Shreya(my 4 yr old daughter) was excited and so was I. We reached Bangalore and decided to drive down to Bandipur alongwith Vinod and his family. Prior to going there, we tried our best to get the hotel bookings done through Jungle Lodges(http://www.junglelodges.com/) one of the best places to be in Karnataka, however rooms were running full. Somehow we managed a place called MC Resorts closer to the park. MC resorts (08229-233044/5 and 299217) is a neat place with cottages at a reasonable rates.
The day we reached, we were late for the evening rounds and hence we decided to drive down to the TN side of the forest i.e. Madhumalli range. We were just in time for the bus trip...a rickety bus with hardly any leg space. As we trugged along we saw wild boar, peafowl, spotted deer, sambhar and a herd of elephants bathing in a waterhole. The elephants charged at the bus and we moved on. We came back to the TN forest counter to check for the elephant ride and to our utter surprise, the elephant ride gets booked at Ooty office...strange ways of the government.
We returned to our resort and decided to have a camp fire outside our room. Spent a long time till about midnight enjoying the food and drink. The children enjoyed watching the fire.
Next day morning we got up at 5:00 a.m. and rushed to the forest reservation counter to book the gypsy...there were only three of them and it seemed all were booked by foreigners by paying an amount of Rs.2000 for 1&1/2 hours. Disappointed we decided to take yet another bus ride. Wintery cold morning and we did not hope to see many animals - landed up seeing some kingfisher, sambar, wild boar and bison.
We decided to move on and drove back to Bangalore. We missed out on seeing a tiger...however the experience was good. I will be back in Bandipur sometime for a better viewing and experience.
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