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Published: March 29th 2008
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Om
Although this is the Hindu symbol for the absolute - for the creation, maintenance and destruction of the universe and the awareness of ones own spiritual identity, Bex thinks it looks like a 30. As many of you know, on March 8th I celebrated my 30th birthday. Its a pretty big milestone and I think hitting it while in India with Becky is about as good as it gets. I want to thank you all so much for your email and messages. It really made me feel great, especially because we are so far from family, friends and home. Ok, enough of that....on with the blog:
Leading up to my birthday, Bex and I struggled to figure out what we should do to ring in my 3rd decade. There were a few pretty good options, but in the end we decided to try to make our way to Bandhavgarh National Park. This park has the highest density of wild tigers in India and has some pretty swanky resorts around it. It was definitely going to break our daily budget, but hey, you only turn 30 once!
Getting to Bandhavgarh, however, was easier said than done. We spent the better part of two days in Varanasi trying to find out how to get there. No one we talked to had heard of the park, and therefore, in true Indian fashion, they refused to believe
Birthday on the Train
17 guests at the party ... but only one girl :( that it existed. It's very difficult (read impossible) to book train tickets on your own in this country, so you are forced to use local "travel agents" who are just as perplexed by the system as we are. The difference is, they pretend to know what they are doing. On several occasions we have sat in a little travel agency/silk shop/internet cafe/pharmacy/ for 45 minutes while the 'travel agent' stares intently at the computer, typing from time to time. We, naturally, would assume the time was spent booking our tickets, but as time wore on, it would become clear that the agent wasn't able to figure out how to get the internet to work let alone book the ticket. Seriously, this is NOT an uncommon event.
We finally came across a man who was able to book us a train ticket for the next day to a city close to the park. After paying, we recieved the ticket and saw that his commision on the ticket was more than 100%. Ripped off again in India! We are now more determined than ever to figure out a better way to book our train tickets.
The next day, we hopped
in an autorickshaw and offered the driver a little extra if he could get us to the train station asap (as usual we were running a little behind schedule). The driver agreed and took us barreling through the backstreets of this chaotic city at breakneck speeds. We were confident that we were going to make the train. But we forgot 'The Renogotiation'. It's a classic trick. The driver agrees to one price, gets you to a place where its difficult to get alternate transport, and restarts the negotiation. In this case he wanted and extra Rs 10 ($0.25). Given the fact we were late, we agreed to Rs 5.
Luckily for us, the train was late. When it arrived about an hour behind schedule we packed ourselves into the 'sleeper class' car, which is equivalent to a 5th Class car....there are only 6 classes. Needless to say, these are not luxury by any stretch of the imagination. We had a very nice group of 17 men to share our 8 person section and they were all very interested in communicating through sign language, limited english, even more limited hindi and a lot of smiles. Due to a train broken
down on our tracks we fell even farther behind schedule. This was definitely a low point of the Indian Rollercoaster.
When midnight rolled around, officially marking the beginning of my 30th year, Bex and I were still stuck on the tracks. It did have its upside though, as all of our bunkmates were extremely happy to hear that it was my birthday, and offered many heartfelt congratulations! Also, the dinner we had ordered hours earlier was delivered at around this time so we ate a very mediocre dinner to ring in the big day.
Our train, which was scheduled to arrive at 11 pm, rolled into Umaria at a little after 4 am. Umaria is still about an hour drive from our hotel, and luckily for us, the driver sent by our hotel was still at the station holding up a handwritten sign "Rebeca". We could have hugged the guy. We finally arrived at the Whispering Grass Resort at a little after 5 am (having set out from Varanasi at 11:30 am the day before). We collapsed into our bed exhausted (we couldn't sleep on the train because we had no idea when our train would arrive at
our station...and nobody is there to tell you).
After our nap, we awoke refreshed and arranged with the hotel naturalist to head out on an afternoon Safari! There are approximately 1100 tigers left in India around 70 of them are in in Bandhavgar. Its a very small park and the guides say that you have a 50% chance of seeing a tiger on any given safari. Unfortunely, two of the commonly seen tigers are mating and two other tigresses have young cubs, so they tend to stay hidden...this would greatly reduce of chances of seeing a tiger.
After all the hasle, Bandavgarh was worth it. On our first trip out we saw many different birds and animals, including two species of eagle (we saw one swoop down and grab another bird from the jungle floor), two types of monkey, wild boars, several types of deer, wild peacocks, kingfishers....and yes, we saw one full grown Royal Bengal Tiger. She was a ways away, lying on her back in the grass, but occasionally she rolled over and stuck her head up high enough to get a clear view. Incredible!
After the Safari, we went back to the hotel and
Ahhh Peace and Quiet
Relaxing at the Whispering Grass before an afternoon safari stuffed ourselves with some fantastic indian food, which kept coming for as long as I kept eating. The Whispering Grass Resort offered us a cute little mud hut with attached bathroom and jungle decor, which was a real break from the grungy places we've been staying. There is nothing around the place, either, so was incredibly quiet. That night, since it was my birthday, we even had a couple of beer...which are few and far between in India. We went to bed early, enjoying the beautiful peace and quiet of the Bandhavgarh night. A real treat after the noise and chaos of Varanasi and Kolkata.
We did three more Safaris, two of them with a couple of very funny young guys, Neil and Mandeep, from the UK. We didn't see another tiger until our last safari. Normally the safaris are done by jeep, but when a tiger is spotted in an area that the jeeps can't access, they allow you to go by elephant for a 'tiger show'. And what a show! Our guide told us that the tiger would be sleeping in the grass, but as our elephant approached the tiger jumped up and ran across a clearing
Tiger in Bandhavgarh
We were only a few feet away from her! heading uphill into the bamboo forests. You could hear her growling and grunting as she moved. Our elephant followed, parted the bamboo with its trunk, and there she was at eye level about 10 - 15 feet ahead of us lying down on the slope, staring back at us. After about five minutes we left, feeling giddy with excitment. In the words of our new friend, Neil, "it was the most incredible natural experience of my life!"
We left Bandavgarh in style, with a rented car and driver heading for Khajuraho, famous for its erotic temples! All said, a truly great birthday!
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brien
non-member comment
Hello
Hello Chris & Becky. I am really enjoying following your trip. Hey Chris your doing just great. You must be getting used to India by now? You guys are great. Thanks again for being so kinds to me. Think of you often Brien