My walk with Lions at the Casela Nature & Leisure Park, Mauritius deserves mention in this separate blog. It was indeed the cherry on the cake in our Mauritius trip.

The Walk is conducted by Safari Adventures, an experienced team who have more than 3 generations of experience in handling and training lions. A five minute safari bus ride took us to the big cat area. We saw a variety of animals and birds like the deer, pink pigeons and zebras on our way. The Company offers three kinds of walks- the Lion Walk, Cheetah Encounter and Lion Encounter. We had opted for the first one and it’s recommended to book the walk in advance as we did, though for the latter two encounters no prior booking is mandatory.

After a briefing from the guide, (who earlier managed a game reserve in Zimbabwe), about the lions and the area of the walk, we started our dream-walk with the lions in a group of 8 people. We walked with a male and female named Kimba and Kiara. The guide lets you take turns to walk alongside the lions. Though they appear to strolling leisurely, the strides of the lions were much longer than ours and we had to literally jog to keep pace with them. We were allowed to touch the lions, strike a pose with them, and rest our hands on their backs. The guides are watchful and instructed us when to take our hands off the lions, if they thought it unsafe.

Throughout the walk, I kept pinching myself to confirm if the whole experience was real. It’s only the wild and ferocious aspect of the lions that we all are familiar with and here we were posing and stroking the beasts. After the initial fear when the lions first came out, the rest of the walk was enjoyable and gave us a feeling of having accomplished something. The lions seemed pretty casual about the human interaction and a chat with the guide confirmed that they were hand reared.

After the lion walk we visited the restaurant in the park with a sea view and an enclosure for giant turtles. There are also peacocks and a few other pretty wild birds that we fed bread crumbs.

It was an once-in-a-lifetime experience truly out of the world

Tips:

• Book your walk in advance

• Apply loads of sun screen; carry your sun glasses/hat

• Carry your camera

• Wear sports shoes because it’s a walk over rough terrain.

• Don’t miss this adventure on your Mauritius trip