MORE TIGERS!!!

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Sunday 3-20 to Monday 3-21
When we first got to Jaipur, we were a little disappointed that we would be traveling on the actual day of Holi and would only be in Jaipur for the previous day’s Elephant Festival. Turns out, it was probably better that way. As we drove from Jaipur to Rathambore National Park we were amazed to see people in the streets (all men of course, who knows where the women were or how they celebrate) absolutely covered in tikka powder. Humans that were once all shades of brown were now completely purple or green with bright yellow hair or a bright red arm. The amount of color on people was astounding and of course they were having a great time sneaking up on people in the streets, throwing powder or colored water on any passerby. We even saw a cow that had failed to escape the onslaught of color! Fortunately, we witnessed all this in nice clean clothes from the safety and comfort of a minivan. Comfort may be a relative term, however, as we came to realize there was another side to Holi. Ransomed road blocks. Just as we had experienced in Nepal during Shiva’s birthday, kids in India celebrated Holi by trying to embezzle extra cash out of drivers as they passed through town. But instead of harmless ropes stretched across the street, in India we came across barricades of huge rocks stretched across the road. There was no way our low riding minivan was going to be able to get over them, so we were forced to stop at each road bock (many of which were spaced only a few hundred yards from each other for the length of the entire town). And once stopped, the kids, led by teenagers and adults, would rush the car on all sides, banging on the windows, threatening to cover the car in tikka paint (one group even threatened to tip the car completely over) if we didn’t pay them money. And unfortunately for us, since they could see through the windows that we were (wealthy) tourists, a few rupees weren’t enough. They cleaned us and the driver out of most of our cash. Seriously, we must have hit over 2 to 3 dozen road blocks on what should have been just a 2 hour drive. It turned into almost 4 hours and made the trip immensely painful. It made the experience in Nepal seem miniscule At first, the Holi road blocks were kind of funny, but then there were so many of them and the teenagers and adults were so greedy and incessant, it started to get a little threatening. [Nick Note: In Nepal the roadblocks were done by little kids, I don’t think we saw anyone older than about 10 and thus they were really cute. Sure they asked for a little money but it was a modest amount, like 25 US cents, and they were really more interested in saying “hello” to you. Also in Nepal there were no traffic blocks stopping traffic in the major roads, just in towns. India was a whole other animal. There were small kids (who indeed were still cute and would want to say hello to us) but they were always led by teenagers or adults who were just terrible, they would bully our driver (who asked us not to pull out any money or talk because it would be harder for him) and they were just interested in extortion. Each stop took forever as each was a haggling exercise between driver and “toll-taker” and they never let us go for less than 2 or 3 dollars; in one place they took about $10 which is just a ridiculous road toll in India. We basically ran out of all money and were worried that we’d be completely out and we’d still have more tolls before arriving at our destination. At one spot there was a typical line of stones but no one manning it and there was a gap large enough to pass, thus we passed without stopping. Seconds later two guys in a car rushed to catch up to us then pulled in front and forced us to a stop then they got out and forced our driver to pay toll money. And most of these were not in towns but along the major road, often there would be 3 or 4 in a kilometer’s distance. I think the kid’s toll tradition is cute, like kids going out on Halloween, but this was like if Halloween was taken over by the mafia.]

After several hours of this, we finally got to Rathambore and were VERY thankful not a toll or boulder was insight. I’m sure in the touristy areas they make sure there are no obstructions like that to deter tourists. Thank goodness that was over! We rested up for a while and took our first jeep safari into Rathambore National Park, former royal hunting grounds of India. We saw langurs, wild peacock and lots of deer, but sadly no tigers. The park itself was beautiful, though. We did see some fresh sloth bear tracks and I was SO excited and eager to see one of these elusive creatures, but again, no luck. We were heading out of Rathambore the next day to head back to Delhi and catch our respective flights out of India, so we only had one last shot to try and see tigers before we left. The next morning, we were not disappointed. Not only did we see a tiger, but we were WAY closer this time than we had been in Corbett. And it wasn’t just a tiger hanging out in the woods, this giant male (seriously giant, its head was HUGE) was devouring the carcass of a sambar deer right in front of us! We were sooooo close we could hear the ribs cracking in its jaws!! ABSOLUTELY AMAZING! You’ll have to check out our photos and video of this thing on Flickr. It was awesome, I was literally jumping up and down and punching Nick and Trent, I was so excited!! We couldn’t believe our good fortune in being able to witness this – even the park ranger we were with said he had never seen such a thing before. Thanks again Ganesh!! Ugh, it was so cool. And then, after about 20 minutes of ogling over the tiger, he gets up, grabs the carcass in his massive jaws and drags the thing back into the woods. It was AWESOME!!!!! We got to see the largest and rarest cat in the world TWICE on our trip! We were so lucky!!! [Nick Note: It is amazing to think that there are only about 1200 wild tigers left (positive note: I learned that was about 20%!i(MISSING)ncrease over the last survey done a few years earlier) in the world and in the span of 3 weeks Cat and I got to see 3 of them, and one so close! The pretty kitty certainly made the Rathambore extortionist gauntlet worth it. Also, luckily Allen was feeling well enough to do the safaris so he got to see it too, so he got the best part.]

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