Last Updated on April 15, 2024 by PowersToTravel
Lions and tigers and bears, oh no!
Needless to say, we saw no lions in India; they belong in Africa. But we did see Tigers and Bears, Birds and Leopards, Antelopes and Mongoose. Seeing wildlife on vacation is always a hit-or-miss proposition. With all the planning, and all the efforts by the tour agency, no one can make that tiger stroll down to the water’s edge and play with her cubs.
But with my choice of Cultural Safari Tours, I maximized our opportunities in ways I had not understood necessary. We have, in the past, used travel agencies in foreign countries when we didn’t have confidence in our ability to speak the language, or use the public transit system, or get out into the wilderness to see what we could not arrange on our own.
However, Cultural Safari Tours exceeded our expectations in so many ways. One key reason I selected Cultural Safari Tours was our desire to see both the architectural wonders of Rajasthan AND go on safari. Some agencies offer the city experience and seem to be a little inexperienced with the wildlife experience. Other agencies focus entirely on the wildlife experience and that would not do for us. But Cultural Safari Tours offered us the Rajasthan Culture and Wildlife Safari Tour.
It was in early 2020 that I began an email dialog with Sudhir Sharma. We wrote back and forth, for several months, about the hotels we wanted, the type of safari opportunities. Sudhir seemed extraordinarily well versed in how to maximize opportunities to see tigers at Ranthambhore National Park. I was almost ready to send our deposit when COVID hit. So regretfully I informed him we would not be coming.
Fast forward to 2023 and we were finally ready for that ‘other side of the world’ trip – but this time we had, in our COVID downtime, dreamt and morphed it into a ’round-the-world’ trip. We trimmed the selected India trip in half in order to fit it into our world schedule. I am so glad Sudhir and his agency made it through the pandemic and was still up and running! He remembered me immediately and got to work and did his magic.
Sudhir’s Whats-App Group
It was while we were still in Nepal, that we became aware that we were about to participate in an unusual experience. Sudhir invited us to his What’s-App group for tiger sightings for that season. Soon we were receiving tiger pictures and tiger reports from many locations in India. Yes, we could have declined, but no, we waited each day to see the viewings from Ranthambhore. When we did see our tigers, you can believe we sent pictures of her and her cubs to all of those faceless drooling soon-to-be-Sudhir-vacationers!
The Zone matters, a great deal
I had done some research, and Sudhir had added a great deal to it. There are many specific zones in Ranthambhore. Some are great for finding tigers, others are fine for scenery and others, well, are just hopeful zones for the ‘overflow people’ who hadn’t planned ahead or with Sudhir. Zones 3, 4, 2, 5 and 6 are considered the best zones for tigers. Zones 3 and 4 are best for landscape views. Because I was planning the trip more than 6 months in advance of our arrival, Sudhir was able to secure safaris for us in Zones 2, 3 and 4 to maximize tigers and scenery.
I felt sorry for other people we met on our trip who were heading to Ranthambhore. “What zones are you assigned to?” I would ask. “Zones? Zones? What’s a Zone?” They had clearly booked with an agency that had not educated them, or perhaps themselves, on the fact that tigers wander in certain zones, across zone boundaries of course, since “zones” are an arbitrary man-made construct. Nonetheless, if you aren’t assigned to a good tiger zone, well, you aren’t very lucky.
Not only was it important to know about the zones, getting that reservation on a Gypsy was also very important. A Gypsy is similar to a Jeep, seating two in front (driver and guide), three in the next row, and three in the back row. You really need someone with feet on the ground, in Sawai Madhopur, to buy you those tickets for the zones on the desired days the day they are made available. Our tickets were bought 7 1/2 months before our arrival. Tickets sell out very rapidly for the best seats for that day. Bottom line, you need Sudhir.
Many people who don’t plan well, or educate themselves well, end up in a “Canter”, which is a humongous noisy diesel vehicle seating about 30 people. That didn’t happen to us!
Our Guide, Mr. Harvinder Singh, is very important
Guides are local wildlife experts who ride in the vehicle, tell the driver where to go, teach you about what you are seeing and most importantly, FIND the wildlife. Our guide on all of our safaris was Mr. Harvinder Singh, one of the most senior (read that “old”, or “experienced”) guides at Ranthambhore. The guide has his ear to the ground, talks to the other guides, knows what the nighttime wildlife cameras picked up the night before, knows the best places to drive his vehicle.
He is focused, very focused, on getting his guests to that tiger! Once, we drove, in reverse, about 40 MPH on a windy dirt road, seemingly out of the blue. “Hang on! She is back there! I know!” And indeed, she, Arrow-Head, was.
On our very first safari, we hit the jackpot! We saw Arrow-Head the tiger, with two of her three cubs. They were originally back in the brush and hardly visible, when Arrow-Head decided to meander directly toward us (and about four other vehicles) with two of the cubs in her wake. Arrow-Head came right onto the stream bank, and settled half in and half out of the water while the cubs played nearby.
We sat in awe for about 20 minutes. (not that we were calmly sitting, taking it all it in – we were scrambling in our vehicle trying to get the best shots!) Mr. Singh had me climb under a bar, onto the running board, and into the front seat (no one is allowed to put foot on the ground) to get me into the front seat for the best pictures. Then like chicklet in a Chinese puzzle, I maneuvered myself back into my seat and others climbed forward like gymnasts on uneven bars. I sort of wished Greg had gotten a picture of me getting a picture of the tiger, as he has a tendency to do.
Other times, we sat quietly in the woodland, watching the monkeys and deer around us, waiting for the early warning systems – the deer to scamper away and the monkeys to chatter, but no, the tiger did not approach during those times.
Unfortunately I didn’t take a picture of Mr. Singh, and apologize for that since he was so very good. I was so focused on the wildlife I didn’t take a shot of the man in front of us!
I’m so glad we booked with Sudhir, as it was he who brought us Mr. Singh.
Check out my video of our safaris in Ranthambhore
Deciding how many seats to rent
Originally, in 2020, Sudhir had recommended that we rent the entire jeep for the morning or afternoon, and not be blocked or distracted by others in the jeep. We definitely did not want either one of us to end up in a center seat. If the tiger were to be on the right, well, we wanted a clear shot to the right, and the same for the left.
However, in 2023 Sudhir said that the national park had changed its policy and that even if you rent the entire jeep, you still can’t freely move between zones to maximize your tiger-spotting possibilities. He felt that we should rent THREE seats for the two of us – to guarantee that we would be able to see right and left. He also arranged the hotel and Gypsy in such a way that we would get the front seat (not the driver/guide row, but the front seat of the two tourist rows.) So we did as recommended, and booked the three seats.
Deciding on the hotel – Not the Raj Palace Resort
Here is where things got a little sticky. In order to guarantee us front row in the Gypsy, Sudhir arranged for us to stay at the Raj Palace Resort. There are many places to stay at Sawai Madhopur and Ranthambhore, at many different levels of comfort. The Raj Palace is in town. By being in town, the gypsy and guide would leave town and stop first at the Raj Palace and pick us up, and voila! we would get the front row. However, that meant that we had to drive in the vehicle another 20 minutes or so to get to the national park, that not being the problem. The problem was that most of the other resorts are located near the national park, on bumpy (how can I express how bumpy? very bumpy!) long dirt roads, sometimes 15 minutes off of the main road. After an hour of spin-jarring, stomach-bouncing, travel, we would arrive at the beginning of the safari! Then the safari would begin, on the dirt roads within the national park. Then we would safari for about three hours. Then we would backtrack to our hotel. We would arrive back at our hotel with only about 45 minutes to spare before lunch, then 45 minutes to spare before the ordeal began again.
Somehow I had imagined safari among the tigers and bears, and then hours of relaxation by the pool to be followed by a late afternoon jaunt. What we experienced was grueling, especially since on our very first safari we saw three tigers, one sloth bear, a leopard, mongoose, deer, monkeys. Why would we want to expose ourselves to more?
Then, and I don’t want to digress too long, the Raj Palace Resort was chock full of children. Not just families enjoying the national park, I’m talking hundreds of children on an overnight school outing. Screaming, running, splashing, howling, children (sounds a bit like a wildlife adventure). No pool for us, it was full of children, no wifi for us, they had put the only two couples in the hotel who weren’t a part of the children’s group in the back rooms where no wifi would reach. They demanded we eat from the children’s buffet – did not happen, I can tell you that! Cold showers, the list goes on.
No, the Raj Palace was not for us. No matter that we would get the front seats in the gypsy.
We should have paid the premium for a private jeep, We could have stayed at a resort closer to the park and been assured of a shorter “commute” and a decent place to stay.
Did I forget to mention Keoladeo?
Ranthambhore with its tiger excitement overshadows but doesn’t completely obscure the wonderful sights at Keoladeo National Park. Keoladeo is near Bharatpur, not far west of Agra. It made an excellent next-day wildlife excursion following our visit to the Taj Mahal, Red Fort and Fahetpur Sikri and before Ranthambhore.
Many websites talk about an e-tricycle. However, starting in 2023 they replaced the e-tricycles with tuk-tuks. They don’t call them tuk-tuks in India, but that’s what I call them. Stuck in a little cabin with a man out front using motorcycle-style handlebars, we toodled along the road in the park. Well, that is certainly no way to go birdwatching! We zipped up the road for a while, stopped for a peacock in a tree, and that was it for us – we walked the rest of the way (until the return when we decided to get back in the tuk-tuk.)
We visited in mid-October and the storks were nesting. I don’t know how many pictures I took of the storks – storks nest-building, storks with tiny babies, storks courting… they were beautiful.
We saw so many other birds, and some mammals too, including a suspicious Nilgai, an Asian Antelope.
Check out my video of our Keoladeo National Park safari
Jhalana Nature Reserve
Just on the outskirts of a major city, Jaipur, is a wilderness area called Jhalana, where leopards live. Sudhir had arranged for a late day private safari to see the leopards. Unfortunately we weren’t as lucky in Jhalana as at Ranthambhore; for all of our wandering around, we spotted no leopards at the waterholes, and the promise of only one leopard in the grass.
Well, that is to say, the other jeeps and guides indicated that there was a leopard in the grass. Waiting for a LONG time, and then zipping around to check the waterholes, we returned to the grass to find everyone still waiting. Suddenly there was action and the leopard crossed the road into the grass on the other side. Unfortunately our driver felt it necessary to accelerate at that moment so I was unable to get a single picture as we were driving 30 mph at that single moment when the leopard was in sight. I was very frustrated. No Mr. Singh here, sadly.
The Culture in Cultural Safari Tours
You’ve read to this point about the Safari aspect of our excellent tour. Now for the Culture. Our pared down trip included only three of the major cities: Delhi, Agra and Jaipur. For each of these cities Sudhir arranged for a day guide, a guide who would take us around, teach us, and then gracefully exit.
Day Guides vs a single guide
We found the guides to be excellent. We especially liked Raj (Rajendra Singh Hada) in Delhi. He managed to show us so many sights in our short 3/4 day there, informing us but not exhausting us.
One problem with day guides is that they don’t get an opportunity to get to know us. I really like to take pictures. As you can tell, I am not a true photographer, but a travel photographer – I really want to remember that place as it was, the weather that affected us, the colors that amazed us. I do want to have the opportunity to stand still, my feet facing forward, to frame that shot at least. I also don’t really want other tourists in the way – get rid of that elbow in front of my camera, that selfie-taking tourist wearing a red shirt!
So many guides are self-important – they feel they are being paid to impart knowledge and if I am not always attentive then I am a poor tourist. On the contrary, I depend on Greg to be attentive while I wander and soak it in and take the pictures. Raj was able to catch on to our rhythm quickly and was a pleasure to travel with in Delhi.
Mansingh in Agra was very well versed in taking pictures of us at the Taj Mahal, which we appreciated.
Others didn’t catch on to us as quickly. When we travel with a single guide throughout our trip we manage to train him or her well at the start, so he/her is not offended and happy to show us the sights. I knew that was a risk with the day guide approach in India, and it did occur, but not enough to make any city unpleasant of course! No sooner would we train a guide than we would be off to another location!
We could have requested a single guide for the whole trip; we chose to be cost-cutting here since our trip to India had turned into a Round-The-World Trip, with all of its attendant costs. My choice would have been to travel with Raj (card shown earlier) the entire trip. He was excellent!
Click here for my video of The Golden Triangle of India – Delhi, Agra and Jaipur
Dev
What kind of heading is “Dev”? Dev is short for Devendra Crysta Devraj. (Hmm, Crysta, was that part of Dev’s name, or was that Sudhir telling us we will be driving in a Crysta Innova?) Regardless, Dev brought us throughout Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan in style.
In the planning stage, we requested a larger vehicle than normal due to our luggage size and Sudhir arranged for a Crysta Innova, a family-style minivan. Both Greg and I sat in comfortable bucket seats, with plenty of room for the other members of our family – the paisley suitcase, the blue suitcase, the roller medical kit, the new blue roller carryon we had to buy in Nepal when our original didn’t even make it through the first country! the duffle-bag which carries our egg-crate bed foam, the list goes on.
Dev’s skill in navigating the terrors of Delhi traffic cannot be undersold; I just sat back and relaxed. Anyone who knows me knows I am a terrified passenger. With Dev, I knew all was under control.
Sudhir Sharma
I mention Sudhir’s name quite a bit, quite familiarly. Was he a tour-planner back in the head office, shuffling paperwork around, printing vouchers, shrouded in mist? Hardly. He greeted us at the airport (accepted our cash payment, which is a good thing!) and met up with us and even traveled from city to city with us on many occasions throughout our trip. Airport transferer, escort, laundry arranger, translator for the Jhalana guide, even giver of a tiger to commemorate our tiger sighting, he was ever present or just out of sight.
Thank you, Sudhir, for an extraordinary time in India!
