Boy Who Cried Tiger!

India, home to ~3,700 tigers in the 1990s, now has only ~1,400. Hence, the Save the Tiger campaign, helped by facebook and twitter has gained signifcant traction in recent times. I figured before I do something more than pressing the 'like' button, I should at least check out the beast in its natural Indian habitat.

Where to go to see a tiger? The full list of tiger sanctuaries in India can help you narrow down to the locations that are best maintained with the highest tiger density. We didn't do that. We just went to the most famous sounding park. Off to Ranthambore!

After a flight to Jaipur and 4 hour car ride from there, we arrive at our "mid-end" hotel. In an area where the nice hotels go for >$800 a night, you can only imagine what our mid-end resort cost.

All that money and effort later, we would have surely seen some tigers, right? Wrong.

After 3 safaris, I gave up and went to the spa at our resort--which incidentally had gorgeous rooms, and delicious, organic, vegetarian, locavore cuisine.

The more interesting story was of my travel partners who persisted and went on a 4th safari. Every single jeep on their route that morning saw a tiger except theirs. Guess, if it's meant to be, it's meant to be.

I should have known that given the celebrity profile of our destination, we had a better shot at spotting below Tiger.