Eventually the ugly urban sprawl of the Kathmandu Valley gives way to a more rural landscape. It's winter so it's dry and dusty and not as green as I thought it would be. The rural towns along the way are scruffy and litter is a major problem everywhere. The road follows the river and hilltop farms with steeply terraced fields are linked to the road by swing bridges over the river valleys.
The closest town to Chitwan is Sauraha, with loads of cheap hotels and tourist shops. It's dirty and unattractive but our hotel The Landmark Forest Resort is a little way out of town.
The Chinese are the biggest tourist group to Nepal and because it's the Lunar New Year holidays our hotel is full of tour groups.
In the afternoon we do a dugout canoe trip down the Naryani river at Chitwan. We see loads of crocodiles and the rare Gharial, a fish eating croc with a long thin snout. The birdlife is good.
On the banks of the river , we find a tuk-tuk coffee stand with awesome Expresso Macchiato and Cappuccino.
Buffet dinner and an early night.
Up early again for a full day Jeep Safari, leaving the hotel before sunrise in the cold and misty morning. We had organised a private vehicle and we were actually the only tourists in the entire reserve that morning. The bush was very thick so game spotting was slow. We saw spotted deer and wild boar and lots of monkeys. Once the sun began to break through the fog, the birds came out too.
Eventually we did see the one horned Asian rhino too. There are 605 rhino in Chitwan and they had recently celebrated 1500 poaching free days.
We didn't see tiger but we did see pug marks.
After enjoying our packed lunches on the top of a viewing platform, we continued. In the afternoon we did encounter other safari groups on half day excursions.
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1 comment:
Much enjoyed....thanks!
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