How to Experience the Ultimate Wildlife Adventure: Velavadar to Gir – A Journey Enriched with Ahmedabad’s Vibrant Charm!

Continuing our wildlife expeditions we thought of visiting the national parks in Gujarat to catch the glimpse of the mighty lion. In our first visit to Gujarat we had covered the Bhuj-Kutch regions travelling though the Little Rann and the Greater Rann. A little off-beat sanctuary close to Ahmedabad was on my radar as I had seen some great photographs from there.

A reason for procrastinating visit to Gir was the travel time. Gir is approx 7 hours drive from Ahmedabad. Since flight to its nearest airport – Rajkot, are costly, it was only suitable to take the 7 hour drive also conveniently breaking at Velavadar for the black buck sanctuary.

Mindful that winter is not the best season to easily spot the wildlife [along with the untimely rains in November due to the cyclone], we decided to take our chances.

Thus began our second trip to Gujarat……….

Blackbuck National Park, Velavadar:

Although the park is not big, it is habituated by thousands of blackbucks. The local main road divides the park into two halves: The Grassland and the Wetland

The park opens at 6.30 am in the morning and since its relatively unknown we don’t have to wake up freakishly early or stand in long queues to get in. Also since the park is small the gypsy safari drives you around both the halves within the stipulated time.

As we watched the herds silently we gained insights into the interactions and behavior of the blackbucks. We witnessed the male blackbuck marking his territory and guarding it by sitting in its center for hours.

As informed by our guide a herd has few male blackbuck and many females. The female bucks have a leader and she watches the stags fight for her attention by wrestling with each other. The winner stag gets to mate with the female leader and then all the other female bucks in the herd. That’s a pretty big win, I did say 😀 The loser stags then go on to make their own herd of losers and continue the fight.

We took 2 gypsy safari drives: one in the morning and the other int he evening. Early morning we had a good sighting of a pack of wolves feasting on their kill. Wolves are the major predators in this region, while the striped hyenas often steal the kill or eat the leftover. We stalked them around for sometime. We also saw different species of migratory birds including harrier, cranes etc. It was real fun to watch a huge monitor lizard waddle on the path. Its really cute, specially since you are safely tucked in the gypsy 😉

It is definitely worth the wait, as you hold your camera to shoot the herd of bucks galloping across the path in different sizes, some timid and watchful, some brave and in control…..and they just go on till your hands ache holding the camera 😉

Note: Once can even walk and ride the park in ones private vehicle and there are no restricted visiting hours. This creates a little nuisance as people do not behave responsibly and respect the wildlife. I saw people in private vehicles making lot of noise and playing loud music inside the park and the vehicles were permitted throughout the day giving no respite to the poor wild.

Accommodation: Currently not many options are available for stay here. There is the government guest house- Kaliyar Bhavan, for the booking needs to be done through demand draft and is a little tedious. Another good one is: BlackBuck Safari Lodge but the best and exceptional, but also costly is: The BlackBuck Lodge

Safaris: We stayed at The BlackBuck Lodge and the gypsies were arranged by lodge itself. We then need to pay the entry ticket and the guide charges along with the camera charges at the entry gate, at the time of visit.

Gir National Park:

High on the amazing experience we had in Velavadar we started for Gir. While finding our resort our driver stopped to ask for directions to a man, who to me looked like a tourist from Africa, and I wondered how would he know the directions around here, but to my surprise he spoke fluent gujarati and gave us the details needed. The situation seemed funny 😀 . I was then informed that he belonged to the Siddi tribe. Although they are more Gujarati than African, they still follow some African customs, mostly music and dance.

After 5 hours of drive we reached our resort. We rested for the day and next day, reached the gates of Sinha Sadan , early morning at 5.30 am, but the situation was too chaotic. Although we had the online permits, we needed to pay the guide fee and the camera fees and the overall process of the jeep and guide allocation was painstaking. A bit disappointed with how the Park gets managed and its total lack of useful discipline. Gir is also very commercialized and has a huge turnout every vacation. But it is the only reserve with Asiatic Lions and so we just got along with the process. The safari started only at 6.30 am.

It was winter and it had been raining till recently so the forest was lush green with a lot of vegetation. There were a lot of water bodies in the jungle with numerous crocodiles.

Due to the thick vegetation the animals were being elusive and only a few spotted deer were seen around. Not many birds too but we did spot different species of owl.

We were waiting desperately to catch the glimpse of the king of the jungle, but he was nowhere to be seen. Then while on the safari on Route # 2, we saw two lionesses lazing around. We gaped at them as they two cuddled around and looked at us…[Can’t imagine what they must be thinking of us crazy humans lining up in front of them in jeeps to get a good peep and photos. 😀 ]

We started the afternoon safari again in the search of the male lion or atleast some sighting of the cubs. I had imagined that with a good lion population in Gir, the sightings would be very frequent, but that was not so. Probably the numerous pride photos circulated on web had set wrong expectations or like our guides frequently kept referring that we have chosen the wrong season to come and we should come in summer when there is hardly any vegetation. But lions have been the laziest of the cats and probably after the nocturnal party would always be found sleeping deep in the vegetation, far from the “disturbing jeeps” as what the guides kept telling us when 😉

On our second safari on route # 12, it started raining while we were deep in the jungle and we were completely drenched as the jeep are open to sky. But we wanted to keep going as long as the driver-guide were comfortable. We spotted another lioness soaking in the rain and guarding her kill. She was seen guarding her spot since morning. We had a tracking collar on her to study her activities and intake. We continued further to reach the beautiful Kamleshwar Dam in the middle of the forest with spectacular viewpoints. Although the dam was full of crocodiles and we spotted a couple too, the views were pleasing. Rain had stopped in this area and it was a pleasing break.

While returning on the route we caught again with the “collar wali” lioness at the sme spot but this time she was savoring her kill, crunching every bone of the dead buffalo calf and relishing it to the last bit. It was an incredible experience to watch it.

Over dinner we discussed about scary lion movies like “The Prey” and “The Ghost And The Darkness” which spooked our little kid. Building on the stories that our guide provided of man-eater lions and leopards in the neighboring villages and youtube videos of lions roaming freely on the main road in Gir and surrounding areas gave us creeps! 😀

Onto safari # 3, the next day morning, on route 5 we did not spot any lion/ness but we crossed tribal village and Maldharis grazing their buffaloes in the midst of the forest full of lions, not letting go of their land and their tradition. Very brave of them to live so!

In search of the King, on the insistence of the little one, we opted for the current booking of Devalia Gypsy Safari. The management is just churning out gypies on demand and the drivers drive at crazy speed to complete the safari and come back and pick new ride. One should look at Devaliya as an “Open Zoo” or “Inverse Zoo”; where animals are allowed to roam freely around in a restricted area under supervision, and people are allowed to watch them from a bus or a jeep. We spotted 2 lionesses and 1 lion enjoying their afternoon siesta. [Does he actually do anything else 😉 ] We also saw 4-5 leopards in the enclosure, these were all man-eaters, as informed by our guide and were captured from the neighboring villages.

Accommodation: There is a lot of choice available here and we were put up in a decent family resort Gir Lion Safari Camp

Safaris: We took 3 safaris which need to be booked online : https://girlion.gujarat.gov.in/ the guide and camera charges are done on the spot.

Not only the wildlife but there are also other things to do while traveling on this route. On our way from Velavadar to Gir we stopped at Junagadh to visit the Mahabat Maqbara. Food Tip: We also had lunch here at “The Petals” restaurant serving gujarati thali.

The Mahabat Maqbara monument is very picturesque and depicts Indo-Islamic architecture.

From Gir after our third safari we also visited the Somnath Temple and the Triveni Sangam, which is confluence of 3 rivers. Note that while entering the Somnath temple one has to deposit all the belongings[including mobile phones and belts etc] in the locker facility. But the temple is very beautiful and is set against a spectacular beach front.

While travelling back to Ahmedabad we took a halt after the long journey and put up for the there at El Dorado

Food Tip: On the way to Ahmedabad from Gir, we braked at Rajkot for lunch at “The Grand Thakkar”

Next day we toured around the city and visited Adalaj Stepwell which is very beautiful but again not well maintained and managed.

We also strolled around the beautiful parks around the Sabarmati Riverfront before taking our flight back home.

Food Tip: In Ahmedabad to relish the delicious gujarati thali at Agashiye thali at “The House of MG“. We also enjoyed dinner and quick meals at Swati Snacks which was our favorite from last visit.

Our friend Jayesh and his team at The Western Routes helped us planning the trip and make the necessary bookings for the same. Their suggestions and tips have been extremely useful.

Itinerary

Ahmedabar ——> Velavadar[1 night]——-> Gir [3 nights] ——->Ahmdabad [1 night]

Ahmedabad – By flight. We had pre-booked a taxi for our internal road travel.

Ahmedabad – Velavadar -By car [2.5 hours drive]

Velavadar -Gir – By car [ 5 hours drive]

Gir- Ahmedabad – By car [7 hours drive]

Plan your travel with useful itineraries.

How to Experience the Ultimate Wildlife Adventure: Velavadar to Gir – A Journey Enriched with Ahmedabad’s Vibrant Charm!

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