As we were contemplating a tour through Rajasthan mostly focused on archaeology, we spotted a place called the Bharatpur Bird Sanctuary along our route. We had time to stop off for a couple of hours. Midday didn’t seem like a great time for seeing birds but we could at least get in a good bike ride, one option for seeing the place.
We didn’t spot anywhere near the two or three hundred species that pass through Bharatpur, but you can see from these pictures we were not disappointed. The place, also known as Keoladeo Ghana National Park, Ghana to locals, was a hunting ground for the Maharajas of Bharaptur dating back to 1850. In a 1938 shoot, the Viceroy of India, Lord Linlithgow, took over four thousand birds. The Maharaja relinquished his rights in 1972. Bharatpur is now a World Heritage Site.