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3 Days in Chitwan National Park

(Well more like 36 hours at Chitwan and a lot of intra-Nepal bus travel)

One of the done things in Nepal, besides trekking, rafting and bungy jumping, is to spend a bit of time on safari at Chitwan National Park in the Terai (southern Nepal near the Indian border).

As you may know I absolutely LOVED South Africa, especially the safaris there, so I was excited at the possibility of adding 'tiger' to the animals spotted on my travels this year. But given other travellers' comments I also entered with low expectations...and with good reason.

The travel agent in Kathmandu caught me in one of my 'can't someone else just deal with the logistics' moments so I bought a 3 day 2 night package, which included transport, all activities at Chitwan, food, and accommodation at Hotel Wildlife Camp. The agent assured me that this was one of the nicer places to stay in Chitwan, which the LP corroborated, and that there would be other travellers to meet up with on the safaris, so I signed up and was on my way and (finally, some might say) out of Thamel.

Arriving after a 7 hour bus ride I was first invited to a barely edible buffet lunch of Chinese food (why?? stick with what you know, people!!), which I ate in the communal dining room in the vicinity of a group of 15 Chinese people and 6 middle aged Germans. To add to my isolation I tried to join the Germans and the wait staff told me I was to eat by myself at the next table instead. Right.

Then I was informed of the program, which was to start with a 'cultural tour', followed by a trip to the elephant stables, dinner, and a culture program. Wait a second, I was told I'd get 3 activities and there's no way I'm doing some cultural tour instead of the elephant and safari related stuff!

The gentleman calmed me down and informed me that in fact all of the things on offer were included in the package so I wouldn't be missing out on anything. Ok, ok, let's do this cultural tour.

Now, of course, "cultural tours" per se are rarely ever informative or worth the effort and this one was no exception. I saw a few chickens, a homemade basket, the interior of someone's house (awkward!) and a really...really...really bad museum that amounted to about 8 plastic mannequins in various, er, cultural poses.

After dinner (more Chinese food! ARGH!) was the cultural program which was somewhat more promising in that the local peoples do some kind of stick dance which is meant to be entertaining. It was, as was the traditional man-dresses-in-drag dance (safe to say that kid was not happy about drawing the short straw that night). But more entertaining was the young Nepali MC who had clearly had his English lessons from the David Attenborough School of Elocution and I think harboured a secret desire to be a cricket commentator one day.

Day 2 - up early for a canoe and 'jungle walk' with the Germans. The canoe actually involved no effort on our part it was more like a leisurely float down the river with a man pushing a rickety boat with a wooden pole from behind. I have no doubt the vessel was seaworthy enough to ward off the several aggressive crocodiles we saw during our 45 minute cruise...

When we were dropped off to commence our walk back into town we had seen one of the 'very aggressive' kinds of crocs nearby and walked to the ledge overlooking the bank to get a closer view. It was at this point that I mentioned to my fellow safari companions that I wasn't worried, as crocs always go for the Germans in Australia so I was well protected...Not sure they found that funny. (but it's true!)

The so-called "jungle walk"was a 90 minute stroll through tall grass and thick, well, jungle in a hope to see a tiger or rhino. Evidently 'sloth bears' (not be confused with drop bears) are also to be found in the jungle and are among the area's most aggressive animal. The 7 of us had 2 Nepali guides with us and were told what to do in the event that we come upon one of the animals - I joked that, having just finished 'Life of Pi' I was well informed on tiger taming and would have no problem, just give me a whistle and make sure it was seasick.

Then I realised that these rangers only have sticks. In Africa they had guns. Guns = much more effective in tiger aggression management. Not to worry, naturally our wildlife spotting amounted to 4 monkeys, a peacock in the distance and 1800 cotton bugs. And I hate monkeys.

Next up - my favourite - Elephant Bathtime! I'm not sure if this serves any actual function but it's fantastic fun. We jump aboard and the mahouts (elephant minders) stand on the elephant's back commanding them to spray us tourists with water.

*commence travel w***er voice*

You simply haven't lived till you've had an elephant's trunk full of water blast your face on a steamy tropical day!

*end travel w***er voice*

It was a definite highlight, though I think I would have preferred not being the center of attention in my bathers (and object of Chinese tourists' cameras - they just can't resist an opportunity to photograph visible white flesh and the second I got on the elephant's back I felt 45 Nikon 300mm lenses zoom onto me.)

The afternoon activity was the big one - a 2 hour elephant safari, which is even less comfortable than it sounds. Back with the Germans we were crammed into a seat constructed out of 2x4s - 4 people per elephant plus the mahout and the poor animal lumbered through the jungle in search of the elusive one-horned Indian rhino and, just maybe a tiger.

No tigers.

5 rhino, a peacock, and 2 deer, but no tigers.

Last up, the next morning we went to the elephant breeding centre prior to heading to Pokhara. This place seemed to be doing a semi-decent job at managing and reasearching elephants, though it wasn't nice to hear about their training techniques the elephants are used to patrol for poachers and other illegal activity in the national park. Plus! Baby elephants! There was a set of 8 month old twins (quite rare, we're told) who were wandering around and taking dust baths, plus a 4 month old that decided to give us a show by wrestling with an older cousin.

I haven't gone quite as overboard on the elephant photos as the panda ones but...yeah OK there are a few.

So all up - glad I went, worth the 2 day diversion, elephant bathtime was awesome...but let's just say Chitwan is no Kruger!