Rhino Spotting in Chitwan National Park

We left Kathmandu on April 2 to head for Chitwan National Park in the hopes of spotting some one-horned rhinos, crocodiles, and perhaps, if we were very lucky - tigers. As we approached the park on the bus, we found it interesting that on many of the signs the word "Royal" (as in Royal Chitwan National Park) had been scratched out or painted over. The King relinquished his power in April 2006, a year after he had dismissed the entire government and seized full executive powers. In speaking with the local people, there seems to be a cautious optimism about the cease fire, the provisional government that is now in place, which includes Maoist Ministers, and the upcoming elections to be held in July(ish). Very few people remain loyal to the King. It has been so unstable for so long in Nepal, we just hope the people here finally have some peace.

As always when we arrive in a new place, we were bombarded by touts as we got off the bus. Edwin managed to choose one fellow to go with, and negotiated a great deal for 2 days of sightseeing around the park. On our first evening, we went to the Elephant Breeding Centre, which breeds elephants in captivity to work in the park, either with the tourists, or to patrol the perimeters of the park, on the lookout for poachers. The baby elephants are cute, but it's kind of sad seeing that most of the elephants are chained to posts and don't have too much room to move. We took in a local cultural performance that night which was great - local drummers and dancers performed traditional stick dances.

Our second day began very early in the morning with a 4-hour jungle walk with our guide Ram. We spotted 2 big crocodiles, a couple of deer, birds and monkeys, but no rhinos on our walk winding through the jungle and grasslands. Later that afternoon, along with two Nepali tourists we boarded the howdah perched on the top of our elephant for our "elephant safari". The mahout (driver) knew exactly where to go, and at one watering hole, we saw a pair of rhinos bathing, and at a second watering hole, there was a family of five.

We left Chitwan the following day, bound for India. Our journey to Varanasi involved 4 buses to get to the border, and one to reach Varanasi. As most tourists were heading north to the cool of Nepal, we knew we were heading for the very hot lowlands of India.

Location: McLeod Ganj, India