Royal Chitwan National Park

Hey again! Have a fast internet connection now so here are some photos - check out this entry and the Varanasi entry for new photos if you like!

Scott showing off his soccer skills

I think they like posing for photos...

Yum, elephant snot!

The playful elephant all by himself

Oooo, he likes that..

A gharial - small crocodile

Very excited baby wants our biscuits!

Buffalo crossing

Like a tank! Lucky we were on an elephant.

Ready for our safari on Emily.

Yay, we're still on, don't roll over yet - argh! (spot shell's leg below)

All the worries and bad feelings we still had concerning the problems we encountered at the border were completely extinguished soon after reaching the Royal Chitwan National Park. We had such a great time there and there’s so much we could tell you. We could go into detail about the beautiful boat ride we did up the river spotting various animals and birds including a stork and a crocodile, or we could try to explain to you how we were scared senseless before undertaking a bush walk with our local guide because of the countless warnings he gave us and the tactics needed in case we ran into a variety of different wild beasts that seemed to be present (like ruhnning in zigzags if a rhino charged us). Or we could give descriptions of how it felt to see, 2m away from us, a massive rhinocerous (about 2m long by 1.5m high by 1.5m wide), which we would not surprised if they were the orginal inspiration for military tanks, from the top of an elephant on our elephant safari, or we could try to explain what it was like to witness the unusual cultural/homosexual show that seemed to blend traditional stick dances with transvestite dances, or we could describe how we oohed and aahed over the absolutely gorgeous baby elephants that we fed and that chased us round wanting our cookies in the elephant breeding grounds, but we’ll skip all that and instead focus on the highlight of our time in the park... the bathing with elephants.

We had heard there was an area where we could go and they would let us swim and bathe with the elephants. We had to admit we were sceptical, but when we got to the area where the locals bring their trained domesticated elephenats to wash every morning we were pleasantly surprised to see four elephants playing around and splashing themselves with the water. Two of them already had tourists struggling to hold onto their backs as they squirted their riders with water from their trunks and wriggled their bodies in a playful way in order to try and dislodge their passengers.

The third elephant was allowed to play by himself. We have to admit, he seemed the happiest with his trainer siiting on the bank watching him. The great beast continued to play and splash himself with the water the entire time we were there. In fact when we left he was still playing, with his trainer patiently waiting for him. He seemed a little smaller than the others so he was probably younger and more playful and although sometimes it’s hard to tell when an animal is happy, we both agreed that we think that elephant was definitelty smiling.

Anyway, it didn’t take us long to skip down to the waters edge towards the fourth elephant (the biggest one). At that stage he was lying happily in the river with his trunk sticking out of the water like a massive snorkel. Scott nodded to the local indicating that we were keen to play with the elephant, where he held out his hand and helped us onto the elephant’s side. He then moved towards the back of the elephant and said repeatedly in a stern voice but not actually shouting "Hazza hazza hazza" or something like that at which the elephant began to roll from its side onto its legs. When this happened, we had to scramble from the side of the elphant, towards it back and then edge towards its neck for a steadier position.

Smiling and laughing as the beast stood and steadied itself, we waved like the tourists we were to our guide who was busy taking photos for us. It didn’t take the elephant trainer long to command "Chop chop", where the elephant, unknown to us, started to fill his trunk from the river. A couple of seconds later we felt the impact of the animal releasing its load of water, Scott especially who was in the front and hence received the direct impact and felt the force of the water hitting him like a firehose.

After another half an hour of the elehpant trying and succeeding in throwing us from its back and dozens more squirtings we left smiling from ear to ear after paying the owner of the elephant a tip of 100 rupees (probably the best 2 Australian dollars we’re ever spent). We took a couple of videos there too – will upload them soon!

It was a magical experience and we decided to stay another night simply to do it all again the next day, where Scott was able to convince one of the elephant owners to let the elephant pick him up with its trunk - something he’d seen one of them do earlier and was determined to give a try. Basically the elephant stands still and you stand in front of him, hold each of its ears with each of your hands, place one of your feet on his trunk and when you lean forward, it lifts you with ease where you walk up his trunk and onto his head. Then it squirts you when you get there, but we think it did that bit just for fun.