Tiger Mountain Tharu Safari

Tiger Mountain Tharu Lodge, one of the 3 Tiger Mountain properties in the Chitwan area, is just 13 km downriver from Tiger Tops Jungle Lodge, on the edge of Chitwan National Park . It is inspired by the lifestyle and rich culture of the indigenous Tharu people. Tharu Lodge is a living diorama constructed in the traditional Tharu longhouse style, and built from local materials. The spacious and comfortable double rooms have en-suite bathrooms with solar-heated water and are stocked with hand-milled herbal soap.

Tharu Lodge offers the best of both worlds: wildlife plus cultural and resort activities, including Bird Watching, jungle walks, sunset strolls, ox cart rides and walks into the different ethnic villages (Tharu, Bote & Mushyar), swimming, tennis, badminton, and pony rides. Elephant and river safaris are available for guests staying two nights or more. The Tharu Lodge grounds and gardens are the home to 43 bird species and frequent visitors to the area include the Greater One-horned Rhinoceros, Wild Boar, Leopard, Sloth Bear, Civet and Jungle Cats and many more. The elusive Royal Bengal Tiger is sometimes sighted.

Tiger Mountain , the pioneer of adventure tourism in Nepal with over 40 years experience, places a great emphasis on self-sufficiency at its lodges. Its own organic farms produce fresh ingredients for its award-wining Nepali and Western cuisine: Wild-Boar cross, poultry, seasonal vegetables and fruit, herbs, salads, honey. All bread, rolls, quiches, pastries, cookies and pies are freshly baked on the premises, and we serve home-made marmalade and jams, chutneys, muesli, yoghurt, pasta, sausage, pate, and fresh organic coffee and herbal teas.

Tharu Lodge is proud to be part of the Tiger Mountain ideal of environmentally responsible tourism with a conscience, and endeavours to blend and harmonize with the surrounding jungle and villages. In line with its ethic of putting something positive back into the areas where its lodges are located , your stay at Tharu Lodge will help fund various community development and environmental projects, including a free clinic, a school for underprivileged children and 4 other educational programmes, village irrigation, recycling, flood relief, agricultural and vocational training, women's literacy and empowerment and anti-poaching and wildlife monitoring programmes.

 

CHARITIES, COMMUNITY & SOCIAL PROJECTS

Tiger Mountain Tharu Lodge Clinic:
Tiger Mountain Tharu Lodge Clinic, staffed by a staff Community Health Worker, provides treatment and medicine to villagers and is open 24 hours for emergency cases. The minimal 2 rupee (approximately 3 cents) fee collected from patients is put into an emergency fund for those who require but can't afford expensive surgery or hospitalisation. The Lodge also provides a vehicle for emergency transportation.

2. Tiger Tops Swissair Pre-School:
Tiger Tops Swissair Pre-School is a joint free head-start programme for underprivileged children made possible by Swissair Staff Fund for Children's Relief, Tiger Mountain and donations from friends and guests. The School's 65 students receive, free of charge, 2 meals a day, health care, uniforms, and schooling. In exchange for the children's schooling, parents help to grow vegetables for students' meals in the school's organic gardens. This gardening work has not only given them a sense of involvement in their children's education but has inspired them to start many kitchen gardens in the village, thus improving village nutrition. The children's meals are cooked with bio-gas from the school buffalo and latrines.Once the students graduate from the programme, their onward education in Government schools is also funded and monitored.

3. TTSA School Library Programme:
TTSA School Library Programme sponsors Saturday reading, art, music and drama activities for all village children, and environmental awareness and conservation lectures and programmes for other local schools. Attendance averages 70 children every Saturday.

4. TTSA School Tree Nursery Project:
TTSA School Tree Nursery Project: was initiated with financial assistance from the International Trust for Nature Conservation. The programme teaches children conservation and responsibility for their natural resources. It also aids in local reafforestation and provides villagers with alternative sources for fodder, fuel and building thus taking pressure off of the environment.

5. Duff Kennedy Scholarship Fund:
Duff Kennedy Scholarship Fund finances the Government School education of older children from poor families. These students, in return, supervise the Saturday library programmes at the Tiger Tops Swissair School. There are currently 85 students covered by this scholarship programme.

6. Provision of salaries for Bote Tharu and Mushyar community teachers:
Provision of salaries for Bote, Tharu and Mushyar community teachers (300 students) When the villagers of the Bote/Mushyar community got together and built a school for their children, but subsequently found they were unable to collect sufficient fees to fund teachers' salaries, Tiger Mountain initiated a teachers' salary fund for their School. It is now supported by guest donations administered by Tiger Mountain Tharu Lodge.

7. Provision of salary for Mushyar village teacher and tutor:
Provision of salary for Mushyar village teacher (64 students) Similarly, Tiger Mountain Tharu Lodge took up the cause of the Mushyar village children when there was no longer a budget to pay their young teacher. He is a 17 year old Duff-Kennedy scholar who gathers the children for 2 hours of teaching in the morning before setting off for his own classes, 9 kilometres from his village. His salary is now funded by Lodge guests and friends.

8. Mushyar Children's Garden Project:
Mushyar Children's Garden Project to teach gardening skills to youngsters and improve village nutrition. A foot pump was offered free of charge to the adults of the village, but they were not keen to dig a well and look after the garden. The older children however took the project on and started producing vegetables for their families, and earning a small income from surplus vegetables -- and the adults are sitting up and taking notice!

9. Dhajaha Flood Relief Project:
Dhajaha Flood Relief Project When 145 families were left homeless by Narayani river flooding in 2000, Tharu Lodge stepped in with clothing and regular medical visits to the relief camp. With the generous help of guests, victims built latrines and dug wells for safe drinking water. Today, they are still in the camp, but at least are living under improved hygiene conditions, with clean water and medical care.

10. Construction of subsidised foot pumps for villagers, installation of hand pumps and related irrigation projects:
Construction of subsidised foot pumps for villagers, installation of hand pumps and related irrigation projects Several foot pumps constructed at the TTSA school and operating in the villages have provided sources of income for the Mushyar children and a village widow, and have also improved nutrition for many families. A hand pump installed by the Lodge with labour from the villagers provides clean water for a number of households, and a water pump and toilet at a community school provides for basic needs.

11. Vocational Training programmes for villagers:
Vocational Training programmes for villagers Tiger Mountain is the main employer in the area, but is obviously not in a position to provide a job for every villager who needs one. As an alternative, it offers training so they can go farther afield armed with a marketable skill.

12. Assistance to Buffer Zone National Park:
Assistance to Buffer Zone National Park to protect wildlife and environment and help in anti-poaching patrols. The Lodge provides vehicles, boats, elephants, manpower and other support for anti-poaching patrols and wildlife monitoring projects.

13. Road/bridge building:
Road/bridge building The Lodge assists in repairing monsoon-damaged roads and also builds roads and bridges with a conscience -- to enable essential irrigation channels for village crops.

14. Telephone service to villagers:
Telephone service to villagers The Lodge makes its radio phone available to villagers at cost, thus sparing them a 9 kilometre walk to the nearest telephone. This provides a lifeline for families who are separated.

15. Recycling programme:
Recycling programme to assist villagers with selling/bartering old plastic Villagers and school children are paid to bring in old plastic, thus helping in the recycling effort and keeping the villages clean.

16. Women's literacy and empowerment:
Classes are conducted at the Bote School and Tiger Tops Swissair Pre-School at night. The women have raised money to pay 2 young teachers, and meet 6 days a week by candle light and oil lamp. They are proudly learning the basics of reading, writing and doing sums, and are also studying hygiene, women's rights, cultivation, counting money and dealing with wild animal threats.