SANJAY GANDHI NATIONAL PARK & KANHERI CAVES

A splendid national park of 104 km2 located north of the city. This park shelters a fauna (leopards, macaques, langurs, deer, snakes...) and a flora of the most interesting, certain parts being inaccessible for reasons of preservation and safety.

Few tourists are interested in the fascinating complex of Buddhist caves located in the park, wrongly. The Kanheri caves complex counts no less than a hundred caves, carved in basalt, dating back to 400 BC. Most of these caves were viharas, i.e. places of life, meditation and study of Buddhism. The most important ones, which were used as meeting places(chaityas), have superb sculpted reliefs. The deity most present on this site is Avalokiteshwara, one of the most popular and venerated boddhisattvas (enlightened beings). The largest cave houses a 7 meter high Buddha statue. The top of the site offers an unusual panorama: a luxuriant vegetation and, in the distance, the chaotic megalopolis... one can even see the World Peace Pagoda (or Vipassana Pagoda) shining on the horizon!

The "Lion & Tiger Safari" is a bus ride from which you can see a lion, often placid, then tigers, behind a fence ... in short, you can dispense with it if you make the visit without children.

A minibus shuttles every 30 minutes between the different sites and the park entrance.