Welcome to Nepal

We are now in Nepal and have been for over a week now. Our final days in India were well spent although with perhaps a little too much time spent on public transport.

Delhi was interesting and amusing to see McDonalds selling Maharaja Macs which we had to try and ended up being a curried chicken burger and altogether not too bad. Delhi, suprisingly was nothing like Calcutta with top brand names appearing on every other street and no way near as much dirt and poverty. Our stay however was swift so we didn't get a chance to really get a feel for the capital.

Our final stop before crossing the border was Kushinigar, a quiet spot to the east of Gorakhpur where Buddha is supposedly to have died. Not much was here except a number of monasteries and temples, the centrepiece containing a very large reclining, gold Buddha.

Eager to move on we were only there for a couple of hours before making our way to the border by jeep, crammed with 11 other people, some of which were clinging to the roof.

The border was very odd as no one appeared to check our passports or visas, so if we had not been shown by a rickshaw driver where to get stamped out and obtain a visa we would have been quite stuck as to where to go.

Our first stop in Nepal was Lumbini, the birthplace of Buddha and extremely small considering its religious importance. With only one restaurant and a couple of guesthouses this has been the quietest of the places we have visited so far and in a huge contrast to the bustle of India.

The gardens surrounding Lumbini are beautiful with many temples some of which still under construction and lakes and ponds surrounding the main temple where it shows the supposed exact birthplace of Buddha. Stuck in Lumbini over the elections that were being held which forced all public transport to stop for a few days, we spent our time cycling around the sites and exporing a number of extremely rural villages.

From Lumbini we moved on to the Royal Chitwan National Park where we stayed on the river overlooking the park with a beautiful view. We really packed it in at the park, doing every activity available from canoeing where we went past marsh muggers and gharials (crocodiles), Jungle trekking where we came face to face with a one horned rhino and followed tiger tracks but with no luck, a jeep safari where we spotted rhinos, deer, wild boar and a sloth bear, an elephant safari where we explored the jungle on the back of an elephant and for some reason due most probably to the overpowering smell of the elephant you are able to get right up close to the wildlife without scaring them away, we went so close to some rhinos in fact that the driver of our elephant touched one and it didn't seem to flinch, we also stayed a night in a watchtower inside the park where the noise was incredible and again we saw all kinds of animals including a rhino just beneath us after it got dark as well as finding a whole group of 11 of them, some babies, eating and bathing in a water hole.

The highlight however was definitely bathtime with the elephants were scores of them come down every morning to the river for their daily bath and you can join in. Remarkably friendly, you can climb up them, jump off them, go underwater, get them to spray water at you, get them to throw you off their backs, walk up their trunks and have them place you on their heads and of course help scrub them. It really was the most amazing thing i have ever done and is going to be hard to beat.

After our action packed adventure Paul and i have now temporarily parted, he is still at the park enjoying the peacefulness and sunshine before heading to Kathmandu whilst i have returned to Lumbini to take part in a 10 day Vipassana Meditation course. This means that you won't hear from me for at least 10 days.

I have some amazing pictures from the park but won't be able to upload them until we get to Pokhara or maybe not until Kathmandu as the internet here is appallingly slow and there is only a floppy drive.

Hope all is well

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