As winter approaches North India, various wetlands start seeing thousands of Migratory Birds and Bharatpur's Keoladeo Bird Sanctuary is one of the most popular wetlands around National Capital region of India and hence sees lot of tourists from Delhi/Noida/Gurgaon region. And it's not limited to nearby tourists. Lot of serious birders visit Bharatpur during Winters from various parts of the country as well as foreigner tourists. This blog-post shares tips to plan a successful trip to Bharatpur from Delhi and what kind of things to take care while planning this birding trip.
Bharatpur town is in Rajasthan State of India and not Uttar Pradesh. Lot of folks think that Bharatpur Bird Sanctuary is in Uttar Pradesh, probably because of it's proximity from Delhi. Bharatpur is approximately 200 Kms from Delhi and it takes approximately 3.5 hrs and that's pretty fast because of great condition of Taj Expressway road. And that's the reason that anyone can plan to visit Bharatpur Birds Sanctuary in a day.
Let me quickly share an itinerary for the day trip to Bharatpur along with some tips :
1. Start early in the morning. 5am is reasonable time as it would take 3.5 hrs to 4 hrs depending upon duration of your break on the way. If you start at 5am, in worst case you reach at the entry gate of Bharatpur Bird Sanctuary by 9am.
2. If you have managed your breakfast on your way, that's fine. Otherwise there is a line of hotels on the left side of the entry gate of Bird Sanctuary where you can find reasonable breakfast options. I highly recommend to have heavy breakfast and spend whole day till 5pm inside the sanctuary and enjoy discovering birds.
3. Please do carry fruits and enough water inside the Keoladeo National Park. It's allowed to carry eatables inside the bird sanctuary.
4. Entry ticket per person is 75 Rs and then you can either hire a cycle-rickshaw on hourly basis or rent a bicycle. I personally prefer walking but be aware that it's approximately 12 kilometers walk (reading taken from my fitbit and certainly it also includes side-walks around the main road inside the sanctuary). Rickshaw charges are 150 rs per hour and I find that reasonable.
5. You also have option to have a guide with you. If it's your first birding experience, I will recommend having one. Otherwise it's your personal choice. As a first timer, guide can be very helpful in locating birds for you and showing to you. They also carry some cool binoculars, and offer some awesome views to their customers.
6. Inside the Keoladeo National Park, there is a lake and boating is allowed inside the lake. Boating tickets are available at the entry gate of the national park. We didn't take this boating tour so not sure if its fruitful from birding perspective or not. But if you have kids with you, you can certainly plan this boating tour. I saw kids enjoying it the most, by looking at big smiles at their faces when they were returning back from the boating tour.
7. If you come back to the entry gate by 5pm, there is enough time with you have late lunch and then head back to Delhi.
Few other things worth considering to ensure a productive trip to Bharatpur :
1. Maintain silence and make best use of your ears in figuring out various bird sounds. These sounds are key indicators to locate birds.
2. Ensure that you are not around the people who making noise in the sanctuary and also refrain from doing that. That way, you would be able to see much more birds than others.
3. It's ok to pause at one place for some time if you hear birds sounds but cant locate them. Patience is the key in Bird watching.
4. Do carry a pair of Binoculars and trust me, you would thank me for this tip the most when you would be done with the tour of Bharatpur Birds Sanctuary.
5. There is parking are around the entry gate, so no worries around parking the car. And don't think of parking it at some distant place or hotel unless you have a hotel for night stay and you want to keep it there.
6. There are 2 canteens inside Bharatpur Birds Sanctuary - one on mid way, which is close to the lake and other is at the end of the road where your birding tour ends. Basic stuff like water bottles, snacks, tea, cold-drinks are available in these canteen. We asked one of the canteen owner about why they don't keep food and I loved the answer - "Food makes the place dirtier, so avoiding it at first place helps us keeping the place clean for these birds."
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Don't get frustrated if you don't see birds in the beginning of the tours inside Bharatpur Bird Sanctuary. In the beginning you need put lot of efforts but you would see birds but as you would go beyond the lake, you will start seeing hundreds of them on both sides of the road.
Now that you have basic tips and the itinerary available, let's dive deep into some of the specific aspects of this trip. But before that would you be interested in knowing a little more about Bharatpur Bird Sanctuary so that you can appreciate the place in much better way.
Let me increase the excitement level a little up by sharing that Bharatpur National park has 300+ bird species and thousands of birds in winters. Lot of national and international tourist and bird/wildlife lovers visit the place every year to appreciate the beauty of these winged wonders.
Related blog-post - Birds of Prey at Keoladeo National Park || Watchful Eyes that Track your Every Movement
To know a little about History of Bharatpur National Park or Bird Sanctuary -
Interestingly it's an artificially created wetland for Royals to do hunting in their own region. This wetland attracts lot of migratory birds in winters and you can see many of them breeding here in this town of Rajasthan.
The name Keoladeo National Park is taken from local temple which is located inside the bird sanctuary.
Related blog-post : Hotel Sunbird @Bharatpur || A Great Place to Return to After a Tiring Walk through Keoladeo National Park
Now let's talk about how to reach Bharatpur's Keoladeo National Park from other parts of the country & the world :
Before jumping onto the options to reach here, let's see some distance approximations from nearby places which are relatively better connected to rest of the world -
Delhi and Bharatpur – 190 km (National Capital of India)
Agra and Bharatpur – 50+ km (the place where taj Mahal is)
Mathura and Bharatpur – 30+ km (An important place for Hindus. There are lot fo temples in this town)
Jaipur and Bharatpur – 170+ km (Jaipur is capital city of Rajasthan state of India)
Luxury trains like Palace of Wheels also cover Bharatpur National Park and if you opt for such option, there is no need to read this post any further because they take care of everything.
Nearby airports around Bharatpur are Delhi and Jaipur and there is a railway station in Bharatpur.
Related Blog-post : ITC Mughal - One of the popular hotels around Taj Mahal in Agra
Why Winters are best to visit Bharatpur National Park?
Broadly we can divide whole year into 3 seasons of North India - Winters (Oct-Mar), Summers (April-June), Monsoons (July-Sept).
Monsoons is worst season to visit Bharatpur National PArk because of high bushes all around and if it's raining, birds would be under their identified shelters. So bird sightings are far less in rainy season.
Summers is a good time but you only find resident birds around and walking in summers of Rajasthan is a pretty big challenge and that cant be easily resolved by hiring a cycle or cycle-rickshaw.
Winters becomes the best because of various reasons - Migratory birds visit the park so you see more than the resident birds of Bharatpur. And then walking around in winters is much better than any other season in Bharatpur. Apart from that winter light is just perfect for photography, especially Nov-feb months are pretty good.
Keoladeo National park has Siberian Crane, Indian Darter, Indian Saurus crane, heron, cormorants, storks, migrant ducks, common teal, gadwall, shoveler, knob billed duck, Indian shag, white spoonbill, green sandpiper, common sandpiper, oriental ibis, babblers, bee-eaters, buntings, guails, warblers, osprey, short-toed eagle, greater spotted eagle, crested serpent eagle, sea eagle and lot more. Am I not mentioning some of the common ones? Yes, but there are 300+ which are hard to list. btw, Parrots of Bharatpur are very friendly and pose you very well.
Apart from birds one can also see Nilgai, chital deer, white sambar, Indian porcupine, small Indian mongoose, jungle cat, fishing ca etc. You certainly see cows inside the park.
It's not rare to see snakes, turtles, lizards, frogs and other species near the water bodies of Bharatpur National Park, and especially in monsoons, which is probably worst season to visit Bharatpur.
Related Blog-post : Travel makes us wiser : A very interesting experience at Fatehpur Sikri, UP (India)
Hope this post would help you plan your trip to Bharatpur National Park. Please comment below if you have further questions or suggestions for us. Wish you a great travel experiences ahead !
If you liked this post and found it helpful, I would request you to follow these things when traveling -
1. Manage your waste well and don’t litter Use dustbins.
2. Tell us if you went to a place and found it hard to locate a dustbin.
3. Avoid bottle waters in hills. Usually you get clean water in hills and water bottles create lot of mess in our ecosystem.
4. Say big no to plastic and avoid those unhealthy snacks packed in plastic bags. Rather buy fruits.
5. Don't play loud blaring music in forests of jungle camps. You are a guest in that ecosystem and disturbing the locals (humans and animals) is not polite
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