Kaziranga National Park

Kaziranga National Park sits on the southern bank of the Brahmaputra river in Assam, in a landscape of tall elephant grass, semi-evergreen forests, and seasonally flooded marshland. It is one of the world's great wildlife conservation stories: when declared a reserve in 1908, fewer than a dozen rhinos remained; today it holds more than 2,600, making it home to roughly two-thirds of the world's Indian one-horned rhinoceros population.

What surprises most visitors is that Kaziranga is also the world's highest-density tiger reserve — by raw tigers-per-square-kilometre, it outranks even Ranthambore. You're unlikely to see them (tall grass makes big cats hard to spot), but the sense of abundant, wild life is overwhelming from the moment you enter.

The park is divided into four ranges: Central, Western, Eastern, and Burapahar. Most visitors focus on the Central and Western ranges — easier to navigate and richer in rhino sightings. Jeep safaris cover the internal tracks at dawn and dusk; elephant safaris (available in the Central range) allow you to push into tall grass that no vehicle can enter, and are the single best way to approach a rhino at close quarters.

Kaziranga is also an Important Bird Area with over 480 species, including the rare greater adjutant stork. The best time to visit is November through April; the park closes entirely from May to October as monsoon floods from the Brahmaputra inundate the grasslands, and the wildlife retreats to higher ground in the Karbi Anglong hills.

The nearest town, Kohora, sits on the NH-37 highway that borders the park's southern edge — accommodation ranges from basic local lodges to the superb Diphlu River Lodge.