21/12/2012 Ranthambore National Park

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Awoke early to leave at 7am for a tiger safari. Early breakfast of vegetable curry, for some, and cornflakes for the others! Freezing cold morning so multiple layers of clothes needed and blankets supplied by the hotel.

Taken into the National Park by a 20 person canter, an open topped bus, with poor suspension! After picking up several other people at various hotels we arrived at the Ranthambore National Park via a large stone gateway. Several other jeeps and canters aslo arrived at the same time and various hawkers hassled the vehicles selling fleeces and wooly hats with National park logo on. Lots of Indian tourists along with swedes, English and Danish.

We eagerly anticipated the first sighting of a Tiger so looked carefully for any signs of the animal. Several times fresh foot prints were seen by our guide.

Stopping at a large lake we saw our first crocodile of the day along with beautiful birds and many deer. Monkeys also lived in the trees and playfully entertained us as we stopped the vehicle. Many green parrots flew overhead and noislily greeted us.

After 2 hours we all felt a little disappointed that we had not seen a tiger, especially as lots of talk around us was of previous sightings. We all laughed as the jeeps kept passing each other and the main question asked was, 'Have you seen any tigers ', which soon became the joke of the holiday as Joe asked the question at every opportunity which stuck as our private joke. After the National park we seemed to see cuddly tigers everywhere which made us chuckle. Jerry even got a photo of one.

After our early start we stayed in the hotel during the afternoon and relaxed by the pool. Too cold to swim we dipped our toes in, Hanna and Joe managed a quick jump in and out for the record but hardly a swim!

Vijay, our driver, joined us to play uno and drink tea. We ate in the restarurant at night and slept early. Not for the first time we were awoken at 2am by Indian men drinking and talking very loudly so Jerry had to scare them off by asking them to keep the noise down dressed only in his pants which seeemd to do the job!

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