Hello,

Our trip to Ranthambore National Park did not start out as we had hoped. The train from Bundi that should have arrived at 9pm actually arrived at 12.30am due to an unexplained and unexpected 3 hour stop at Kota station. We were not very impressed and nor was the hotel manager who had to let us in and then wake up at 4.30 to get the hotel ready for the morning safari. We slept in and decided to forgo the morning safari in favour of the evening one. We had a really good safari spotting deer, baby crocodiles and lots of birds, but sadly no tigers. We enjoyed it so much we decided it would be worth getting up at 5.30am to go on the morning safari. We quickly picked up the tracks of a tiger but these unfortunately lead us to the edge of our alloted zone in the park which we could not go out of. We were all a bit disheartened. However, just a couple of minutes later we rounded a bend to find two stationary vehicles with people telling us to be quiet as there was a tiger ahead. Luckily we had the best jeep driver of the lot, who didnt hesitate to offend his colleages by quickly pushing his way to the front so we had the best view.

There, just lying in the middle of the road, was a beautiful tiger who didn't seem to care at all that we were there. Everyone was so excited. Then, all of a sudden, three cubs ran out of the bushes playing with each other! Even the driver and the guide were shocked. We could not believe our luck. It was the third time in their lives (7 months) that the cubs have been sighted. After a few minutes, the family slowly meandered away into the bushes and were gone leaving us to make a hasty exit before the other angry drivers could catch up with us...

It was an incredibly experience to see tigers in the wild!

We were very lucky. Most people do not even see one tiger even though they go on several safaris. The hotel manager said that he had never heard of a group seeing four tigers in one safari before. We had a very good day!