Bannerghatta Trip - The Wildlife Safari Park

At 10am we queued up for the "safari". They started boarding the bus around 10:30 (in India the concept of time is rather fluid). We didn't get on the first bus -- they let a group of 5 behind us board instead. So had to wait another 15 minutes. We were the first to board the next bus -- which was actually good because we got prime seating in the front of the bus. The grand safari is broken out into 4 sections -- herbivores (and smaller animals that don't eat deer), bears, lions, and tigers (rather like the song from the Wizard of Oz).

In the first section we saw various types of deer and some wild boar (which I think are very cool looking). All of the animals were a bit off the road -- so a little difficult to take pictures. The bus guide & driver let me take the jump seat in the front of the bus for the best picture taking --- I did know they weren't doing it out of the kindness of their heart -- and that some type of tip would be expected.

Entering the second section with the bears was a little Jurassic Park-like. There is a double gated area that the bus goes through (1 gate opens, bus enters, gate closes, 2nd gate opens, we exit, 2nd gate closes). There is also a huge moat around the bear section and the perimeter is wired. Saw a bunch of black bears -- some very close to the bus. Exiting the bear section was the same as the entry with the double gates -- lots of bear paw prints on the gate -- guess they want to get out to visit the lions!

The third section was Asian lions -- just a bit different looking from African lions. Saw about 5 lions just off of the road -- one of them roared a couple of times for us -- great sound!

The fourth section was tigers: orange and white. We saw about 6 tigers - 2 orange and 4 white. Tigers are beautiful animals -- and the white tigers especially so. The tigers were just roaming about right off the road. The best part of the safari was watching one of the white tigers stalk & pounce one of the orange tigers sleeping in the grass. It was a rather slow-motion pounce so we assume it's a game that they play.

I gave the driver 50 rupees (about $1) when exiting the bus as a tip for letting me sit in the jump seat -- was annoyed when he told me that he wanted 100 rupees (I had another 50 rupees in hand as a tip for the guide). I don't mind supporting the local economy -- but not willing to give a tip that's more than the cost to enter into the park (145 rupees per person).

Overall the park was a worthwhile trip -- not quite the same as seeing animals in the wild -- but probably the only time I'll see a white tiger less than 10 feet away from me.

If you are interested --- more pictures from the park are out on Flickr.