Canoeing on the river to see more wildlife in Chitwan

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In addition to riding elephants at Chitwan National Wildlife Park in Nepal, several of us took took a dugout canoe ride along the Rapti River. The large dugout canoes were powered by two very strong men with poles, Nepal's version of Venetian gondoliers.

While coasting down the river, we saw smoke wafting up from a nearby river bank and a few men squatting near the fire. Our Chitwan guide told us that someone was being cremated. One of the men by the fire saw us coming and got up and shouted, "No pictures." Our guide, after asking a local woman nearby who was being cremated, explained to us that a 35-year-old woman from the village had died. He also said that ashes put in the Rapti River in Nepal eventually end up in the Ganges River, the Hindus' most sacred river.

Eventually, we climbed out of our canoe and hiked through the jungle and across a few makeshift log bridges that required balance-beam skills to see an alligator conservation center. A local village man carrying a huge stick to protect us from any animals that we might encounter led the way. We stopped for a drink at a ramshackle building with numerous cases of empty Pepsi bottles piled up in front. There we saw a little spotted deer. We then went on to see the alligators. The alligators being bred at the alligator preservation center are "gharial" aligators. They are vegetarians; I call them the "good alligators" to remember them. The other kind of alligators in Nepal are "mugger" alligators. They eat deer and buffalo and are very aggressive. I call them the "bad" alligators. Finally, before heading back up the river in our canoe, we visited a full-grown tiger in bamboo enclosure whose mother was reportedly a man-eater. At one time, tigers were hunted at Chitwan. I guess those days are long gone if this is the only tiger left.

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