Bardia National Park

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Wednesday- March 30
This morning we don't walk to the park entrance, as Sonja is taking a jeep tour - what a wuss - and we are hitching a ride. It later turns out to be a wise choice on her part. We get dropped off at a trail head where we will head for another part of the river through different habitat, Sal forest, in the hopes of seeing new and different birds and what the heck how about another tiger. Padam is finding the birds by sight and sound and we get to the river, cross a rickety wooden bridge and walk to another bend in the river where we hop down and walk along the bank trail. During the walk Padam casually mentions, "It's going to rain, I hear thunder." We all smile. Then the prospect of rain is quickly forgotten. River otters! Seven playful, swimming otters - another lucky spotting, I am told. We walk on to another covered perch on the river bank to begin another sit and wait. We see the otters again and two magnificent Spotted Deer stags. Pitter patter, raindrops begin to fall. We move under a tree, but it gets worse, much worse. We are picking up to leave when a guide with 2 guys shows up and the guides all confer and we walk ahead to a place where a little crude shelter of branches has been fashioned near the river's edge. The guides gather more material and we get under. I remember I had an umbrella so I volunteer to crouch beneath it so the others can fit into the shelter - almost. After about an hour it is obvious this is no short cloudburst. We are going to make a run for an observation tower about a half a mile up the river. Since I have an umbrella only my bottom half gets completely soaked, but by the time we get to the tower, Sundar and Padam are shivering. There are about ten other drenched souls already there and more will show up. This is a basic wooden tower, so the wind brings in as much rain as the roof keeps out. Most of the others decide to call it a day and leave. Our stalwart trio and another guide-client duo are going to stay, eat an early lunch and see if the rain stops. The other guide is running in place to get warm and at one point jogs out of the tower and does calisthenics in the rain. Then he runs back in and begins martial arts moves. He is quite entertaining. Suddenly, Sundar announces the jeep is coming for us! It arrives as the rain stops and we are delivered back to the resort for a cup of hot tea and dry clothes - the power is off again, so no warm shower! I wash out my wet clothes. Now I have some down time to catch up on this narrative and relax and reflect. A late afternoon walk in the surrounding community provides new experiences. The park service brings out logged dead trees which are then allocated to the community. It is distribution time and the lot looks somewhat like a Christmas tree lot with families staking out their logs. These are huge logs that they bring home via oxcart, if they're lucky enough to have one. We saw one log suspended on ropes carried out by 4 men. While watching this, a man who had been helping with the loading, runs out to speak with Sundar. He has lived here his entire life and is apparently now working at the elephant breeding center.When he was a boy he would bring cattle and oxen across the river to graze in what is now the park. In the afternoon when returning his charges home across the river, he would hang onto a tail, with his shirt tied on top of his head, to keep it dry. Once, a tiger came out of the forest during a river crossing and took one of his cattle. Needless to say, he lost his shirt. During another crossing he and his friends decided to take off all their clothes. A huge river surge swept the clothes off and away and they had to make grass skirts to cover themselves. Then they had to suffer the long walk home in humiliation, not to mention serious trouble at home. After our fully-clothed walk back to the lodge in the fading sunlight, we return to no power and cold showers again.

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