That captures our journey to Chitwan National Reserve in Nepal.
We flew from Kathmandu to Bharatapur--waiting four hours because of bad weather. We had been offered a six hour car ride, and in retrospect that would have been the good choice. Nonetheless we finally boarded and took the 1/2 hour flight and landed at a small airstrip. From there we were met by Temple Tiger and driven by chaotic Nepali highway. Already our position as priviledged westerners was obvious--the two of rode in an nearly empty van, with resort employees outnumbering us, as we passed buses jammed to the roofs with Nepalis. After roughly one hour
we turned off and drove past fields and farmers, until we reached the Narayani river, which we crossed by boat.
On the far side of the river, now in the Chitwan National Reserve, we went by jeep through grassland and muddy track, through sal hardwood forest, to reach the Temple Tiger site.
The amenities at Temple Tiger are spartan, but that satisfied us. We did have power and hot water--for 3 hours in the morning and 3 hours in the evening--and a hot fire and all the tea (chiyaa in Nepali) we could drink.
Despite being in the lowlands, it was cold and misty. At night our hut was heated by kerosene heater and while we were at dinner--mitho khaana, or tasty food, by the way--the hot water bottle fairies visited our beds making them cozy and warm.
One of the attractions of Chitwan is elephant riding. In our short visit we had 4 wonderful elephant rides. Elephants are a combination horse and bulldozer, able to push through high grass and dense forest. Furthermore rhinos and tigers will not charge an elephant, making us safe.
The elephants were endlessly fascinating to watch. They must eat hundreds of pounds of food per day, mostly grass, but as we were out on safari the elephants were constantly grabbing snacks as they walked.
I don't know if it is a good life for the elephant. (I also wonder if "elephant driver," or panjit, is a good job. Probably is, but insurance is hell to get.) Elephants are not domesticated like dogs and cattles; these are wild elephants, tamed, but that is not the same. On the other hand, it is very hard to make an elephant do something it really does not want to do. One should also note that overall things have improved in Chitwan; a century ago important visitors were slaughtering tigers by the score.
On a side note, perhaps the best meditation on what the elephant's life must be like is Carol Emshwiller's marvelous SF novel The Mount.
We saw a lot of wildlife: monkeys (2 kinds), deer (4 kinds, including the fetching "barking deer," the world's smallest and cutest deer), wild boar, more birds than we could count although Donna tried with a bird book, and rhinos.
Rhinos seems less scared of us than annoyed to have their peace and quiet disturbed. They have poor eyesight and squint at the papparazzi, trying to see who is bothering them now.
There are only a little more than 100 tigers left in Chitwan. They feed mostly on deer and wild boar. Going on a walk through the forest with our excellent naturalist--who gave us careful instructions on how to deal with angry rhinos, sloth-bears, and tigers--we did find evidence of tigers
a pawprint. On our second full day in Chitwan, while out in the forest with a naturalist, we heard a monkey giving a predator warning. "Must be a tiger or a leopard," said our guide, who carefully steered us away (not being on elephant back made us vulnerable). Humans, it seems, do not earn a warning from monkeys; they consider us weird, not threatening. I do not know if they underestimate us or have us pegged.
I don't have time to go through all the adventures we had, floating on the river and inspecting termite mounds. We had a wonderful time which we will long remember. We were away only 2 1/2 days from Kathmandu and yet it seems a week.
We have been in Nepal barely 9 days and it seems a month.
Tomorrow we go to Pokhara, where we hope for better views of the Himalayas.
