Tigers of Ranthambore

India: Ranthambore. Our safari drive in Ranthambore National Park on Friday afternoon (5th) took place in sight of the eponymous hilltop fort, which encloses 102 hectares and dates back to the 5th century, when it was built by the Yadava King Jayant. As expected, we spotted macaques, Sambar deer, chital (spotted deer), crocodiles and peacocks. The tigers remained elusive until we neared the end of our drive. Then a female was seen padding along a dry, rocky creek about 15 metres from the road. She paused to drink from a small pool and then sauntered on and out of sight.

The sighting was a rare delight. When I was a teenager, the tiger was my favourite animal and I had a velvet painting of one on my wall, which Mom had painted. They are such majestic creatures and it is sad to think that they were almost hunted and marginalised to extinction. In 1900 there were around 100,000 tigers in India, but by 1972 there were fewer than 2,000 left. Today, after tireless conservation efforts, and the economic incentive of ecotourism, they have recovered to just over 3,500.

We had a second, early morning drive on Saturday, where we saw a mother and three cubs resting on the hillside, perhaps 500 metres away. Although the close encounter of the previous day was more thrilling, I liked that the tigers are able to live unharassed in their habitat, since the safari vehicles are not allowed to leave the dirt roads to pursue them. As I noted in a comment on my LinkedIn post, “these are moments that make life magical”. I will always remember the rainstorm after that first sighting, when we all got happily soaked on the open air jeep.