are so silly. You don't need a long neck to be a goose I always say.

Incredible how lucky are we, but wait there's more, we drove around for awhile longer and then made our way out heading towards the entry gate. Then there she was again! overlooking a tree full of tasty monkeys at another pond. We stopped for awhile then let a couple other vehicles enjoy the tiger and we continued out of the park.

Unbelievable, that tiger was so relaxed. Apparently they found a dear carcass yesterday too so she had most likely eaten, and won't have to eat for another 3-4 days. So that's why she was just cruising, they are use to the people in the park though. Still the guide said earlier this year someone was killed in the park, a farmer tried to save one of his goats from a tigers grip, then the tiger though he would taste better.

Well it didn't turn out to be a waste of money at all, we finally got to see some tigers, alright!

We got dropped off to our hotel after the tour finished, just in time before breakfast finished. Lucky again.

We then got packed up and checked out if this friendly hotel. We had a long afternoon drive today 350km, back along the same bumpy road. I wanted to stop so many times and have an over or two of cricket along the way but I didn't. I'll have to keep an eye out for a game when we are on our own.

It was a long drive today 7hrs, and dark we we arrived to Agra. Yudhvir and I spoke for a while along the way. Agra drivers a terrible, they are all over the place. Yudhvir was a bit unsure of the whereabouts of the hotel too, so the traffic was all around us.

We found it alive, and had a friendly greeting, about time we did We even got upgraded to a suite, which was nice. Our tour company probably main the call for the upgrade, because they knew we were not too happy with them. That's about all we got though, their English was very limited and couldn't answer our questions on things to do in Agra. Or remember to cook our dinner, we just went to a corner store and picked up some nibbles. Then got our bags ready for checkout, and bed. It was a too later night for an early morning again. But we are both excited to finally see the taj mahal tomorrow.