So anyway, after a long 7 hour bus ride we arrive in Chitwan and are rushed out of the bus and onto a jungle safari type open jeep thing- It was incredible! We all totally felt like we were transported into a scene from Jurassic Park with the obvious giant T-rex chasing after us. Luckily for us, we only saw beautiful jungle scenery as we made it to our living quarters today- The Jungle Lagoon. As we exit our vehicle, we see a sight that we have waited so long for--our first elephant viewing. Passing our jeep was a huge Asian elephant that had it's face intricately painted and was carrying a man guiding it. We all boasted with excitement, especially since we would be riding on of them! The Jungle Lagoon was pretty cool considering the cheap price we spent for it. I don't know why but I really didn't correlate the fact that the jungle is bound to have huge spiders and insects and I forgot that I had an incredible fear of all things bugs. When we first entered our room, we were greeted with many many big spiders all over the wall. My friends being braver than I was, played the part of hero and quickly got rid of them but I knew there were more to come considering the bathroom window was literally exposed- I wouldn't even call it a window but more like a big hole. But I shouldn't be complaining since my other friends situation was much worse than my own. She had entered her room then the bathroom to find a n enormous jumping spider that jumped at her. When she told me, I completely froze and fear ran through my body. The hotel owners reassured us that these were not poisonous spiders but we were cautiously reluctant to take that to the heart. We had the hotel staff go in and try to kill it and, while doing so, a huge huge hissing cockroach stormed out. My jaw dropped; like it wasn't your typical house cockroach...this thing was a monolith. Apparently, they got it out but my friend discovered it again in the same room and decided enough was enough and moved into my room. My room had spiders but not at all the size that she discovered. Fortunately for us, there were mosquito nets above every bed which not only secured us from mosquitos but from other critters as well.
So enough about the bugs let's move onto the heat and get all the negative aspects of the trip out of the way so I can focus on the more positive uplifting ones. We didn't feel the heat as much the first day because it had been raining off and on and that subsequently suppressed the heat but we definitely felt it the remainder of the trip. Obviously, there was no AC and the only source of cool air was to be found in the fans but because of frequent power outages, that became a luxury. I can just recall this one time when my friends and I were sitting and talking and everyone was sweating so much including myself. There just seemed to be no relief and it made sleeping a pain in the ass. Have you ever tried sleeping in your own sweat ? Make that like 5 times worse and that's what it's like. Not to mention also that due to a lack of bed supply I was with another person and we were squished under a mosquito net--not the most comfortable experience. Showers would sometime seem like a complete waste of time considering the fact that we will be just as sweaty again once we get out of the shower.
Okay, now let's stray away from all these downsides and move to the positives- Yay! Ok soour first little excursion outside the hotel premises was this stunning riverside that looked along the river and the surrounding valley. At that time, it was nearing sunset so it made an even more beautiful view. According to one of the staff members, though, a week or so ago a man was recently eaten alive bya crocodile while he was fishing at night! Granted, he was waist deep in crocodile infested waters and it was dark, I was still a bit afraid to know I would be taking a canoe ride among these waters. But besides the fact, the view was stunning and we observed family's on their fishing boats pass. The boats were very traditional looking, long and wooden with a person steering standing up near the end with a long rod- definitely a site I've never seen before. It's clear with this river, though, that it's a major source of income and worth the risk of being mauled by a croc. I even observed men fishing waist deep despite the fact that a man just died. Then, we moved on and took a walk through the villages around Chitwan. We pass an alley way that was full of marijuana blatantly growing (keep in mind it's technically illegal in Nepal- key word: "technically"). Then I entered a neighborhood that was pretty much something from a book or a time-machine. There were mud huts everywhere with straw roofs and these were actually people's homes. They were extraordinarily small but they were holding very large families. We got the opportunity to enter an unoccupied house and the floor was pounded mud and there were cooking makeshift tools everywhere that you would mistake for something preserved hundreds of years ago but no this was the typical house of an everyday villager. It was so small and so hot- I could not at all fathom how people would live here for their entire lives--It was pretty amazing. While Kathmandu has it's share of foreign visitors, Chitwan seems to not get them as much and pretty much every house we walked by we were stared at, sometimes we were greeted by jovial children waving frantically or saying "Hello!"
So after a long night's sleep of tossing and turning and constantly waking up, I woke up to one of the most beautiful things! Right from my window beside my bed I could spot elephants literally walking right by the window- Woah! What a fantastic site to be awaken to! Definitely one of the highlights of the trip for me among many others of course! After all, it's not everyday you wake up to see elephants outside your window in the jungle. This got me so pumped because I knew that day we would be taking an elephant safari and participating in elephant bathing! First step after breakfast was the long-awaited elephant safari in which we were hoisted onto an elephant and taken through the jungle for an hours long journey. It's hard to imagine how large elephants actually are that is until your sitting on one for a long time. It was so much higher than I imagined when I first got on. There was a box like seating thing that three of us sat on and the rest of the group rode an elephant behind us. It was a much smoother ride than I originally anticipate but with a cost, like everything. Because we were riding directly through the jungle, anything in our paths we went right into--Including the dreadful spiders! Ee gads! Being in the front of the elephant, I had the gracious job of clearing way all the spider webs for everyone as I was pelted with spiders and webs--But it wasn't so bad since luckily they were a moderate size for me to handle. But, at one point I got scared of this spider that went on me kind of freaked out and dropped my water bottle. While I was a bit distraught at first, the elephant behind us kindly took his trunk and grabbed the water bottle and handed it back to me- It was definitely worth dropping my water bottle! It was so cool to watch for everyone! Apparently, elephants trunks can do just about anything and are extremely strong. We were entertained through the safari with peacocks, wild boar, deer, sounds of birds of paradise, and colorful vibrant insects that surrounded the confined forest trees. Very cool to be watching from the vantage point of on top of an elephant. It was equally as amusing to watch the elephant behind us inconspicuously eating huge branches off trees, crushing them with their trunk and slowly chewing them as they traversed through the jungle. One sort of fearful parts, however, was a moment where our elephant seemed to have stepped on something uncomfortable and let out a huge wail. We felt so bad for the elephant and wondered what they could have stepped on. After a 5 minute wait for the elephant to calm down, we continued on our path.
After our phenomenal elephant safari we were heading straight for the elephant bathing part of the trip which definitely made it's way to my list of top moments of this Chitwan trip. You basically go on one of the elephants (who is to be bathed) bareback and they bathe themselves and you. I never thought this would be legal considering falling off the elephant would be particularly painful. In fact, someone volunteering feel off while doing this and sprained their ankle but we weren't going to let that little instance set us off. My friend Hunter and I were the first to go, him going in the front and me being behind him. There was nothing to hold on so I kind of started freaking out and was frantically holding on for dear life onto my friends waist for support. It did seem, however, that I was perfectly safe not holding on since the elephants skin was very rough and was easy to sit on shockingly. Then I saw the elephant collect lake water in his trunk and wait for it wait for it.....Splash right into my face. The water was cold and just because of the whole situation, I let out a huge scream. This happened continuously and I suddenly began to feel the elephant tipping over to it's side. In my mind I'm thinking "Is this supposed to be happening?!" but the elephant kept tipping and gravity eventually gave way and me and my friend fell right into the lake. I was pleased to know, afterward, that this was supposed to happen as we started rubbing the elephant in order to bathe it? I presumed. Anyway, we were asked to get back onto the elephant and it was a bit tricky to get back onto the elephants back. In fact, my friends, who went after me, had a harder time trying to get back on the elephants back that they had to actually climb and shimmy up the elephants trunk (It made for some fantastically hilarious pictures) It was one of the coolest sensations ever to be bareback on an elephant. Compared to the secure elephant safari that we took, this was a totally separate experience and was definitely more natural, bringing us closer with these beautiful creatures.
Finally after everyone was done with their elephant bathing, we made our way home but our guides said they knew prime rhino viewing areas that they could take us to- We gladly accepted and sort of ran, because the rain was coming, to get to see the rhino. We ran about a mile into the jungle until our guides stopped us and told us to be quiet and look out into the distance. I soon spotted a rhino casually eating grass. It was so surreal seeing a rhino just out there in his own habitat not confined by the bars of a zoo which was the only view of a rhino I've gotten. We had to leave soon though because of the imminent rain ahead of us. After walking a long walk back to our hotel, we waited for the rain to calm down and then made our way to the elephant breeding center. This, I originally, anticipated at being a pleasant experience but the cold reality soon set in and made the experience more contemplative which was, come to think of it, just as enjoyable in an impactful way. I'm saying this because the elephants we viewed were literally chained by the foot to a shackle to one confined little area. We watched, somberly, as they used their trunks to attempt to free themselves from the restricting chains. This sort of opened a debate between my friends concerning the ethicalness of the situation. We never really came to the conclusion since it was a bit of an inevitable situation at the time and there were a lot of factors to consider. Besides the fact, however, it nevertheless opened up that discourse which I was glad to think about and contemplate.
Finally, we embarked on the last part of our trip- the canoe ride through the crocodile infested waters. This was perhaps the more scarier part of the entire trip for me. From the look of the canoe from the shore it seemed pretty sturdy- that is, until I entered it to find that it shook, swayed back and forth, and was a lot lower towards the water than I originally anticipated. In addition, our guide vehemently told us to be quiet as he needed full concentration while steering. Also, they explained to us if we see an animal in the water do not freak out and start flailing our arms around so as to not flip us over as it was possible to do so if balance was disturbed in the boat. Now, we did spot a lot of medium-sized crocodiles that weren't so intimidating but then I turned my head and saw an enormous crocodile going into the water from the bank of the river- This thing was freakin huge! After ,seeing that I kinda freaked out internally for a bit knowing that should I fall out of this boat that crocodile is right there to eat me. Luckily, our guide seemed very skilled even when we went over these little rapids that also freaked me out since I felt us tipping slightly at that point. The thing that really was creepy was just the stillness and silentness of the river. It was so quiet despite the fact that under those waters were some vicious creatures. Fortunately, we arrived safely after a, in retrospect, peaceful and relaxing ride through the river where we saw a lot of jungle elements that really made it worthwhile.
Welp, that's about it as far as the trip to Chitwan goes. I had an absolutely wonderful time experiencing the jungle for the first time but it would not have been as great as it was without the company of some awesome beast friends! Thanks guys for making this trip amazing for me!
Stay tuned for more!
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