Christmas in Chitwan

Aside from the afore mentioned glorious tree, some delicious mincepies - courtesy of (imported by Anthony importers) Fortnum and Mason mincemeat, and some carol concerts, it really didnt seem that Christmasey here. For starters we (Mel, John Anthony and moi) woke up on Christmas day and headed down to Chitwan National Park, to an island jungle place where there were absolutly no signs of Christmas other than the 2 aussies in the room next door randomly singing Christmas songs lound enough to be audible through the wall - which wasnt hard as the wall was made of reeds/straw or something like that...

At Chitwan we learnt many things about asian elephants. For example an elephant eats 250kg of food per day, drinks 150 litres of water per day, has a foot circumference which is half its height etc etc. I have decided elephants are amazing... very very lovely, but totally impractical as pets. We went on several elephant saffaris, the perpose being to spy rhinos in the wild. We actually saw 4 which was very exciting - pictures to come on flickr. The elephants just stamped through the jungle - nothing got in their way, so ducking and diving large branches and trees was essential when on their backs! One day we went out with the elephant herders/riders (?) to help collect the elephants food. It was sold as 'grass cutting', but seemed more like hacking down the tops of trees and loading them onto the backs of elephants to me... this involved a bit of bareback elephant riding (you discover muscles in places previously unknown to have muscles), and also involved clinging to the back of the elephant whilst the keeper was up a tree and the elephant decided that it was a bit hungrey and would really quite like to knock over a few trees to get some yummy vine from the top of one...

We also went walking in the jungle looking for Rhinos again with some sucess - once the rhino was spotted the guide had to call (making a bird noise) to signal the elephant riders to bring the elephants forward, we then all followed the elephants who were following the rhino. apparently rhinos dont charge elephants, but might go for humans - if annoyed - which they probably would be, being woken up by 7 tourists flashing cameras at it.

Generally we climbed onto the elephants via a wooden platform, however we learnt how to climb/be lifted up their trunks... it takes a while to adjust to the fact that elephants have very thick skin and arent in the least troubled by heavy walking boots stamping all over them! I was fairly crap at getting on this way, however it was easy in comparison to the time when in the jungle i was told the elephant had a bad trunk and so i would have to climb on via the back legs. This involved being shoved very hard from one end by a bemused Nepali and pulled up by another whilst my legs flailed wildly around... not very attractive!

We also did a boat trip to spot crocodiles and ate much food - especially Mel who seemed very keen on the 'eat a much as you like' buffets.

We made it home unsavaged, and in reasonably good time despite hanging around due to a strike/road blockade, which was fortunately called off after about an hour. When Anthony and I went up to investigate we saw that tyres had been burnt (traditional) and that the road was blocked, but asking around it transpired none of the teachers (who were protesting about pay) were there at the moment... random, a strike and blockade without those who were striking... not really sure how it worked!