Our Many Moons of Honey: Nepal: Chitwan National Park

Our next stop on our tour of Nepal was Chitwan National Park, which is a World Heritage Listed Park reserve that protects over 932 sq km of sal forest, water marshes and grassland. The park boasts 50 different species of mammals including rhinos, royal Bengali tigers, deer, monkeys, wild elephants, leopards, sloth bears and wild boars, as well as 500 different species of birds and butterflies. The one-horned rhinoceros is the most famous animal in Chitwan and one that you are likely to see. The tiger, on the other hand, is a rare sight as there are only 100 or so in Chitwan and they are nocturnal animals.

Before we get into the details of our jungle adventure we must tell you a bit about our bus ride to the park and the bus system in Nepal in general. The only way to get around the country economically is by bus. Buses reach as far up the mountains as conditions will allow and have a very interesting organization system. Though they aren’t the newest and at times not the most comfortable for tall people, they sure are efficient and an adventure! All the buses (and trucks) are made by Tata, an Indian conglomerate, and we’d say 98% of them are pimped out with designs and murals on the outside and sometimes inside by the cabin. Pretty funky to look at. The insides vary in states of disrepair, with the local buses having the most wear and tear, but they still get you to your destination. We can see why they would be in those conditions due to the state of Nepali roads: either lots of dust and dirt or lots and lots of rocks. Let us tell you a bit about how the buses works. There is always a young boy working the door of the bus. The boy has many jobs from taking all the payments to helping the driver navigate the roads and traffic to soliciting passengers. So what this young boy does is he hangs out the bus door as the bus drives along and yells to the people on the side of the road the buses destination. If someone indicates they want to get on, he bangs once on the side of the bus and the driver stops. Once that person is on (and the luggage has been thrown on the roof) the boys whistles or bangs twice on the side of the bus and the driver takes off and the boy collects the money. This continues throughout the journey. Likewise when someone wants to get off, the boy bangs once to stop the bus, grabs the luggage off the roof, hits the bus twice or whistles to start it up again and then runs to get back on the bus. The boy also removes obstacles from the road and is the driver’s left side mirror when navigating through heavy traffic or narrow streets - he bangs in successive double taps to let the driver know that he has space to pass. Note that all of running, climbing and jumping on and off the bus is performed in flip flops J .

Now a little about the ride itself. Besides being highly entertaining and at times scary (overtaking trucks on blind corners on the side of the mountains in single lane roads) the bus is made for much much shorter people and the windows and doors rarely stay shut. On our ride to Chitwan, every five minutes M would shut the window in front of us leading to the cabin and the window next to us as it was quite cold and we wanted to keep the dust out. It was so dusty that the trees and bushes lining the road were grey rather than green (see picture here: sad grey trees ) and shockingly, villages were drying their laundry along the side of the road. The windows weren’t the only thing sliding open throughout the ride. As we bumped along, the door latch would slowly start to turn and eventually the door would swing completely open. We would ride with the door open (and S&M giggling) until the boy would notice and latch it again. Simply priceless.

water buffalo in the fields of Sauraha

So we finally arrived to Sauraha which is a small village in the parks buffer zone. The first thing that is noticeable as you step off the bus is the clean fresh air and peacefulness of the place. Coming from Kathmandu which was very noisy and polluted this was a welcome change. The area of the village is surrounded by yellow flower fields and native mud huts (houses of the Tharo people). There are elephants and water buffalos everywhere. The first thing we did upon arriving at our hotel was take a long overdue shower. Due to the water shortages and consistent power outages that are more than common in Nepal’s winter months we were unable to shower for the last four days we were in the Kathmandu Valley (note: two of the four days were spent hiking the Himalayas). Yup we are your typical North American prima donnas J .

We spent a total of 3 days and 2 nights at hotel Parkland in Sauraha. They had our whole itinerary planned out for us from the time we woke up to the time we went to bed. This was probably our least favorite part as we both like to explore and do things on our own time … but when in Rome (or in this case Chitwan) do as they do (or say!). Our action packed days included a few nature hikes through the jungle, a beautiful sunset buy the river, a canoe ride down the river (this is where we got our first look at the crocodiles that are quite common along the river side), a visit to the elephant breeding centre and an elephant back safari. All in all we saw and experienced a whole lot. The highlight of the visit was definitely the elephant back safari into and through thick jungle. What magnificent animals. For such a large and powerful mammals it’s amazing how gentle they can be. We both fell in love. While we are on the topic of elephants we also got to visit with a local elephant on our first night in Chitwan. We sat next to him while he was being fed “Kuchi” which are bundles of grasses filled with rice, molasses and salt, while our guide Hari told us all about the captive elephants as well as the difference between Asian and African elephants. We can’t remember them all but one of the differences is the ears with the African elephant having the big ears shaped like Africa (i.e. Dumbo) where as the Asian elephant has small ears shaped like India.

We saw so many animals that one can only see when visiting a zoo in most parts of the world. On our first day we saw two one horned rhinos grazing by the side of the river. During our forays into the jungle we saw many crocodiles, spotted deer, brown deer, monkeys, water buffalos, peacocks, many different birds including storks, wild boars and the ever dangerous wild chicken! What a great experience!!!

As always, here are a few pictures with many more HERE (password: elephant).