Be Vewy Vewy Quiet, We're Hunting Whinos

Sauraha, Nepal

Well, it turns out that if everyone was jumping off a cliff, we'd do it too. At the time of booking, a walking safari didn't seem so crazy... But as we got off the dugout canoe and crossed into the Chitwan National Park as the first visitors of the day, I started to panic. Looking for rhinos and tigers on foot suddenly did not seem like a smart idea. The next ten minutes were some of the longest of my life. When some wild elephants roared nearby I almost ran. But our two guides were steady, and they were "armed" with sticks. So onwards we walked into the foggy jungle which made the whole scene even scarier. It got scarier still when we got into the foggy open grasslands and there were no more trees that could potentially provide refuge. Out in the open, I stayed as close as I could to the guide.


As we walked down the path we sporadically startled deer ( four types in the park, we saw two types), peacocks, and wild chickens. Out in the grasslands, we repeatedly saw rhino tracks and fresh dung and even tiger footprints. While walking along a river trying to catch sight of animals at the watering hole we heard a rustling and a grunt on the other side of the river. With the elephant grass so high, we couldn't see the animal, but our guides told us it was a bear sloth. We were beginning to think the rhinos had gotten the better of us, when we rounded a tuft of elephant grass... And walked up to a rhino only 30 feet away. Wow! The initial shock gave way to the understanding that rhinos are not usually aggressive and are pretty much just armored cows.


We finished the walking safari with few other sightings, and rounded out the day with a jeep safari. This was decidedly less exciting, but we did see "mugger" crocodiles, monkeys, and some more deer. We also went to a gharial (crocodile) breeding center. Oh, and there was a partial solar eclipse to boot.



The highlight of today was the third type of safari, an elephant safari. We clambered onto the top of a waiting elephant which we shared with a young German couple. The ride was not very smooth, but from our vantage point we could survey the whole jungle and approach wildlife without startling it. This was especially surprising to us because we had never seen a deer that was not running away, but the elephants were of no bother to them. At one point there were five elephants surrounding a rhino mom and baby and they didn't even flinch.


After the three safaris with four separate rhino sightings, we feel we are ready to head back north to Kathmandu for some more sightseeing and maybe some biking too.