Shuklaphanta Wildlife Reserve
We had been working on the dining hall for the last few weeks while the Banda weakened from town to town. We were getting a little ‘cabin fever’ because we couldn’t go anywhere by jeep without trouble. The Banda began to weaken in the west and a week off brought the tin for the roof and the mysteries (Carpenters) went for it as John, Krishna, Seata, and me drove to the farthest west point of Nepal to see a 350 square kilometer animal preserve called Shuklaphanta that also has 50 square kms of grass land in the heart of the park, our goal, but we were told that roads were in bad condition with tall grass and lots of trees across the road. Phanta means grassland. The drive would take four hours from Thakaduwara, Bardia.
We went to the river to wait for our friend Krishna to come back from escorting his wife to her village in the jungle and then join us. The boatman went over to get him but in the end he only needed the boat to carry his cell phone. We scratched our heads and had a good laugh at the sight.
When we got out to the main east west highway we asked the policemen what the conditions were like and he said no problem. We didn’t see many cars on the road but the buses and trucks were running so that was a good sign that the Banda was lightening up in the west.
We arrived in Shuklaphata and the Shuklaphanta Jungle Cottages where we were going to stay for two nights. We spoke to the head of the park who was surprised to see us because there were no tourists or visitors in the park at the moment and they weren’t really organized enough to get our permits together. It worked though and we were scheduled for a jeep trek the following day. We would be the only tourists in the whole park. Jungle Cottage is literally down the street from the entrance to the park. We had to take a guide and we chose a man named Kum Thakur. He worked at the cottages and was very informative and spoke English pretty well. Our friend Krishna worked at this park along time ago, before the Maoist uprising ten years ago or so. He moved to Thakaduwara to work the Bardia National Park instead because tourists were still coming.
We drove in and looked for Tigers, Swamp Deer, Wild Boar, and birds. The grass was really high and wouldn’t be burned until December so it made sighting Swamp Deer very difficult. The Shuklaphanta is well known for it’s large herd of Swamp Deer, approximately 2,400 and growing. It is not well known for Rhinos or Elephant but that might be because the park is difficult to access. This is one of the reasons it has a not so positive poaching problem. The word is that poachers come across the open border and do there thing and disappear back over the border. We stopped at many of the towers scattered all over the area we were in and checked out one of the parks abandon offices. Apparently someone was killed here and being so remote they just closed it and moved closer to civilization.
It was a good day for birds and we saw or lured a few in with bird songs and a speaker. That was cool, you play a birdcall a few times and then turn it off and listen and the jungle answers you back. It was nice to get out of the dining hall for a few days of change.
The following morning we drove to the very west of Nepal where we walked across a 1.5 km walking bridge across the river bordering both Nepal and India. Where we were it is still Nepal on the far side but India is 2 km away. It was hot and the only cool place was when the jeep was moving. Seata was a dolled up and I didn’t know why until we started driving back and all the women were dressed up in their finest for a woman’s festival. It pretty much goes on for a month and there are dances and parties all across Nepal.
We got as far as Lempki before we had to fill up and while we waited I noticed the attendant had used a different gas pump than before. I asked Krishna, Krishna saw fuel coming out of the tank because the attendant was watching the women dancing across the street and couldn’t be bothered with us. He couldn’t be bothered with us to the point that he put diesel in our petrol tank and we caught it before we started it up. That dance cost us four hours and a tank cleaning. I did manage to snap off a bunch of very colorful photos though and that always makes things better.
Our friend Seata was egger to get home and dance with her friends and she managed to catch a late dance and have some fun. We sat in the tower and discussed the logistics of going to Rara and Jumla for a couple weeks of trekking before I have to appear in Katmandu for the Gharana Classical Music Festival at the Yak and Yeti Hotel on October 8-11.
