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| Asian one horned Rhino - My photo |
Another tiger "hunt". I only ever hunt with a camera! This time in Chitwan National Park in Nepal. Nepal is such a divers country with so many wonderful tourist activities, from sunning mountain scenery (9 of the 10 highest mountains can be found in Nepal) to amazing cultural and world heritage sites. There are also a few amazing nature reserves and Chitwan is regarded as the best. I have already posted a few blogs on Nepal but the country is well worth another few posts.
One of the main nature reserves in Nepal is in the low lands and is called Chitwan National Park. Like most of the nature reserves in the area, accommodation is outside the park. There is just a small river between the village and the park.
After arriving, the guide and I went for a walk along the river. There was a lot of evidence of rhino and apparently they cross into the town at night. These are the Asian one horned rhino. Maybe I would get to see one? Across the river, there was a strange looking small cat, with long legs. It was a rear jungle cat. Maybe my luck was in. A cat in Chitwan! I was looking for the much bigger stripped version, but a cat is cat!
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| Jungle cat - not my photo |
Next morning was an early start. I had arranged for a full day trip into Chitwan. It was a misty morning. I discovered that every day is a misty morning in Chitwan. We made our way down to the river in the thick mist and travelled across the river to the nature reserve. After a walk of about 200 meters, along a path with very high reeds, and thick mist (in tiger country) we reached the jeep. Off we went. Very thick bush. In the mist and with the thick bush the only way we're going to see a tiger was if it climbed onto the jeep with us!
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| Boat ride in the mist |
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| Walk in the mist in tigre country |
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| Thick bush and mist - not ideal for tiger spotting |
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| Tiger prints |
We drove and drove. We went much deeper into the reserve then most of the trips. Eventually we got our first sign that there were Tigers! A beautiful set of fresh prints, about 3 hours old. But no tiger. We came to a large open area along a river. On the far back was my first Asian rhino. It was about 600 hundred meters away, so very far and not good for photos. The guide said that as the rhino was on the other bank of the river, we could walk across the open area for a better look. About 400 hundred meters from the jeep, there were beautiful fresh tiger prints in the sand. This would not be an ideal time to see my first wild tiger! We made it to the bank of the river for really great views of the rhino. We also made it back to the jeep without finding the tiger who made the large prints.
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| Asian rhino |
We did not get to see a wild tiger on this trip, or indeed anywhere in Chitwan. Did get to see tiger tracks, but not quite the same as seeming a tiger. Apart from not seeing a tiger, it was a great trip. I did get to see Asian rhino on three occasions and most of the other animals, like spotted deer, Samba deer, Monkeys and wild pig. The best sighting of the day was a sloth bear.
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| Samba deer | |
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| Spotted deer |
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| Sloth bear - not my photo |
There are a lot of leopards in the area and we did find evidence of this, in the form of a small deer up a tree, but no spotted cats. There are also cloud leopards in Chitwan. This would be an amazing animal to see in the wild and I would swop five wild tigers for a cloud leopard, but as I did not have any tigers to swop, I did not get to see a cloud leopard. Oh well, must always leave something to go back for.
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| Cloud leopard - not my photo |
One of the birds I was really looking for was the Jungle fowl. This is the original chicken. This is a really beautiful bird and can still fly, unlike the domesticated version. The peacock is also an endemic bird in the area and I did also get to see quite a few of them.
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| Jungle fowl |
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