Safari Bases
Wildlife & Safari
The towns you sleep in — gate access, jeep bookings and the drive to the first zone.
70 places
Tamil Nadu
Anamalai Tiger Reserve
The Anamalai Tiger Reserve, also known as the Indira Gandhi Wildlife Sanctuary, lies in the Anaimalai Hills of the Western Ghats in Tamil Nadu near Pollachi and Valparai. Part of a UNESCO-listed Western Ghats landscape, its shola forests and grasslands shelter tigers, elephants, gaur, the endangered lion-tailed macaque and the Nilgiri tahr.
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Haryana
Asola Bhatti Wildlife Sanctuary
Semi-arid Aravalli forest straddling the Delhi border into the Faridabad and Gurugram districts — 32 sq km of it, and one of the last pieces of the Delhi Ridge that development has not eaten. It is a working link in the leopard corridor that runs from Sariska through Nuh and Gurugram to the ridge, which is a better reason to walk it than any single sight inside. Old open-pit mines have filled into dozens of small lakes. The seasonal waterfalls at Pali, Dhuaj and Kot adjoin it, as does the sacred grove at Mangar Bani; Surajkund and Anangpur Dam are close.
Meghalaya
Baghmara Pitcher Plant Wildlife Sanctuary
The protected species here is a plant. Nepenthes khasiana, called Me'mang-Koksi or ghost basket locally, is an endangered pitcher plant, and this small reserve forest near Baghmara in the South Garo Hills exists to keep it going. Meghalaya only notified the area as a wildlife sanctuary in July 2022. It sits 112 km south of Tura, which is a long way to come for something you look down at rather than up at. Worth the detour if pitcher plants genuinely interest you, or if you are already in Baghmara. Otherwise, not.
Meghalaya
Balpakram National Park
Land of the eternal wind is what the name means in Garo myth, and at around 910 metres up against the Bangladesh border in the South Garo Hills, you can see where that came from. The park was inaugurated in December 1987 and gives habitat to barking deer, wild water buffalo, Indian elephant, marbled cat, Asian golden cat, red panda and Bengal tiger, a list that reads better than most visitors' day will. Come for the country and the quiet rather than a guaranteed sighting, and treat any cat as pure luck.
Madhya Pradesh
Bandhavgarh National Park
Bandhavgarh has one of the highest densities of Bengal tigers in India, set around an ancient hilltop fort in the Vindhya hills of Madhya Pradesh. Its landscape is a mix of sal forest, grassland meadows and dramatic cliffs.
Karnataka
Bandipur National Park
Bandipur National Park, in the Chamarajanagar district of Karnataka, is one of India's tiger reserves and part of the Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve. Once a hunting ground of the Mysore maharajas, its teak and rosewood forests shelter tigers, leopards, elephants, gaur and dholes, and it forms a continuous wildlife corridor with Nagarhole, Mudumalai and Wayanad.
Karnataka
Bhadra Wildlife Sanctuary
Bhadra Wildlife Sanctuary and Tiger Reserve, set around the Bhadra reservoir near Chikmagalur in Karnataka's Western Ghats, is a lush tiger reserve known worldwide for a successful, voluntary relocation of villages that helped its wildlife rebound. Its forests shelter tigers, leopards, elephants, gaur and rich birdlife.
Odisha
Bhitarkanika National Park
Bhitarkanika National Park in Odisha protects one of India's largest mangrove ecosystems, a maze of tidal creeks and forests fed by several rivers. It is famed for its huge saltwater crocodiles, along with king cobras, water monitors and vast numbers of birds; nearby Gahirmatha beach is a major nesting site for Olive Ridley sea turtles.
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Himachal Pradesh
Chail Sanctuary
Two names worth remembering here are Blossom and Jhaja, where the sambar, goral and cheer pheasant actually turn up. Barking deer and kalij pheasants come out at dusk and dawn, so the middle of the day is the worst time to be walking; plan around the light rather than the drive up. The forest is oak, pine and open grassland across 110 square kilometres, protected since 1976, with leopard and Himalayan black bear in it that you are unlikely to see. March to October is the window. The Maharaja of Patiala's European red deer are long gone, and the 1988 survey found none.
Kerala
Chinnar Wildlife Sanctuary
Chinnar Wildlife Sanctuary, in Kerala's Idukki district near Marayoor and Munnar, is an unusual rain-shadow reserve of dry thorny scrub and deciduous forest, very different from Kerala's usual rainforests. It is known for the grizzled giant squirrel, star tortoise, elephants and a landscape dotted with sandalwood trees and ancient rock art.
Andhra Pradesh
Coringa Wildlife Sanctuary
The tide runs this place. The forest floods at least twice a day, and the mangroves hold themselves clear of the water on a tangle of stilt-like prop roots that slows the current, drops sediment and builds the mud you are standing over. It is an estuary near Kakinada, the third largest stretch of mangrove in India, with 24 mangrove species and more than 120 kinds of bird, among them the critically endangered white-backed and long-billed vultures. Those two are rare enough that seeing either is luck, not planning. Come for the birds and the shape of the forest; nothing here is dramatic.
Haryana
Crocodile Breeding Centre, Kurukshetra
Muggers, and only muggers — the freshwater crocodile native to India — bred at Bhor Saidan village on the Kurukshetra-Pehowa road, 13 km out from the old Kurukshetra bus stand and 22 km from the new one. It is one of four crocodile breeding centres in the country, run by the Haryana Forests Department. There is not a great deal to it beyond the animals themselves, so pair it with something on the same run: Chhilchhila Wildlife Sanctuary lies 10 km south. Half an hour, if you are already in Kurukshetra.
Jammu & Kashmir
Dachigam National Park
Dachigam National Park, in the mountains just outside Srinagar in Jammu and Kashmir, is the last stronghold of the endangered Kashmir stag, or hangul, the state animal. Rising from riverine valley to alpine meadow, it also shelters Himalayan black bears, leopards, musk deer and a wealth of Himalayan birds.
Karnataka
Dandeli (Kali Tiger Reserve)
Dandeli, part of the Kali Tiger Reserve on the Kali river in Karnataka's Western Ghats, is one of South India's top wildlife-and-adventure destinations. Its deciduous forests hold tigers, elephants, black panthers and one of India's richest hornbill populations, and the river has white-water rafting and kayaking.
Assam
Dehing Patkai National Park
India's largest surviving stretch of lowland rainforest sits here, 231 square kilometres of dipterocarp forest across Dibrugarh and Tinsukia districts, part of a belt that runs on for more than 575 sq km and over into Arunachal Pradesh. Protection came late, a wildlife sanctuary only in 2004 and a national park in 2020, and it doubles as an elephant reserve. It was a study of the white-winged wood duck that first made the case for the place, which tells you what it is really about: go expecting birds and canopy rather than a set-piece safari.
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Rajasthan
Desert National Park
Desert National Park, spread across the Thar desert near Jaisalmer and Barmer in Rajasthan, is one of India's largest protected areas and the last stronghold of the critically endangered Great Indian Bustard. Its dunes, scrub and rocky expanses shelter desert foxes, chinkara, desert cats and raptors, along with ancient fossils.
Assam
Dibru-Saikhowa National Park
Water sets the terms here. The park lies between the Brahmaputra and Lohit in the north and the Dibru in the south, at an average of 118 metres, and it holds the largest salix swamp forest in northeast India along with canebrakes and grassland. Rainfall runs from 2,300 to 3,800 mm a year, so summer is hot and thoroughly wet; winter is cool and usually dry, which is the sane time to come. Fish diversity is one of its real distinctions, not the headline most visitors want, but it tells you this is a river park more than a forest one.
Uttar Pradesh
Dudhwa National Park
Dudhwa National Park, part of the Dudhwa Tiger Reserve in the Terai grasslands of Uttar Pradesh near the Nepal border, protects one of India's finest surviving stretches of tall wet grassland and sal forest. It is a stronghold for tigers, the rare swamp deer (barasingha) and reintroduced one-horned rhinos, along with elephants and rich birdlife.
Arunachal Pradesh
Eaglenest Wildlife Sanctuary
The name is not about birds of prey: it comes from the Red Eagle Division of the Indian army, posted here in the 1950s. The ground climbs from 500 to 3,250 metres in West Kameng, which is the whole point of the place, since that spread of height is what packs so much into one sanctuary. Sessa Orchid Sanctuary adjoins it to the northeast and Pakke Tiger Reserve sits across the Kameng river to the east, so it is worth planning the three together rather than picking one.
Gujarat
Gir National Park
Gir is the last refuge of the Asiatic lion, the only place on earth outside Africa where wild lions roam. This dry deciduous forest in Saurashtra also shelters leopards, antelope and over 300 bird species across its safari routes.
Himachal Pradesh
Great Himalayan National Park
The Great Himalayan National Park was listed by UNESCO in 2014, and what makes it worth the effort is what it does not have: no road crosses it, nothing is sold inside it, and there is no signal past the boundary. Entry is on a permit, issued at Sai Ropa or Gushaini. Past the gate you walk. The standard trips run two to five days up the Tirthan, Sainj or Jiwa valleys with a local guide and a porter, and the community booking system means the money stays in the villages at the edge. Himalayan brown bear, musk deer and western tragopan all live in here and you will probably see none of them — this is dense forest, not grassland. What you get instead is four days without meeting anyone. The ecozone villages outside the boundary — Gushaini, Ropa, Shangarh — are where you sleep before and after, and each is worth a night either side. Mid-May to the end of June, and mid-September to the end of October. The higher passes hold snow outside that, and the monsoon closes the trails.
Assam
Hoollongapar Gibbon Sanctuary
The hoolock gibbon, India's only ape, lives in this patch of evergreen forest, calling from the hollong trees that dominate the upper canopy, and you are far more likely to hear it than see it. The Bengal slow loris is here too, northeast India's only nocturnal primate. Understand the scale before you come: the forest once ran to the Patkai foothills and is now an island ringed by tea gardens and villages, still losing ground to logging and encroachment. Come for the primates, not for a long mammal list.
Haryana
Jatayu Conservation Breeding Centre, Pinjore
Five acres inside the Bir Shikargah sanctuary, 8 km out of Pinjore, holding the world's largest breeding programme for Indian vultures — and, since the house sparrow started thinning out across Punjab and Haryana, for sparrows too. It opened in 2001 as Asia's first vulture breeding centre. The work done here identified diclofenac, given to cattle, as what was killing the birds, and the veterinary drug was banned across India in 2007-08 on the strength of it. This is a working conservation facility rather than an enclosure built for visitors, so ask about access before you make the drive.
Uttarakhand
Jim Corbett National Park
Jim Corbett is India's oldest national park and the birthplace of Project Tiger, set in the Himalayan foothills along the Ramganga River. Famed for its tigers, elephants and rich birdlife across the Dhikala, Bijrani and Jhirna zones, it is one of the country's safari destinations.
Arunachal Pradesh
Kamlang Wildlife Sanctuary
Few places in India can list a Bengal tiger and a snow leopard on the same sheet. Kamlang does, along with leopard and clouded leopard, which says more about how far the ground climbs than about your odds of seeing any of them. It became India's 50th tiger reserve, was declared an eco-sensitive zone in 2024, and takes its name from the Kamlang River running through it in Lohit district. Glow Lake is the one body of water worth aiming for. The Mishmi communities around the edge trace their descent from King Rukmo of the Mahabharata.
Chhattisgarh
Kanger Valley National Park
Roughly 200 square kilometres of Bastar, running about 33.5 km from the Teerathgarh waterfalls in the west to the Kolab river on the Odisha boundary, and only some 6 km deep north to south. The Kanger river runs through the middle and gives the park its name. It is one of India's densest national parks, and the rock beneath it is limestone, so the underground caves are as much of the draw as the wildlife. Listen for the Bastar hill myna, the state bird. The park sits 30 km southeast of Jagdalpur, close enough to make a day of rather than an expedition.
Madhya Pradesh
Kanha National Park
Kanha is one of India's largest and most beautiful tiger reserves, a landscape of sal forests and open meadows said to have inspired Kipling's 'The Jungle Book'. It is also the last home of the rare barasingha (swamp deer).
Telangana
Kasu Brahmananda Reddy National Park
This was a prince's estate before it was a park. The palace complex went to Mukarram Jah at his coronation in 1967, and only in 1998 did the state declare its 390 acres a national park. What sits around the palace is the odd inventory of a vanished household: a peacock bungalow on a hillock, the round Gol Bungalow, stables built for elephants, horses and cattle, a motor khana that once held a fleet of vintage cars, two wells and two water tanks. It is in the middle of Jubilee Hills, which is exactly the point, a jungle inside the concrete one.
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.
Manipur
Keibul Lamjao National Park
No other national park in the world floats. The surface here is phumdi, mats of decomposed plant material, and the forty square kilometres of it are an inseparable part of Loktak Lake rather than a park beside it. The place was set aside in 1966 as a sanctuary for the endangered Eld's deer, the state animal of Manipur, and gazetted a national park in 1977. UNESCO holds it on the tentative list as the Keibul Lamjao Conservation Area, a larger boundary taking in the Loktak buffer and Pumlen Pat. Go for the deer; the park exists because of them.
Rajasthan
Keoladeo National Park (Bharatpur)
Keoladeo National Park in Bharatpur, Rajasthan, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the world's finest bird sanctuaries. A man-made wetland created by a former ruler, it hosts hundreds of resident and migratory bird species, from painted storks and herons to wintering waterfowl, and was historically a rare wintering ground of the Siberian crane.
Sikkim
Khangchendzonga National Park
India's first mixed World Heritage site, listed in July 2016 for its nature and its culture together, which is the unusual part. The park covers 1,784 square kilometres around Kangchenjunga, the third-highest mountain on earth at 8,586 metres, and forms the core of the Khangchendzonga Biosphere Reserve. This is trekking country rather than drive-through country, so plan in days rather than an afternoon and go in with a route already settled.
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Mizoram
Lengteng Wildlife Sanctuary
Birds are the reason this one exists. Lengteng was made a protected area in 1999 and a national wildlife sanctuary by the Ministry of Environment and Forests on 31 May 2001, specifically for its rare bird species, and the alpine forest it covers holds the second highest peak in Mizoram. That combination is the appeal and also the warning: high, cold, eastern Saitual district, walking-and-waiting country rather than a park you drive through. Bring binoculars and patience, or leave it to people who have both.
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.
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Manipur
Manipur Zoological Garden
The reason to come is the Sangai, the brow-antlered deer that lives nowhere else, and this is the only place to see one apart from Keibul Lamjao, the floating national park where the wild herd is. The zoo at Iroisemba is medium-sized, and the collection is mostly Manipur's own rather than a global line-up: Schedule 1 amphibians, birds, mammals and reptiles. The Central Zoo Authority made it the coordinating zoo for the breeding centre for both Sangai and serow. Any month of the year works. Just not a Monday, when it is usually shut.
Andaman & Nicobar Islands
Mount Harriet National Park
Look at the back of a twenty-rupee note: that picture was taken here. The park was set up in 1969 and covers only 4.62 sq km, wrapped around the 383-metre peak now called Mount Manipur, third-highest in the archipelago and well below Saddle Peak. Small does not mean empty. Andaman wild pigs, saltwater crocodiles, turtles and robber crabs live in it, and it is a serious butterfly spot, which is the real argument for walking slowly and looking down as often as up. The name remembers Harriet Tytler, wife of the settlement's superintendent in the 1860s.
Tamil Nadu
Mudumalai National Park
Mudumalai National Park, in the Nilgiri Hills of Tamil Nadu, is a key part of the Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve, adjoining Bandipur, Nagarhole and Wayanad. Its mix of deciduous forest, grassland and swamp supports tigers, elephants, gaur, leopards and rich birdlife, and it lies on the scenic route between Ooty and Mysuru.
Karnataka
Nagarhole National Park
Nagarhole National Park (Rajiv Gandhi National Park), in Karnataka's Kodagu and Mysuru districts, is a lush tiger reserve within the Nilgiri Biosphere. Its rivers, teak forests and the Kabini backwaters support tigers, leopards, elephants and dholes, and the Kabini zone is famous among wildlife photographers for rare sightings of the black panther.
Maharashtra
Nagzira Wildlife Sanctuary
Nagzira Wildlife Sanctuary, in the Gondia and Bhandara districts of eastern Maharashtra, is a compact, lake-dotted forest that forms part of the Navegaon-Nagzira Tiger Reserve. Its teak and bamboo forests shelter tigers, leopards, gaur, wild dogs and abundant birdlife around scenic lakes.
Arunachal Pradesh
Namdapha National Park
Namdapha National Park, in the Changlang district of eastern Arunachal Pradesh, is one of India's largest and most biodiverse protected areas. Ranging from tropical forest to snow-capped peaks, it is the only park in India believed to host four big cats - tiger, leopard, clouded leopard and snow leopard - along with the rare red panda and hoolock gibbon.
Assam
Nameri National Park
Nameri National Park, in the Sonitpur district of Assam at the foothills of Arunachal Pradesh, is a birdwatcher's paradise along the Jia Bhoroli river. Famed for the rare white-winged wood duck, it also shelters elephants, tigers, leopards and clouded leopards, and has gentle rafting down the Jia Bhoroli through forest.
Uttarakhand
Nanda Devi National Park
Nanda Devi National Park, in the Chamoli district of Uttarakhand, surrounds Nanda Devi, India's second-highest peak, in a high-Himalayan glacial basin. A UNESCO World Heritage Site, it shelters snow leopards, Himalayan musk deer, bharal (blue sheep) and Himalayan tahr amid dramatic peaks, glaciers and alpine meadows.
Jharkhand
Palamau Tiger Reserve
Jharkhand has exactly one tiger reserve and this is it, about 1,130 square kilometres across Palamu, Latehar and Garhwa, with Betla National Park inside its boundary. If someone tells you they are off to Betla, this is the forest they mean. It was among the first nine reserves declared in 1973, when the tiger project began, which is the weight the name carries. Go for the forest itself and treat a tiger as luck; ground this large owes nobody a sighting.
Madhya Pradesh
Panna Tiger Reserve
Panna Tiger Reserve, on the banks of the Ken river in Madhya Pradesh, is a celebrated conservation success story, having rebuilt its tiger population after the cats were lost from the park. Its plateaus, gorges and forests shelter tigers, leopards, gharials and abundant birdlife, and its location near Khajuraho makes it an easy add-on to a heritage trip.
Chandigarh
Parrot Bird Sanctuary, Chandigarh
The parrots keep their own timetable, flying out in flocks in the morning and coming back in the evening. That clock is photoperiodism, which is why the corporation's high-mast lights once wrecked their sleep until a resident raised it and the lights were switched off. The Sector 21 sanctuary is small, but two parks adjoin it and the flocks settle in those trees as well, so you are not tied to one spot. Go at either end of the day. In the flat middle hours there is little here beyond the benches teenagers call the Taj Mahal benches.
Uttar Pradesh
Patna Bird Sanctuary
Come in winter, or don't come. The lake here is small: a single square kilometre of water inside a sanctuary of 1.09, which makes it the smallest bird sanctuary in Uttar Pradesh. In the cold months it carries something like 200,000 birds across 300 species, among them pintail, shoveler, Baer's pochard and black-necked stork. By summer the whole surface vanishes under water hyacinth and Potamogeton and there is little left to look at. It lies near Jalesar in Etah district, was founded in 1991, and became a Ramsar site in 2026.
Madhya Pradesh
Pench Tiger Reserve
Pench Tiger Reserve, straddling Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra along the Pench river, is the landscape that inspired Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book. Its teak and sal forests are rich in tigers, leopards, wild dogs, gaur and abundant deer, and it was home to the celebrated Collarwali tigress, one of India's most prolific.
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.
Maharashtra
Radhanagari Wildlife Sanctuary
Radhanagari Wildlife Sanctuary, in the Western Ghats of Kolhapur district in Maharashtra, is one of the region's oldest protected areas and is known for its population of the Indian gaur (bison). Part of a UNESCO-listed Western Ghats site, its dense forests, plateaus and the Radhanagari Dam support gaur, leopards, sloth bears and rich birdlife.
Uttarakhand
Rajaji National Park
Rajaji National Park, spread across the Shivalik foothills of Uttarakhand near Haridwar, Rishikesh and Dehradun, is a tiger reserve best known for its large population of Asian elephants. The Ganga flows along its edge, and its sal forests and grasslands shelter elephants, tigers, leopards, deer and over three hundred bird species.
West Bengal
Ramnabagan Wildlife Sanctuary
Set your expectations to the size of the place and this is a decent hour out: 14.31 hectares of teak and sal inside Bardhaman, with spotted deer and common langur, run now as a small-category zoo under the name Bardhaman Zoological Park. It was declared reserved forest in 1960 and turned into a deer park in 1978 with six spotted deer. Anyone arriving for a wildlife sanctuary in the safari sense will be let down. This is a city forest patch with animals in it, and its value is exactly that, a break from the town around it.
Karnataka
Ranganathittu Bird Sanctuary
Ranganathittu Bird Sanctuary, on islets in the Kaveri river near Srirangapatna and Mysuru, is the largest bird sanctuary in Karnataka. Its riverine islands host large breeding colonies of painted storks, pelicans, herons, ibises and cormorants, while marsh crocodiles bask along the banks, all easily seen on a short boat ride.
Rajasthan
Ranthambore National Park
Ranthambore is one of the largest and best-known wildlife sanctuaries in northern India, with a thriving population of the endangered Royal Bengal tiger. It lies in Sawai Madhopur district, where the ancient Vindhya and Aravalli ranges meet, and the ground is a mix of rugged rocky cliffs, dry deciduous forest and lakes linked one to the next. The 10th-century Ranthambore Fort stands inside the forest, and it is what makes the park look like nowhere else. Tigers here hunt in broad daylight, across the old stone ruins, the palace pavilions and the lake edges. The park is run under strict environmental rules and divided into ten safari zones, which keeps the vehicles spread out and the pressure off the ecological core.
Tripura
Rowa Wildlife Sanctuary
North Tripura's sanctuary sits close enough to Panisagar that the town presses on it from every side, and the record is blunt about it: significant anthropogenic pressure, with a real risk of the forest breaking into fragments. Rainfall is fairly high, which you would expect to settle the fire question, but the area is still classified as highly fire prone. None of that makes it worthless. It makes it a working piece of forest under strain rather than a set-piece. Worth a look if you are already in the north of the state; not worth the journey on its own.
Maharashtra
Sanjay Gandhi National Park
Sanjay Gandhi National Park, in the northern suburbs of Mumbai, is a rare protected forest within a megacity and one of the world's most-visited national parks. Its forests are famous for a resident leopard population living alongside the city, and the park also holds the ancient Kanheri Caves, lakes, a toy train and popular nature trails.
Rajasthan
Sariska Tiger Reserve
Sariska, set in the Aravalli hills near Alwar, is a tiger reserve known for its dry forests, ancient temples and the dramatic Kankwari Fort. It made conservation history as the first reserve to successfully relocate tigers after local extinction.
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Gujarat
Sasan Gir (Talala)
Gir, near Talala, is the last place in the wild where the Asiatic lion survives. Its dry-deciduous forest and scrub also shelter leopards, deer and a wide range of birds, and safaris run from the sanctuary's gates.
Madhya Pradesh
Satpura Tiger Reserve
Satpura Tiger Reserve, set in the rugged Satpura hills of Madhya Pradesh along the Denwa river, is one of central India's most distinctive parks. Less crowded than its neighbours, it is known for walking safaris, canoe safaris and boat rides, with sightings of leopards, sloth bears, tigers, gaur and the Indian giant squirrel amid dramatic gorges and forests.
Arunachal Pradesh
Sessa Orchid Sanctuary
Start at the nursery. It holds representative specimens of the sanctuary's orchid species along with a demonstration farm of Cymbidium hybrids grown for cut flowers, and half an hour there will teach you what to look for on the trekking routes the forest department has cut through the rest of it. Sessa covers 100 square kilometres of Himalayan foothill in West Kameng, running into Eaglenest Wildlife Sanctuary to the southwest as part of the Kameng Protected Area Complex. The ground is rugged, with deep gorges and high peaks, so this is walking rather than driving. Most of it is Bugun territory by tradition.
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Manipur
Shirui National Park
One flower carries this park. The Shirui lily grows naturally on these slopes, and it is what most people make the journey up to Ukhrul for. The walk to Shirui Kashong Peak, at 2,835 metres, gives you the view and the birds together: Blyth's tragopan and Mrs Hume's bar-backed pheasant both live on the hilltop, and a number of rivers start from it. Tiger and leopard are on the list for the park, established in 1982, but treat that as a matter of record rather than something you will see.
Kerala
Silent Valley National Park
Silent Valley National Park, in the Nilgiri Hills of Kerala's Palakkad district, protects one of India's last undisturbed tracts of tropical evergreen rainforest. Part of the Nilgiri Biosphere, it is known for its endemic lion-tailed macaque, rich birdlife and river ecosystem, and is famous as the focus of a landmark environmental movement that saved it from a dam.
Odisha
Simlipal National Park
Simlipal National Park, in the Mayurbhanj district of Odisha, is a tiger reserve and biosphere reserve set among rolling sal forests, plateaus and waterfalls. It is one of the few places associated with rare melanistic (black) tigers, and also shelters elephants, leopards and gaur, along with the Barehipani and Joranda waterfalls.
Chandigarh
Sukhna Wildlife Sanctuary
Plan this one before you turn up. The 2,600-hectare preserve in the Shivalik hills near Sukhna Lake admits only a limited number of visitors and requires an entry pass, issued by the Forest Department office in Sector 19, so the trip really starts there and not at the gate. It has been a notified sanctuary since 1998. It is also usually closed to the public through the rainy season, which takes the wettest months off your calendar. Come with the pass already in hand.
West Bengal
Sundarbans National Park
The Sundarbans National Park is the largest continuous mangrove forest on earth — a vast estuarine delta in West Bengal formed where the Ganges and Brahmaputra meet, cut into a maze of tidal mudflats, narrow river channels and dense island swamps. It holds the world's only population of tigers adapted to living in a mangrove habitat. There is no safari on land here; it is all done from the water, on licensed multi-deck passenger boats that work along the thick roots of the Sundari trees. The core reserve also holds saltwater crocodiles, water monitors and river dolphins.
Maharashtra
Tadoba Andhari Tiger Reserve
Tadoba is Maharashtra's oldest and largest national park, increasingly famous for frequent daytime tiger sightings. Its teak and bamboo forests around Tadoba Lake support tigers, leopards, sloth bears and wild dogs.
Rajasthan
Tal Chhapar Sanctuary
Tal Chhapar Sanctuary, in the Churu district of Rajasthan's Shekhawati region, is a flat, saline grassland famed for its graceful blackbuck herds and as one of India's finest hotspots for raptors and migratory birds. The open plains make wildlife watching exceptionally easy and rewarding.
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.
Uttarakhand
Valley of Flowers National Park
A UNESCO World Heritage Site in the high Himalayas famed for its vast meadows of endemic alpine flowers blooming in monsoon. The Valley of Flowers National Park is an Indian national park located in North Chamoli, deep within the West Himalaya region. It is known for its alpine meadows carpeted with hundreds of species of colourful wild orchids, poppies, and primulas.
Sikkim
Varsey Rhododendron Sanctuary
A 104 sq km sanctuary in the Singalila Range in western Sikkim, running up against Nepal to the west and, to the south, West Bengal across the Rambong Khola stream. The rhododendrons bloom from March until May, and that is the whole case for coming. Outside those months you are walking good ridge forest with nothing in flower, which is a fine day out but not the day out you came for. So fix your dates first and build the rest of the trip around them. If you can choose, aim for the middle of that window rather than its edges. It is also spelled Barsey.
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Manipur
Yangoupokpi-Lokchao Wildlife Sanctuary
The interest here is where it sits: right on the Indo-Myanmar border in Chandel district, at the seam where two major geographical zones meet, so the forest carries Indo-Burma diversity rather than the usual Indian mix. It covers 184.8 square kilometres and lies about 110 km from Imphal, which is a long day's driving in this terrain. Naturalists will get more out of it than casual visitors. Treat it as a trip for people who already know what they are looking for.
