LEOPARDS & TIGERS & BOARS, OH MY!

We are staying our third and final night in Bandhavgarh National Park tonight. Annie, my latest roomie, & I upgraded from tents to a fab room with hot shower and thematic tiger-print sheets. We had our last safaris this morning and the group is now ready to start playing cards and drinking at the lovely hour of 1PM. It's celebration time, as we ALL saw tigers on our safaris this morning!!!!! It was totally exciting!!!! Our group saw one big female from the jeep several times, and then Annie & I tracked a big male ("V2") from elephant back. Our elephant was trumpeting and the driver took her/us crashing through the jungle so we could actually follow the tiger. It was AWESOME! Pictures don't do it justice, but they are in my brain forever.

Varanasi was also pretty incredible. We did a sunrise boat ride down the Ganges, floating past all the ghats and people doing their bathing/washing/drinking/etc. in the septic water. Yikes! But beautiful and colorful and altogether foreign. Went to several temples and sunset ceremonies on the ghats. Felt like we were in a live action video game as we raced through the streets in these crazy little contraptions called "tuk tuks." Each group of three had its own driver for the day - Ka Ka was ours and he deserved some kind of award for his superb driving skills. We dodged and bobbed through a constant, messy wave of people/cows/goats/dogs/bicycles/motorcycles/ rickshaws/cars/buses/shrines/random rocks/gaping potholes/scattered gravel patches/other tuk tuks through insane streets and teensy dark alleys. No stop signs. No stop lights. No lanes. It was like being on a smoggy big-ticket white-knuckle roller coaster with no safety bars and drunk carnies and a bazillion blaring horns instead of music. It's hard to imagine that there aren't accidents and dead bodies all over the place, but the system seems to work somehow. It was hilarious and scary and a rush all at the same time.

Ten people in our group celebrated the Thanksgiving holiday in Varanasi with "bhang lhassis." Basically large tumblers of a sweet yogurt drink that is blended with massive amounts of very potent weed. OH MY GAWD!!!!! It was a total blast and I laughed so hard for so long that my abs are still sore. Can't wait to do it again, which apparently is only possible in the major spiritual cities, of which we are mapping the routes:)

Really loving it so far and it is zooming by. Another 12-ish hour drive tomorrow, headed to Panna National Park. One of the drivers, Steve, lost a bet and has to wear only a diaper and tiger hat tomorrow plus get out and buy us stuff to eat dressed like that in various villages. Or so we shall see.

Hope everyone had a great holiday!