December 3

This morning, I was already up when the wake-up knock came at 6:05. I had decided during the night that I wanted another elephant ride, and I needed to buy a ticket. I went to the Hotel Association building, as I was instructed yesterday. Nothing there suggests that this is a place to sign up for elephant rides. In fact, nobody was there at 6:20, but a man outside asked if I was looking for an elephant ride, and he told me to go directly to the park headquarters. At the park entrance, some Nepalis were waiting under a shelter. They told me this is the elephant queue, and I should wait here for the ticket office to open. It was supposed to open at 6:00, but recently it has been dark at this hour, so they have been opening late.

More Nepalis gradually arrived to buy tickets for guests at their hotels. I was the only tourist here. They were curious how I found out about the elephant queue. I explained that my hotel had their own elephants, and didn't like their guests to use the government elephants. They told me that this was bad for the government, and that the lodges were only interested in people's money and didn't give as good a ride, and that I was less likely to see wildlife outside the park. I was told that I should have signed up at the Hotel Association yesterday, but that it would probably be all right, because it was not peak season.

I was also told that I would need my park entrance permit to buy a ticket. An entrance permit costs 650 Rs and is valid for two days. I didn't have mine, since the guide carried the permits yesterday on our jungle walk. A man wrote my name and nationality on his hand to give to the ticket office, and told me to hurry back to the hotel and get my permit. I ran back, slowing only to pass the large pack of dogs which had assembled by the river, some of which looked angry. Breakfast was now being served, but I told them I didn't have time for it today, and went behind the dining room to search for my guide. I found him and retrieved my ticket, which had the name `Mr. Scott' on it. Nepalis don't seem very interested in last names, possibly since theirs are all the same.

When I returned to the park headquarters, the ticket office had already opened and the queue was gone. The man had given my name to the office, and they said there would be no problem since I already had an entrance pass. I showed it and paid 650 Rs, and got a ticket for the morning elephant ride at 8:00. It was now 7:15, so I went to the closest restaurant, the Annapurna II at the Tiger Camp Lodge, which was just outside the park entrance, overlooking the river. The Japanese man and French couple from my hotel passed with their guide on their way to the bird walk as I sat there. I had the special breakfast, which included scrambled eggs, toast, and fried potato with onion, and then went to the elephant boarding platform to wait. A park army guard came by and told me that the elephants probably wouldn't come until 8:30, and I should wait. No one else was here yet. The guard was very friendly, and we talked for a while.

Shortly, the other people arrived, and the elephants came. There were five big ones and a smaller one, which would have only a single passenger. The big elephants each had a platform like the ones we rode yesterday, and carried four people. I went with three Japanese engineers who were working in Nepal for six months. The government elephant platforms had pillows to sit on, and were more comfortable than yesterday's. In the past, the government elephants didn't have platforms, and my guide books were out of date on this, so I had expected that we would have to ride directly on the back, as in the pictures shown in the visitor's center.

We crossed the river into a large grassland. There we saw some deer and spotted deer. The elephants split into two groups, with ours leading the one on the left. Eventually, we trapped a rhino in the middle and closed in on it. The elephants held it as long as they could, until it escaped between two of them. Since our elephant was the first that came upon it, we had an excellent close-up view. We saw some more deer in the grass, and then entered a forest, through which we would return to the river. There, we saw more deer, including a third, dwarf species, two wild boars, and a peacock. We also came across an elephant carrying the two Belgian ladies I met at Hot Spring. We waved to each other. After leaving the forest, we crossed the river again, and returned to the loading platform around 10 AM. I gave my small camera to a Nepali at the boarding station and asked him to take pictures of me. He took two.

I stopped on the way back to the hotel and bought a tiger T-shirt and a map, then rented a bicycle for 10 Rs an hour until lunch. I rode it through some Tharu villages in the surrounding countryside, mostly following the road taken by the elephants yesterday. Whenever I stopped, children would come up and ask for one rupee. This is the first place I had encountered much begging, but it was still only the children. I turned back when I came to a river which had to be crossed to continue. It was shallow enough to walk across, and many people did. Some women bathed in the river near the road. They removed only their tops while bathing. Only children bathed naked. There were very few vehicles, just a couple of jeeps and a few bicycles. Most people were walking. Many of them carried farming tools, especially large curved knives. I saw no other westerners here. Some people said ``bye-bye'' when they saw me. I would learn today that the brilliant yellow flowers surrounding the villages were mustard. I took pictures of the beautiful fields and villages whenever I could stop away from children. Ox carts and cattle in the road were the biggest obstacle.

I returned to the hotel for lunch at noon: chow mein with vegetable soup and banana custard. The Japanese man who never spoke had left, but the retired French couple was still here. They had visited the Elephant Breeding Center this morning to see the baby elephants, after going on the bird walk. I told them I had taken another elephant ride, inside the park. The French couple was also nearing the end of their trip to Nepal. They had already been here over a month, and had done the Annapurna Circuit trek, followed by a trip into the Sanctuary, and another trek in the Everest region where they visited both Kala Pattar and Gokyo, crossing the Cho La pass in between. They had done much more walking than I had.

After lunch, the young English man from the elephant ride yesterday and I would go on a canoe ride and jungle walk with a new guide, who I now met. This would be a special long trip, and we would pay the boatman extra for it. The English man did not yet have a park entrance permit, and we had to wait until the office opened at 2 PM to get him one. The canoe ride started out down the Rapti River as yesterday, and we saw a lot of birds, including kingfishers, ducks, a kind of eagle, and egrets. Then, the other tourists in the canoe got out where we stopped yesterday, and we continued further down the river to a part of the park seen by few tourists.

Rare gharial crocodile

Here, we encountered several crocodiles: two marsh muggers and a gharial. The marsh muggers are dangerous, and can even attack boats that go too close. Gharials are an endangered species that eat only fish, but could bite if provoked. Our guide once grabbed one by the tail without harm. We were lucky to see one, since they are very rare. We did not approach too closely, since the guide said that if we scared it, it would not come back here again, and he wanted to be able to show it to other people.

As we left the canoe, we saw fresh tracks, and the guide asked if we could guess what they were. They looked almost like human footprints, combined with prints someone would make while walking on his knuckles. The guide said they were fresh sloth bear prints. We followed them to try to find one. Our guide carried a large stick to fight the bear if it attacked. We were instructed to stand behind him, and not to run, if this happened. We also picked up sticks for extra protection. The English man was instructed to put on his sweater, since he was wearing a white T-shirt, and white makes sloth bears angry. The guide said they are not used to seeing white in the wilderness, except on the belly of another sloth bear ready to attack.

Soon we saw rhino and baby rhino tracks and followed them to the edge of a grassland. There, we could hear rhinos in the grass, and see motion in the grass, but could not see the rhinos. We were instructed to be very quiet when rhinos were near, and to stand still, since they have poor eyesight, and to be safe, will attack anything that moves or makes a noise. If one approaches, we were to climb a tree. The guide climbed a tree to take a look, but said it was too dangerous to try to get closer to this one, since it could have a baby. We quietly moved on.

Soon we heard a loud noise behind a nearby clump of brush, and our guide raised his stick, prepared for a sloth bear. It was only a peacock taking off, with great noise. The guide said he had to fight a sloth bear once while guiding some Germans. A short distance beyond, we heard two rhinos at close range. The guide actually saw the leg of one a few feet away in the grass, and we ran fast in the opposite direction to a tree, which we quickly climbed. We stayed in the tree for several minutes, very quiet, while the guide surveyed the surroundings and listened. We did not see any rhinos, but could see where they were moving through the twenty foot high grass. The guide could hear a rhino sleeping near the tree, so we had to climb down very quietly to leave the area without waking it, or attracting the attention of the other rhinos which were still nearby.

We left the grass and entered the forest. A rhino was heard approaching on the same trail in the opposite direction, so we made a detour and climbed a tree until it passed. We never saw it, but we saw its tracks. We also saw numerous deer and brown rhesus monkeys, the kind seen at temples in Kathmandu. We also saw a black-faced lemur, another kind of monkey that we had seen near Chhomrong in the Annapurnas. Several trees had claw marks from sloth bears. They climb to get honey from bee hives in the trees. We watched and listened as at least two rhinos moved through the grass near the edge of the forest.

We returned to the river along the jeep road we followed back yesterday, but today the walk was longer. We saw more deer and some wild chickens, which our guide says are very tough and not good to eat. We had to climb a tree again when our guide heard a rhino making a noise they make when scared. We saw only motion in the trees. As the sun set at 5:15, we were the last people walking in the jungle. The guide said tigers would be waking and moving about now, but seeing one is rare. He said that if one is confronted, you should back off slowly, and not run. We reached the river at dusk, removed our shoes, and waded out to get the canoe ferry. The guide liked my convertible pants. He said to squat in the seatless canoe like on a Nepali toilet, but I kneeled this time, and was more comfortable. Our guide suggested to walk back without shoes instead of waiting there to dry our feet, and we did this along the sandy river bank, until we came to the gravelly road.

We got back to the hotel at 6:00, just in time for dinner. People were already seated in the dining room. We had the same Nepali buffet as the night we arrived. Meals alternate in two day cycles here, since that is as long as most people stay. The guide said we climbed trees very well. He did not like to take women on the more adventurous jungle walks, like we just did, because they must be pushed up trees. He said he would sometimes be pushing women up trees while a rhino was charging, and had some close calls. When I mentioned my government elephant ride this morning, he told me I had been lucky to see rhinos, since those rides leave too late for the best wildlife viewing. The guide said he would take the English man and me to the Elephant Breeding Center in the morning before we left, if we paid for his bicycle rental.

After dinner, the hotel manager entertained us with card tricks and some sleight of hand. He is one of the few chubby Nepalis I've seen. Then I went downtown and ate a slice of papaya pie, and returned to go to bed. Our guide sleeps in his village. He said he didn't like the bright flourescent lights in the hotel courtyard, which stay on every night until 10 PM.

Copyright Scott A. Yost, 1994. All rights reserved.