Elephant & Rhino Country
Wildlife & Safari
Assam's grasslands and the southern elephant corridors — the big herbivores, not the cats.
5 places
Assam
Kaziranga National Park
Kaziranga covers over 430 square kilometres of alluvial floodplain along the southern bank of the Brahmaputra in Assam. It is marsh country, thick with towering elephant grass, shallow reed swamps and stands of open sal forest. More than two-thirds of the world's surviving one-horned rhinos live here. The park is divided into four safari ranges and run under strict rules. Bagori is the popular one for early-morning elephant-back safaris, which get you close to rhinos grazing in the mist without disturbing them.
Assam
Manas National Park
Manas National Park, in the Himalayan foothills of Assam on the border with Bhutan, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, tiger reserve, elephant reserve and biosphere reserve in one. Its grasslands and forests along the Manas river shelter tigers, rhinos, wild elephants and rare species such as the pygmy hog, golden langur and Bengal florican.
Assam
Pobitora Wildlife Sanctuary
Pobitora Wildlife Sanctuary, in the Morigaon district of Assam near Guwahati, is famed for having the highest density of one-horned rhinos in the world. Its compact grasslands and wetlands are packed with rhinos and are also excellent for wild buffalo, leopards and migratory birds.
Kerala
Thekkady (Periyar)
Thekkady sits at 900 metres in the Cardamom Hills of Idukki district, hard against the Tamil Nadu border, and everything here revolves around the Periyar Tiger Reserve — over 925 square kilometres of rugged evergreen rainforest. The safari is done on water rather than by road. Visitors board double-decker boats and look for animals along the marshy banks and among the submerged tree trunks standing in the lake. Beyond the park boundary the land gives way to valleys of organic spice farms.
Thekkady (Periyar)
Periyar Lake Boat Cruise
The reserve's main safari runs on large passenger boats, following the winding arms of the lake and watching for wildlife.
