18th Apr
After one and a half days rest after Everest I am on the move again. This time I am off to Chitwan which is a national park. This will take us about 5 to 6 hours drive in an old mini bus with no air conditioning, very hard seats and not much room. The roads out of Kathmandu are mad. The scenery once again is breathtaking and also a bit frightening. Kathmandu is a lot higher than Chitwan which means we have to make it to the bottom of the valley in one piece. The road is narrow, very busy and dusty. I think there must have been a competition on that day as to how many people they could cram into and onto the bus without losing too many. Eventually we make it to Chitwan. Our program for the next 3 days is getting up at 6am, going out on safari, having breakfast, going to the river to wash the elephants, back for lunch, afternoon nap (too hot to go out) then at 4pm our elephant ride through the park. All in all, a full three days.

On our early morning safari we sat on the roof of the jeep - this was great fun. Didn't see much wild life till we got to the river. Then we saw 2 rhinos, one on the bank and one in the river. The male made a bee-line for the female who was in the water. After a lot of thrashing about, and the female playing hard to get, they eventually get down to the business of mating. This according to our guide is most unusual to mate in the water.
Before dinner that night we are entertained by some local men doing traditional dancing and of course we all have to join in at the end. We must have looked like a load of demented women jumping around. Still it was good fun and no one knew us anyway.
Good job my kids couldn't see me as they would have thought "mother's lost the plot this time". Next day after another early start, then breakfast, it's back to Kathmandu and that road again.