You come here for the Asiatic lion, looked for from a safari vehicle. The fee is per vehicle (7,600 rupees on a weekday for up to six people), so it works best for a family or group. Rules are strict: foreigners must carry their original passport, and the park is shut from 16 June to 15 October. If you're alone and counting your money, skip it.
Go in the coloured months. The black ones are best avoided.
Up to 6 per vehicle, and foreigners pay 7,600 rupees on weekdays, 9,500 on weekends and festivals, plus possible add-ons, so check the portal. Slots are 06:30 to 09:30 and 15:00 to 18:00 from 16 October to end February, then 06:00 to 09:00 and 16:00 to 19:00 from 1 March to 15 June. A 09:00 to 12:00 slot is also listed.
The cheaper choices for foreigners: 3,800 rupees per vehicle on weekdays and 4,750 on weekends and festivals. Devalia is closed on Wednesdays and Ambardi on Tuesdays.
Book two drives, an afternoon one when you arrive and a morning one the next day. Sightings are never guaranteed.
Nobody comes to Gir for dinner, and in Sasan you'll eat mostly at your hotel. The food is Kathiyawadi: hot, rustic and vegetarian-heavy, cooked for dry country. Gujarat is a dry state, so there's no alcohol.
A thick flatbread of pearl millet, eaten with white butter and chaas, or thin spiced buttermilk. The heart of a meal here.
Vegetarian
Mashed roast aubergine, spiced and eaten with rotla. Look for it on a Kathiyawadi thali.
Vegetarian
A tomato curry topped with crunchy gram flour noodles. Sharper and spicier than most Gujarati food.
Vegetarian
Rice and lentils cooked soft, then finished with spices in hot fat. A good meal after a dawn safari.
Vegetarian
Pure vegetarian Kathiyawadi cooking at a hotel restaurant.
Mid-range, vegetarianA hotel Kathiyawadi thali with sev tamatar and ringan no olo.
A treatA roadside thali with rotla, dal, rice and jaggery.
Cheap eats
Take the overnight train from Ahmedabad to Junagadh, about 7h20, or drive 7 to 9 hours. It's the hardest place in this region to reach without one or the other. Sasan has its own station. Keshod airport and Junagadh are each about 60 km away, Veraval 45 km, Diu 100 km, Rajkot 160 km and Ahmedabad 370 km.
Sasan Gir Lodges around Sasan, the village by the park, which is where you want to be for early drives. It's a long way from anywhere else.
These penalties come from the text of the Gujarat Prohibition Act as published on a legal database. For drinking without a permit, a first offence carries up to six months in prison and/or a fine of up to 1,000 rupees, with a minimum of three months and 500 rupees unless the court records special reasons. A second or later offence carries six months to two years and a fine of up to 2,000 rupees. For buying, possessing or transporting liquor without a permit, the Act as amended in 2017 allows up to ten years in prison and a fine of up to 5 lakh rupees (500,000), with a first-offence minimum of two years and 1 lakh rupees (100,000) unless special reasons are recorded. Causing a nuisance while drunk in a public place carries one to three years plus a fine. Police have raided private venues too: in July 2025 they arrested 39 people at a resort near Sanand for allegedly drinking. We found no case involving a foreign tourist. This wording is from one legal database and has not been checked against an official copy.
Sources differ on this, or we have only one, so check locally.
Book on girlion.gujarat.gov.in, open 3 months ahead, with no tatkal (last-minute) quota. One permit covers 6 adults and 1 child, and foreigners without an original passport are refused entry.
Gir Jungle and Girnar safaris close 16 June to 15 October every year, and Girnar also for Parikrama (a pilgrim walk) and Mahashivratri (a Hindu festival). Devalia shuts Wednesdays, Ambardi Tuesdays.
Gujarat is a dry state: alcohol is banned. Section 46A of the Gujarat Prohibition Act, 1949 lets an authorised officer grant a tourist's permit to a non-citizen who is visiting temporarily, to consume, use and buy foreign liquor, and the permit can never be granted for more than one month. Without a permit, drinking or holding alcohol is a criminal offence and can mean prison. If you want a drink, get the permit first, buy only from licensed outlets (the state publishes a list, mostly hotels and resorts in cities such as Ahmedabad), and drink only in private, never in public. Do not expect bars. Never buy bootleg liquor. We could not confirm which online permit portal works today, so ask your hotel about the permit when you book and allow extra time on arrival.
Don't touch alcohol without a tourist's permit, valid at most one month, around Gir or elsewhere in Gujarat: it's a criminal offence. Use licensed outlets, drink in private, never buy bootleg liquor.
The only report we found of how a foreign visitor actually got the permit is from March 2016. The traveller needed a passport, a visa or entry stamp and a hotel document proving a Gujarat stay. One hotel refused despite an online permit, and an in-person application at a licensed hotel liquor shop in Ahmedabad worked. That is old, so ask your hotel before you arrive. The state's Prohibition and Excise Department is at Nashabandi Bhavan, Sector 10B, Gandhinagar (email pne-gnr@gujarat.gov.in).
Sources differ on this, or we have only one, so check locally.
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