Magnificent Jawai - The Many Joys Of Leopard Country

Leopard spotting may be the prime reason why Jawai has made it to the travel map, but it is certainly not the only one. From off-roading thrills to endearing red-turbaned Rabaris herding flocks of goats, the spectacles here are wide and varied, finds PUNITA MALHOTRA.

- Punita Malhotra

UNDISTURBED MONOTONY had been our loyal companion all along the National Highway 162 from Delhi. But now, as we curved along the Pali-Beawar flyover and glided over the asphalt ribbon slicing through the sheer rock of Aravallis, anticipation stirred.

Past the congested lanes of Sumerpur village, it was a catapult, without fair warning, into the most bucolic scenes. A lavish tapestry of gentle farmlands stretched for miles in every direction. Lacing the horizon were lava-cooled hills sculpted over billions of years by the forces of nature. The natural caves and rock shelters of these enormous granite mountains sheltered one of the world’s highest non-forest concentrations of Panthera Pardus. This was leopard country, and we had just been blind-sighted by a lost GPS.

In the last lap of our 660-km, 10-hour ride we manoeuvered waterlogged tunnels, hard-rock stone surfaces and even a bumpy dirt road running beside railway tracks, we landed weary and weather-beaten at Bera Safari Lodge. Artfully designed by the owner, wildlife conservationist and photographer Shatrunjay Pratap Singh and his wife Katyaini, it instantly struck a chord with its thatched roof mud huts, lantern-lit sandy paths, and fi ve (naturally distanced) stone cottages. Other than a few rustic village homes, there was no evidence of civilisation in the cacti-fi-lled rocky desert.

Into the wilderness