Travel Guide Parc National De Bardia

Located in the western Terai, Bardia is the region's largest park and most unspoilt reserve. Created in 1988, it stretches over 1,000 km2. This is where you have the best chance of spotting a Bengal tiger, hiding in your observatory at the end of the dry season when water is scarce. Bardia is a bit like Chitwan was 15 years ago, without the massive concretization of Sauraha. It became a national park at the end of the 1980s and now boasts some fifteen lodges in the village of Takurdwara, but its remoteness from the capital is holding back its development, and all the better for it. The park has fewer than 10,000 visitors a year, compared with over 250,000 in Chitwan! Although life here is more rustic than in Chitwan, the fauna is also easier to observe, particularly rhinoceroses (reintroduced 15 years ago) and crocodiles, while tigers and leopards are more difficult to spot. It's well worth a visit, and you won't be bothered by the stream of jeeps on safari.