Chitwan National Park

After the trekking, I was definitely in need of some R&R and a little down time, what better place than the jungles of Nepal surrounded by deadly tigers and angry rhinos. As part of the package deal with our trekking company, we booked a three day stay at a "resort" (it is called a resort but it was not very luxurious) located on an island in the middle of this National Park. I am going to skip the getting there part and just get right into the resort itself because having just typed that last blog I am getting a little bit tired of typing. Sorry. To get to the resort we had to take a canoe across a river onto this small island that was owned entirely by our resort. There were somewhere around thirty other guests there at the same time, and everyone was divided into groups based on your arrival date. As soon as we arrived, we were given our rooms and told that we would be going on an elephant safari in an hour. Sweet. This was the first time I had ever gotten to ride an elephant, and lets just say that it is a strange experience. Just the motion of the beast lumbering through the jungle was very funny to me. Elephants are truly ancient beasts. The handler road on the elephants neck and head, while myself, Dave, and one other guy road on a wooden box that was attached to the elephants back. The only thing that annoyed me about the ride was the treatment of the elephant by the handler. The guy was constantly beating the elephant over the head with a metal hook or bamboo stick with such force that it made us cringe. But, it is what it is and we could not stop him. The safari itself lasted a few hours and took us through a few areas that they thought would contain various wild animals. We ended up seeing a few monkeys, peacocks, and deer, but the coolest thing was the sighting of a rhino in a watering hole. We were able to get very close to this crazy looking animal, which was like nothing I imagined. The armor and body structure of the thing was incredible. The rhino seemed almost indifferent to us on our elephants and allowed us to get quite close. Slowly though, he got up from his bathing and lumbered through the tall grass with us on its heels. After the trip was over, I tipped the handler a few rupees and he let us play around with the elephant for a bit. The strangest thing was when I mounted the head of the elephant. The way to do this is by grabbing its massive ears and letting the beast lift you up by his trunk (the trunk is incredibly strong). The head is covered in these long, coarse hairs that are very strange to the touch. The next day we woke very early and were taken out in a jeep far into the jungle in hopes of seeing a tiger. This trip was largely a bust and we only saw deer, monkeys, and peacock again. That afternoon we took a walk through the jungle on foot and were fortunate to see a crocodile which was very cool. Besides that, the walk was largely a bust, just like the morning's jeep ride. My favorite part of the whole experience occurred that afternoon. After the morning's activities, the elephants were brought down to the river to bath. We were able to get in to the water with the animals which was amazing. They had commands to do things such as what Dave and I referred to as "the mechanical bull", where you held on to the elephants ears for dear life while it tried to throw you off, and getting showers from the elephants trunk. Finally, that night we went on a birdwatching adventure. Dave is in to birdwatching, but I on the other hand had no real desire to crane my neck upward for the next two hours of my life, so after jut thirty minutes I high-tailed it back to the resort and had a beer and watched the sunset. The next morning we only had time to do one activity before we departed back to Kathmandu, so we elected to go back out to the watering hole that we had seen the rhino the first day on the elephant, this time on foot. This was a good call because we saw the animal again, but because we were on foot, the guide would not let us get very close. Overall, the experience in Chitwan was relaxing and a nice way to wind down from trekking. Riding elephants was a trip, as was was seeing a rhino up close and personal. Now I am back in Kathmandu for the next two days, and then off to Cairo on the 26th. I am starting to get a little tired of all things Nepal, so I am ready to get out of here. I am going to post up pics on facebook most likely tomorrow, so check them out there.