Strike in the Terai

The strike only affected travel between Kathmandu and the Terai.  No vehicles could travel the road without threat of violence.  If I hadn't planned my trip so tightly, I would have been just fine with another day in the jungle.  I had so many things left unfinished in Kathmandu.  I was also very worried about the hassle of rescheduling my flights and about my husband having to arrange more child care in my absence.

But, there was nothing I could do.  So, we just made the best of our extra day.

In the morning, Smiley offered us an extra walk in the jungle to see if we could find rhino.

He sent a young man ahead of us to make sure the path was safe.  There is no telling what could be watching us from behind that tall grass.

He climbed trees, trying to find rhino for us.

We saw some men fishing.

They hadn't seen any rhino.

We waded across the river.  I apparently committed a faux pas by wearing my shoes around my neck.  Causing the locals to laugh.  Criminals are made to wear shoes around their neck as a public chastisement in Nepal .

We ran into a buffalo herder.

He hadn't seen any rhinos since yesterday.

But it was another beautiful walk.

Past interesting fields.

 I had to give up on the rhino photo this trip.  Perhaps next time.

Hunting for Rhino

I have been to the jungle a few times now and have seen rhinos up close and wild elephants, crocodiles, several kinds of monkeys and at least 50 different types of  birds.  Until this trip I had no photos from the jungle at all.  The first time I traveled to Nepal my camera broke before I got to the jungle.  On my second trip to the jungle, both my father and I ate something that gave us diarrhea.  My dad cleared his system just before we got on the bus back to Kathmandu, but I didn't know I was going to have a problem until we were about an hour up hill.  I wasn't exactly sure how to stop the bus, but I knew I had to do something urgently.  So I walked up to the front of the bus and told the bus driver that he must stop because I was having 'female troubles.'  I thought that might keep the situation discreet.  The driver swiftly pulled over to the left and I exited into the tall grass on the side of a very steep cliff.  Unwisely, I had chosen to wear bib overalls that day, that meant that I would have to basically undress from my shoulders to my knees with a bus load of people above me to my rear.  In order to hide myself a completely as possible,  I scooted as far to the edge of the cliff as I could safely manage so that when I unbuckled my bib and let it drop forward all of the rolls of film that my father shot of the jungle went bouncing out of my pocket and careened over the edge of the cliff.  It was very sad... we had some great shots of mother and baby rhinos that were standing only 20 feet from us while we rode the back of an elephant.  Adding to my embarrassment, several other passengers exited the bus and relieved themselves in the grass as well.  Then when we all returned to the bus my father told me that the bus driver had stood up when I left the bus and announced to everyone that I was having female troubles.  So much for trying to be discreet. 

The time that I went to the jungle with my uncle, I didn't have a camera, so this time I was determined to get some good pictures of rhinos for my boys!

Heading up from the river past the tall grass and into the jungle.

Rhino poop, we are getting closer.

We spotted a rhino in the distance lying on its side.  It was too far away to get a good picture for you.

We were a bit on edge knowing that if a rhino smelled us our only recourse was to climb a tree.

We followed elephant tracks to the river hoping to see either wild elephants or bathing rhinos.

There were only birds.

On the way back to the jungle we found the shed skin of a cobra but luckily we didn't run into its former owner.

We walked for about two hours, but I didn't find a good rhino shot for the boys.

We took a nap when we returned to the lodge.

In a few hours we went out searching for rhino again, this time on the back of an elephant. To be continued...