Next it was off to Sawai Madhopur, which is the town closest to Ranthambhore National Park. This journey was our first taste of the "bad" Indian roads we've heard so much about. We traveled 250 km on a pothole ridden, dirt-mixed-with-pavement, bike path. We're not kidding. It was exhausting. We had our first wipe out as old timer Jared veered off the single lane road to avoid a barreling bus, hit the sand on the shoulder, started fishtailing, and went down. There were no major bike or human injuries, so back to riding.
The crashes here are at speeds of 10-20 mph (so far) so as we get more comfortable with the machines we should have time to take PROPER evasive action, which should in theory cut down on crashes. That’s the idea anyway. On the way, we had a pretty amazing experience in a town called Gangapur. We had decided it would be a good place to stop for lunch. However, before we even got off the bikes, about 150 people surrounded us! Most people just stared at us, while a few people attempted to speak English. I can’t blame them for staring. Just imagine it from their world...into town come two loud, thumping motorcycles, packed with strange looking, colorful, dirty "things". Straddling these machines are the strangest "things" of all: two humanoid figures clad from head to toe in the skin of the Hindu holy cow, eyes veiled behind darkened masks, heads protected in brightly colored hard shells, spewing out an array of incomprehensible noises. We think we look pretty post-apocalyptic in our get-ups and I can only imagine what THEY think. We get these "I just saw an alien" looks everywhere we go. So there we were, surrounded by all these people just staring at us! The people gathered in so closely we could barely move. When we did move, the people parted slowly and smoothly...quite a strange sensation, like being surrounded by a school of human fish all moving in harmony. We walked about 20 meters, looked back, and they were still all just standing there by the bikes looking at us. We got a little nervous about the safety of our cargo, so Jared stayed with the bikes as I got some bananas from the stand right in front of me. I came back to the bikes just as someone was asking Jared for his autograph…let me tell you, this global communication penetrates everywhere. We are already famous in India for our web site, I2W. We sat on the bikes eating bananas, 301 eyes watching our every move. We felt like a couple of monkeys in a zoo, a space man zoo.
We arrived in Sawadi Madaphour after 7 straight hours of riding on roads we didn’t think could exist under the definition of "road". We were battered and beaten as we rolled into town and found the nearest hotel: the Pink Palace! A fitting ending to a long and arduous journey -- to find yourself at the front gate of a pink palace. They got the 'pink' part right but the 'palace' was a stretch. The next day we took the bikes to Ranthambhore National Park, 12 km out of town, and arranged to go on a tiger safari. We joined 15 or so other people in a wildlife safari inside the park at sunset. The only way to actually see any of the interior of the park is to take these vehicles called "cantors" on small roads inside the park. After thinking about it, I also found it a good idea not to let tourists trample around by foot in a tiger reserve. We'd make for a walking happy meal for tigers, no? We saw a lot of wildlife (tiger food) but no tigers that evening. We decided to get up early the next day for the morning safari, which supposedly had a better chance of tiger-spottings. We dragged ourselves out of bed at 5:30am and got on the cantor with a huge Indian family of 14. About 45 minutes into the ride we heard this deep, loud roaring from across the lake. The driver put the pedal down and made way around the lake, towards the roar. Between the cantor’s diesel engine and the Indian family loudly chatting away, I couldn’t imagine any animals would stay anywhere near us. Yet, to our disbelief, about 80 feet in front of us sat a pair of tigers!
It turns out they were presently the only breeding pair in the park. It was really an incredible experience to see them in the wild, a much better feeling than I thought it would be. Just knowing that they lived somewhat naturally out in this beautiful park was enough to make all things good in the world. Then the reality of the situation hit: that this loss of habitat which has forced the formation of these wildlife preserves is happening on a global scale, and is only increasing worldwide in intensity. I don’t know how long these magnificent creatures can hold off the human invasion. What an obnoxious species we are. All right, enough of that. I could go off, but I’ll spare you the agony. We checked off the tiger box on our Lonely Planet "been there, done that" tourist check list, and decided to move on. Next up, the town of Bundi, 150 km to the southwest.
