Safari in Nepal

Chitwan National Park:

The name ‘Chitwan’ has several possible meanings, but the most literal translation of the two NEPALI words that make it up: chit or chita (heart) and wan or ban (jungle). Chitwan is thus ‘the heart of the jungle’.

At the beginning of the nineteenth century, cultivation in the valley was deliberately prohibited by the government of Nepal in order to maintain a barrier of disease-ridden forests as a defense against the invasion of diseases from the south. Then for the century between 1846 and 1950, when the Rana prime ministers were de facto rulers of Nepal, Chitwan was declared a private hunting reserve, maintained exclusively for the privileged classes. Penalties for poaching were severe - capital punishment for killing rhino - and the wildlife in the area thus received a measure of protection.

From time to time great hunts for rhino were held during the cool, mosquito-free winter months from December to February. The Ranas invited royalty from Europe and the Princely States of India, as well as other foreign dignitaries, to take part in these grand maneuvers, which were organized on a magnificent scale, often with several hundred leopards.

Bardia national Park.

More remote and less visited than Chitwan, Bardia is a mixture of dry deciduous forest, vast stretches of open grassland and island-filled rivers, rich with acacia and silk cotton trees. Hiding in the tall grasses or ‘Machans’ on the edges of huge sal forests, wild elephants roam, one of which is reported to be the largest in Asia.

The Park is home to more than 250 species of birds, many of them waterbirds. Overhead, birds of prey like the fish eagle, crested serpent eagle and goshawk keep a keen eye on the plains for their next meal. The rivers that feed them are also home to the rare marsh mugger crocodile, the Gangetic dolphin and the mahseer game fish.

Sunrises here are something to behold. The sense of isolation from civilisation, and the feeling that these immense forests have been here since the dawn of time conspire to offer a true wilderness experience which can only take your breath away.You stay in luxury tented camps in the forest.