Rhinos, Elephants, Geckos, Ocean creatures,

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When last we blogged we were headed on our way to Chitwan National park in Southern Nepal.... I got lazy and a couple of months have passed. 😉 This is my attempt to restart the blog machine that is Corey... Please note that beer is cheap in Esquel Argentina and I am pretty buzzed at the moment. 😊

26th October 2010...

We arrived at "Jungle Adventure World" (our hotel) near Chitwan National Park late afternoon after another fabulous Nepali bus ride. FYI, if I never have to ride another bus in Nepal for the rest of my life, I will be a very happy man! We settled into our new diggs and although they were not too bad, I honestly expected more from a place called "Jungle Adventure World." That night we discovered the deliciousness of the butter chicken at a nearby restaurant in town, had some malt beverage (beer) and then crashed for the night.

Our first day in the park we decided to check out the Elephant Breeding Centre and also stop by to see the daily elephant baths in the nearby river. The breeding centre was both cool and sad. There were about 20 elephants in the centre, from big males and females to a couple of very cute 2 year old males. Despite their size (small car size!), 2 year old elephants are pretty adorable next to their big parents! The sad part about the centre was that all of the elephants were chained at the ankle to big posts. The chains themselves were not more than about 6ft long either. The bigger males even had their front legs chained together, presumably to prevent the big guys from getting to much momentum to rip the posts out of the ground! Seeing such awesome animals chained up just seems wrong to me. The good news is that, unlike zoos back home, the animals do get out for a few hours each day into their natural habitat. Their trainers take them out and let the animals forage and gather their own food for the next day! Other good news is that the older elephants are used for park patrols to help protect the wildlife in the park such as rhinos and other elephants that are targeted by poachers. The caretakers even make the elephants "elephant momos" as treats!

After the breeding centre, we went down to the shore of the river in town and watched some mahouts (elephant drivers/trainers) wash their rides. It is quite a sight to see multi-tonne animals getting a scrub down by a tiny nepali man. At times the entire animal is submerged and the only sign of life is the tip of the trunk that pops up every nnow and then for a gulp of air! Various verbal commands and unfortunately the odd whack with a stick and the big guys (and gals) will sit, stand, turn over, spray water...etc.... Oh yeah. The poop.... Appropriately huge. Many times, while watching some large melon sized object float down the river, one of us would point and say "elephant poop!" Thankfully in town there is a concerted effort to keep the streets clear of the atomic elephant bombs. Along the same lines of poop... Elephant farts are quite a sight to behold too!

Our second day in the park was a busy one. We arranged for an elephant ride through the park and also took a canoe trip down the local river. The elephant ride was something else let me tell you. Our ride was a rather large 8 year old bull who still had his massive tusks. In Nepal they do not cut them off, they only blunt the ends. Of the three bulls in our tour, we got the big boy too. Andrea and I clambered on board using a boarding tower and took our seats on the padded platform on the elephant's back. 2 more locals climbed on and then we were off on the tour! During the 1 1/2 hour tour looking for wildlife, we managed to get an exceptionally brief glimpse of a 1 horned rhino, but that was about it. The main highlight of the tour was how our mahout liked to blaze new trails through the bush with the elephant. As a result, our ride involved a lot of foliage smacking us in the face and legs. The REAL highlight was watching our elephant stomp an 8" diameter tree to the ground with one step and then toss the trunk aside with its trunk.

After the elephant ride, we took the canoe ride "DOWN BY THE RIVER!" (props to Chris Farley) and we were lucky enough to see a couple species of crocodile, a troop of monkeys and some cool kingfishers along the way. At the end of the canoe ride, we had a short walk through a grassy field (really tall grass) to get our ride back to town. Apparently, the walk could have been a bit treacherous if we had happened upon a rhino or tiger, but unfortunately it was pretty boring.

Our time in Chitwan National Park finished, we headed back to Kathmandu. Back in the city, the only really cool thing that we did was visit the famed Swayambunath "Monkey temple." The temple, naturally, is home to a local troop of Macaques monkeys and a host of Buddhist and Hindu Temples. Despite all of the temples, our main focus was on watching the cute little Macaque babies play around and clutch onto their mothers for transport. The coolest thing that we saw, however, was a buddhist monk slamming a Red Bull! Oh how times have changed! Alas, after the Monkey Temple, I went down for the count with a bad case of the Kathmandu Kraps! 3 days....I shall say no more.... Thus ended our time in Nepal.

On November 5th 2010, we departed from Kathmandu on our way to Indonesia. Looking back a couple months later, I could take or leave Kathmandu, but trekking in Nepal truly was epic! After a quick bounce through Bangkok, a flight to Bali, a bus, a looong ass ferry to Lombok (island) and a short boat trip, we landed on the tiny island paradise of Gili Meno. Gili Meno is pretty rad I must say. The island is surrounded by reefs, which we thoroughly explored utilizing our awesome snorkeling skills. We saw lion fish, sea snakes, scorpion fish, eels, a whole bushel of turtles, the biggest sea anemone ever, Barracuda and some MASSIVE PUFFER FISH. We also saw some pretty nifty and neato blue coral and a tiny, bright yellow and black polka-dotted puffer fish, but there is really too much to list.

The first encounter with a sea snake was a bit scary for me. Andrea was pointing something out to me underwater and when I looked I realized what we were looking at. We were looking at a big sea snake in the coral about 5-10ft away! I pulled Andrea so she would follow as I swam off in a bit of a hurry! Luckily we got to see another snake from a safer distance a couple of days later. They are really pretty cool to watch. In addtion to the sea life, the island was home to some honkin big bees and some prehistoric sized geckos. We nicknamed the bees "Darth Vader Bees" due to their size and jet black colouring while Godzilla the gecko was a permanent resident in our nice little beach house. He was a pretty laid back and cool roomate I must say...until he started dropping deuces from the ceiling! House keeping was a bit lax to say the least, so after a few days we had to be very wary of the little gifts he left for us. The bathroom in our abod was also the home of a small crab. I had to evict him....twice!

Other highlights of the island were:

-Doing absolutley nothing on a beautiful little island.
-Watching a gecko slaughter bugs inside a hanging paper lamp. All you could see were the shadows of death as the little gecko jumped around eating bugs inside the"Terror-drome!"
-Reading too many books.
-A restaurant selling "magic mushroom rides." We did not partake, but we thought that was pretty cool.
- Super cheap fruit juices made right when you order. I particularly enjoyed the banana juice and Andrea the gross papaya juice. 😉

After literally snorkelling for 10 days in a row, reading entirely too much and just chillaxin, we moved camp to Ubub Bali. We scored some LEGENDARY diggs in Ubud with a sweet raised super awesome queen bed over a bed of ivory white river rocks, a pimpin bathroom, and a pool all smack dab in the middle of some beautiful and oddly mosquito free rice paddies. Oooooh...the best part was that it had a mini bar with grocery store pricing! Bintang beer is not that good, but when it is cold and cheap and already in your room? Exactly...you drink it. 😊 At night, if you looked closely, there were even some cool fireflies flying around outside.

The coolest thing about Ubud is the monkey Forest by far. Right in the middle of town are a few acres of forested parkland that serve as home to a bunch (300?) of Balinese Macaques and some temples. When we got to the park, we spent some time just taking in the sights of the temples and the monkeys going about their business. We watched the "little people" playing, fighting, socializing, mothering, etc... Then we decided to sit down near the macaques feeding area. At this point things got a lot more interesting. We had managed to attract the attention of a small female monkey (pretty much just by sitting down) who was chewing on a piece of sweet potato. She started to slowly and somewhat sneakily, move closer and closer to me and before I knew it she was on my lap, still eating her sweet potato of course. After awhile she dropped the tater and started to search me for "items of interest." She reached up my shorts, tried to open my pockets and when she found nothing, she jumped onto Andrea's lap. She thoroughly searched Andrea's shorts and pockets until she eyed up what she wanted. With one swift motion, our little friend snatched Andrea's left earring and quite deftly removed it! Now back in my lap, the little thief started to chew on and play with the earring while I held out my hand stupidly saying "give it back." She dropped the earring into my hand, probably by accident, but before I could close my hand the earring was already being chewed on some more. Not long after, she made the fatal mistake of dropping the earring onto the ground. I covered it with my boot quickly and the little rascal will now have to go steal somebody else's jewels in the future! With the earring retrieved and penciled in for an antiseptic rinse, we decided to get moving. The fact that a rather large male monkey was approaching to investigate hastened our departure!

I learned something rather important in Ubud. DO NOT EAT GERMAN SAUSAGE AND POTATO SALAD IN BALI! I got rather ill. The meal ruined a hot and humid walking tour through rice paddies the following day. Ugggh.

The last highlight of Ubud was the cooking class we attended (no german sausage). There was not a lot of cooking by the students really, but we learned a bit about the local cuisine and had a good time.

With our time finished in Indonesia, we headed back to Bangkok. Stay tuned for the blog on that portion of the trip!

CHAO!

Corey and Andrea

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