Pench national park

After a 5.30am alarm call be met our guide, Shiv, at reception at 6am for coffee before leaving to drive the 20 minutes to the park gate. It was still dark, although the almost full moon gave lots of light, and very very cold. Fortunately here, along with blankets, they also gave us hot water bottles for the journey!

The park opens at 6.45am and we were at the gate ready to go in at that time.

We drove into the park and were soon on the trail of a tiger. First we saw some fresh pug marks and then Shiv also spotted a fresh scent mark on a tree that the tiger had left. We got our hopes up and after some tooing and froing we spotted a female tiger crossing the road. We kept on her trail and managed to spot her again some time later and watch her for about 5 minutes as she walked through the undergrowth and then crossed another track.

Time flies when you're having fun and so we then headed to a spot for breakfast where we could get off the vehicle. The breakfast was spread out on a table that folded out from the bonnet and was delicious. Thankfully it had now started to warm up!

During the drive we also saw xxxxxxx.

After breakfast we drove the long road back to the park gate and then back to the hotel.

We went back to her room and had a coffee on the balcony before heading over to the restaurant at 1:00 p.m. for lunch which has usual was an Indian selection of various dishes including chicken, salad, dahl, etc

Our afternoon safari started at 2:30 and we drove the 20 minutes to the gate and spent the afternoon trying to find the elusive, tigers and leopards sadly without success on this occasion. However, we did see a number of new birds, a crocodile and a golden jackal.

It was getting dark when we arrived back at the lodge and after a coffee we headed to the room to get clean and changed ready for dinner.

We watched the last part of the documentary on the tigers of Pench national park before dinner tonight and then headed for dinner, inside tonight thankfully! After another massive meal we headed back to the room and promptly fell asleep!Read more