Snow Leopard Watching Holidays

Only in the past decade has it been possible to visit snow leopard habitat with a meaningful chance of seeing them in the wild. Seeing a wild snow leopard inevitably means staying in remote locations, spending long hours in the field and working with the best local trackers. In Ladakh, in the far north of India, our tours are based in a warm, comfortable homestay, which has recently been established to support snow leopard conservation in the community of Ulley. From here we travel to surrounding valleys in the comfort of vehicles, responding to sightings made by our expert trackers. With the discomfort of camping and strenuous walks at high altitude eliminated, this is by far the easiest way to watch snow leopards in Ladakh in India.

We now also offer cutting edge tours to watch snow leopards in Mongolia. Based in comfortable ger camps, rented from local communities, we likewise work with local snow leopard conservationists here. As in Ladakh, we spend long hours in the field, scanning rocky mountainsides. However, here too, most cats are found for us by our expert local trackers, and we are driven as close as possible to them in our vehicles. In both countries, snow leopard sightings are often over long distances, as the cats are both wary and highly sensitive to disturbance. Our snow leopard tours in Mongolia have the advantage of taking place at quite low altitude, at the end of the warm summer, and of visiting an excellent site for Pallas’s cat too.

Snow leopards in India

The snow leopard occurs at low density over a vast range in the mountains of 12 countries in Asia. It is a supreme mountain hunter, its camouflage allowing it to creep hundreds of metres across dusty grey rock and scree before dropping from above onto its prey. Across their range, snow leopards specialise in different prey. In Ladakh, where we have run highly successful tours for several years, their chief prey is the blue sheep, though they may also take Asiatic ibex, argali, woolly hare and Himalayan marmot. In winter, with marmots hibernating, these snow leopards follow the blue sheep downhill to 3,500-4,000 metres, which is the altitude at which we look for them. Late winter is also their mating season, making them easier to observe on either our Snow Leopard Photography trip or our Snow Leopard Watching trip in Ladakh. 

A trip to see Ladakh's snow leopards can also be combined with other spectacular wildlife locations in India. Search for snow leopard, Asiatic lion, leopard and tiger as part of our India's Big Cats tour, or there is our India's Tigers, Snow Leopard & Red Pandas trip focusing on these iconic Indian mammals. We can also tailor a wildlife trip to India to suit your exact requirements.

Snow leopards in Mongolia

In the Gobi-Altai mountains of western Mongolia, snow leopards occur at much lower altitude than in Ladakh. Even in summer, when we visit as part of our Cats of Mountain & Steppe tour, we are able to stay at little above 1,000 metres and travel daily into surrounding mountains in search of the cats. Here the snow leopard preys largely on Asiatic ibex and, in summer, on tarbagan marmots, though argali, tolai hares and Pallas’s pikas are all taken too.

As each mountain range here is relatively isolated, young snow leopards may be forced to cross rocky steppe, more typically the domain of the wolf, to reach new territory and find a mate. Both in Ladakh and in Mongolia, we work directly with local snow leopard conservationists, helping to ensure the future of these majestic cats in the wild mountains of Asia.