One, or perhaps the best, aspect of this career we’ve chosen is being close to all these amazing places. Chitwan (means “heart of the jungle in Nepali” which is certainly true) National Park in Nepal, modeled on the parks in the US, is just a quick flight from Kathmandu (but a long 5 hr drive to go 100 miles total, due to the poor roads) and a world away from Kathmandu.
They do one thing differently from our national parks though – the goal is just conservation, not recreational.
No snowmobiles in these parks, no camp grounds, no hiking trails, no hotels even. Used to be different, with a few expensive hotels in the middle of the park that started off as hunting lodges for mostly British royalty. 
Nowadays, all the hotels are outside the park, in an area they call a buffer zone. It works, as the locals use the buffer zones for fishing, agriculture, grazing, and don’t go into the park. The animals also come out – like you see in our pictures – as the buffer zone is still jungle. Seems to be working for everyone, as they had zero Rhinos killed last year for the horns or hoofs, and tigers are having a baby boom based on the last census.
For Marisa, the main attraction was her new friend, Hira Kali, the big female elephant that we took two rides on. 
The hotel we stayed at had eight (!) elephants, but four of them were off playing in an elephant polo tournament (a real thing, designed to get tourists to the area in the winter off season). I think Marisa also just liked being able to see all the big white bulls. The three Rhinos we saw were just bonus. Perhaps the best thing about an almost 3 year old is how everything is so new for her. Easy to entertain!
