Bannerghatta Nat'l Park

We decided that since this Saturday was our second to last Saturday being in Bangalore we would go out to Bannerghatta National Park which is situated just south of Bangalore. so we woke up early and got a bus headed to majestic which is the main bus station in Bangalore. from there we caught a cheap A/C Volvo bus out to the national park. it took about two hours for the transit part of getting there but it was worth it we immediately booked ourself a grand safari for 100 rupees (2 bucks)! it included the lion, tiger, and bear safari plus a zoo pass for the day. we were excited! we went to stand in line for the safari and there was about 100 people in front of us but us being the two white guys the leader looked at us and asked if we were just two and we said yes so we were immediately escorted to the bus in front of everyone i felt pretty bad but it seems we get treated pretty well at tourist sites (only to try to get tips, i was also guilty of this when i saw rich people come into the Marriott last always willing to help the deep pockets!) so we got onto the bus and went to the back of the bus. well this bus was full of a group of young girls from college. so we sat in the back till about 3 minutes into the trip then we were again escorted to the front of the bus right next to the driver so that we could see a good 180 degrees. and plus who doesn't want to sit on a hard seat right next to the shifter and see Indian animals all around!! and we did see a lot of animals: Sloth Bears:

Tigers and White Tigers:

Lions:

we also saw plenty of stags, deer, javelinas, a yak, and other animals on the safari. The Sloth Bears did a cool bear dance that in hindi they call Baloo, hence the naming the jungle book character (amazing what you learn on an indian safari). the dance wasnt much but it was very interesting to watch them. they would just sway back and forth and back and forth. the driver said it was natural but wikipedia said that some indian priests train them to dance for performance reason, im not sure which to believe, it looked pretty natural.

we then went to the zoo where we saw King Cobras, caged monkeys, wild monkeys, hippos, and more elephants. i stayed at the elephants for quite a while when they were giving blessings:

if you give an elephant 1-5 rupees you put it in their trunk and they will lift the coin to their driver then proceed to give you a tap on your head. the big elephants were pretty good at it. but this small little fellow couldn't quite get the gentle part down and he ended up scaring a lot of children and missing a lot of heads. it was great fun to just sit there and watch these massive elephants love the company of humans. after the zoo we found a small section on the map that said live dinosaurs so we took off to find them, and sure enough after being sneaky enough we captured the most amzing site on camera:

outside of the zoo we found carnival rides. Robby says that outside a lot of tourist traps in Southern Asia there are carnival-like rides that just wait for anyone to come to ride them Robby did the ferris wheel while i grabbed some snacks then we went for the rocking boat:

and of course we had some local carnies join us!:

it was a super successful day. i loved it and straight from the park we took a chain of buses to get to the church to go to a movie night where we watched the testaments. what a day!!