Corbett in a day?

Mary Poppins

Hello,

We are planning a trip to north India in December of this year.

The friend I am going with MUST go to a nature reserve. Originally we had scheduled in a visit to Ranthambore, but I have since found out (via this wonderful forum) that Ranthambore has no elephants (which are my favourite animal). I am now trying to work out if we can go to Corbett via Delhi.

Because of time restrictions, I am wondering if you think it would be completely ridiculous to just go to Corbett for the day. The train gets in at 5am and leaves at 9.40pm so it would be a proper full day. I know ideally we would stay a night or two, but there is only one train back to Delhi and I don't think we can afford to spend two full days there.

Would love to hear if you guys think this is out of the question or doable!

kritikal

I ,for one, would definitely recommend that you try to stay for at least a night at Dhikala (the core area of the reserve).

But then again, given the constraints, I guess you could do Corbett in one day. From whatever I know, you are allowed to take a jeep inside Dhikala, only if you are staying at Dhikala overnight. But you can take the day safari in the canter. There are two day safaris normally - one which begins at 6 a.m. and one around early/mid afternoon.

You could also do day safaris through Bijrani or Jhirna (the other areas of the reserve). There are a lot of jeeps which are available just outside the booking office at Ramnagar. These safaris can be taken anytime after 2 p.m (till about 5-6 p.m).

If you don't mind packing two safari rides in one day, maybe you could do the early morning safari at Dhikala and follow it up with a safari at Bijrani or Jhirna.

Hope this helps!

Mary Poppins

Thanks for your response Kritikal.

Is it worth going if we can't go to Dhikala - I just read on the website that unless you're staying there overnight you can't do the elephant safari.

Will we still potentially see tigers and elephants in the outer areas of the park?

kritikal

Actually, we got to see more wildlife at Bijrani than at Dhikala! We spotted a tiger and a big herd of elephants togethe(about 10 of them). Our jeep even got charged by a tusker

But, in my opinion, you have to definitely experience Dhikala! Maybe you could try staying the night there and rent a car back to Delhi the next day. I guess there are some buses available too during the day, although they are probably not the deluxe/Volvo kinds.

shahronakm

Ideally one should spend at least 3 nights in a wild life sanctuary but since you can not spare more than one day, just go it & enjoy the forest but do not expect to see to many wild animnals as December will be very cold & most of the wildlife will be in deep forests unlike summer months when animals are often seen around Dhikala lodge.

Ronak.

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