Elephant World
Thursday was completely awesome! Tara booked us a day at Elephant World, which is a sanctuary for elephants from the logging and tourist industries about three hours outside of Bangkok.
The sanctuary has over 30 elephants, most of which are female. Each elephant has a mahout or caretaker who spends almost 24 hours a day with their elephant. All the elephants know each other by sight and smell, and all the staff can tell them apart, as well.
When we arrived we were told the rules: no selfies (the animals may mistake them as food, which could be bad for obvious reasons), don't touch the littlest baby because it's only 2 weeks old, don't go up to an elephant by yourself, and stay away from any elephants with red rope (they're dangerous).
Our first activity was to feed four of the elephants. Our tour guide, Betty, said that they are some of the younger elephants and they like to stay together as a little clique. Our group called them the mean girls from then on because they wouldn't let any other elephants into their group. The oldest in the group was Nemochi who acted as the matriarch and leader. The youngest was Spy who's only seven years old. I was surprised at myself because I was apprehensive about feeding and being near the elephants. I'm not usually the type to be afraid of animals, but elephants are HUGE. And obviously i knew that before, but seeing them and being that close was a different experience. Also, their trunks are weird and kind of freak me out. They move everywhere and are so useful and versatile, but I can't help thinking that they're huge snakes attached to a gigantic, intelligent elephant. Luckily, I got over that fast and had a great time feeding them and playing with them all day.
Then, we went over to the babies. There were two, one was two weeks old (which we couldn't touch), and the other was two months old - he was very playful and we could touch him. We fed the moms some bananas to help with lactation. Although the babies couldn't eat real food yet, the older one would pick up bananas and put them in his mouth to practice using his trunk. They were adorable!
The sanctuary has over 30 elephants, most of which are female. Each elephant has a mahout or caretaker who spends almost 24 hours a day with their elephant. All the elephants know each other by sight and smell, and all the staff can tell them apart, as well.
When we arrived we were told the rules: no selfies (the animals may mistake them as food, which could be bad for obvious reasons), don't touch the littlest baby because it's only 2 weeks old, don't go up to an elephant by yourself, and stay away from any elephants with red rope (they're dangerous).
Our first activity was to feed four of the elephants. Our tour guide, Betty, said that they are some of the younger elephants and they like to stay together as a little clique. Our group called them the mean girls from then on because they wouldn't let any other elephants into their group. The oldest in the group was Nemochi who acted as the matriarch and leader. The youngest was Spy who's only seven years old. I was surprised at myself because I was apprehensive about feeding and being near the elephants. I'm not usually the type to be afraid of animals, but elephants are HUGE. And obviously i knew that before, but seeing them and being that close was a different experience. Also, their trunks are weird and kind of freak me out. They move everywhere and are so useful and versatile, but I can't help thinking that they're huge snakes attached to a gigantic, intelligent elephant. Luckily, I got over that fast and had a great time feeding them and playing with them all day.
Then, we went over to the babies. There were two, one was two weeks old (which we couldn't touch), and the other was two months old - he was very playful and we could touch him. We fed the moms some bananas to help with lactation. Although the babies couldn't eat real food yet, the older one would pick up bananas and put them in his mouth to practice using his trunk. They were adorable!
Next we took a truck ride to a different part of the sanctuary to cut up some green bananas and make some sticky rice to feed to the old elephants later. On the way we got to see some elephants bathing in the river.
Then we had lunch (delicious traditional Thai food) and saw some more elephants. I still can't believe how many there were at the sanctuary. They were just walking around, talking to each other, eating, bathing, scratching on trees, and trying to find some shade to nap in. And, as always, there were some stray dogs (and a couple who belonged to the staff) lounging around as well.
As we walked over to the next activity, we noticed that the younger baby elephant and its mom were out of their pen on a walk. We got to go over and see them together then.
After that, we went back down to where we had cooked the bananas and rice and made rice balls covered in protein for an old elephant, Malee. Malee (beautiful flower) had been a tourist elephant who worked on the streets of Bangkok and Phuket. Working in big cities is very harmful for elephants because they can hear far away and the noises of the city can hurt their ears. Also, elephants can communicate through ground vibrations and stomping, so the constant motion and vibrations of cities aren't good either. Malee was hit by a car in Bangkok and her back left leg was severely injured. She still prefers to stand on three legs and keep weight off that leg because it never properly healed.
Malee didn't want all of the rice balls, so we also fed some to the oldest elephant there who is 88. In the wild, Asian elephants usually only live to around 70. Then all of their teeth fall out and they are unable to find anything they can eat. In captivity, however, mahouts and other caregivers are able to feed them and they have a longer lifespan. When we fed them the rice balls, we bypassed placing them in their trunks and put them straight into their mouths!
After feed the old elephants, we went to give the four "mean girls" a mud bath. The pit where you do that was unusually deep and everyone kept sinking into the mud. By the end all the people and elephants were covered in mud, so we went to wash off in the river. We didn't get any pictures in the mud because we didn't want to risk our phones.
In the river, we scrubbed the elephants and splashed water on them to get them clean. Skin maintenance is very important for elephants, and they do this type of thing in the wild, too. In return, the mahouts got the elephants to spray us with water from their trunks. Then, we got to jump off a 10 foot high dock into the river and swim with the elephants some more. The river and mud bath were definitely the most fun and my favorite part of the day.
Amazing! How wonderful!
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