Ranthambhore National Park, Rajasthan, India

Bengal Tiger (Panthera tigris tigris)

Ranthambhore National Park isn’t perfect. The theme park style of taking huge busses of tourists around isn’t the most naturalistic way of enjoying a park, but I’m in favor of it. It’s prohibited to step down from a vehicle. Each vehicle is manned by guides and drivers whose livelihood is reliant on staying in good standing with the park. Number of visitors and jeeps into each section is heavily regulated from day to day. Jeeps have to stay on designated trails. Only about 1/6 of the park is open to visitors. These regulations have allowed animals to become accustomed to vehicle traffic. The jeeps are loud, announcing their presence to animals and allowing them time to leave if they want to. No animals are ever fed or otherwise interacted with.

These regulations protect both the visitors and the animals in the park. The animals can regulate their interaction with humans. The tigers especially seemed to not view the jeeps as a threat. This female slept under a tree for two hours while 250ft away a dozen jeeps jostled to see her. When she decided to get up, she stretched and walked directly towards the jeeps, scenting, sniffing, and stretching the whole way, never giving the jeeps and the very loud people more than a casual glance. She came within 40 feet of us where she sat and drank. She barely looked up as all the jeeps revved their engines and left her drinking (the park was closing and all jeeps have to be out before 6pm). I’d rather see a park like this than see bears killed on Yosemite’s roads by dumb people.