Sat 4/01/2014 15:39
Our second day in Chitwan was filled with a few ‘adventure’ items. Note that I put adventure in quotes, I did this because it was a little staged and not really adventurous at all. First we headed for a jungle trek with elephants. Definitely cool, but except for riding on top of an elephant with three other people it was painful but interesting. I had my GoPro camera out on an extended tripod taking video from various angles. I’m sure I looked pretty stupid, but at least I got some interesting shots… hopefully. The elephant ride took about an hour and we were lead around a semi big area full of deer and a couple of rinos. The rinos though just laid there and many of us later talked about how drugged they looked. In fact the whole experience during the time at Chitwan seemed like a theme park that had staged animals to give the tourists a sense of danger or realism.

What was really fun was the elephant bath at the river’s edge near our hotel. I like elephants and when they are playing in the water it just makes them looks so cute. For a small fee people were able to take the bath with the elephants and that was so much fun to watch. The photos from that were great. I wanted to do it myself and would have if someone would’ve pushed me just a little. It really looked like fun.

After the elephant bath we had lunch and then headed out for a canoe ride and a visit to an elephant breeding center. Again, I hate to sound so harsh, but the whole thing seemed so staged and phony. We saw a few alligators (or crocodiles) laying along the shore but at no time did they move. I mean, I don’t think I saw any of them blink, or even breathe. We even joked that they looked like they were stuffed and placed in various locations. I guess in the big picture it was fun and something to remember, but at the time it just seemed ridiculously staged.