One of our favorite excursions during our first year of world travel was spending an afternoon caring for elephants, so without a doubt, we knew our first activity to kick off our new round of world travel just had to be another day spent with elephants.
We were pleased to discover that even more elephant owners were embracing the “Saddle off” program in Thailand. Instead of the elephants being used for tourist rides, stunts, and labor, the owners are now letting the animals roam free. Tourists can pay to spend a day with the elephants feeding them, walking with them, and maybe even helping them with a bath. The day is totally up to the elephants.
This time, we selected the Majestic Elephant Project. Our tour guide was the owner of three elephants that had been handed down to him by his parents. While his parents had used the elephants for tourist riding and hard labor in the past, he recently decided to embrace the more elephant friendly saddle off program. After driving about an hour from Chiang Mai in a comfortable van, we switched to the bed of a truck to get transported on dirt roads into the forest to meet the elephants.
Nothing quite prepares you for the adrenaline rush of walking up to an elephant and offering food. Although we had done this previously, our hearts were still pounding with a nervous excitement as we approached them for the first time.
Once you give an elephant a banana, you become BFFs. Taking them for a walk through the jungle was easy because they would just follow you and your bag of treats.
They are such sweet animals and really are quite careful not to run you over during the walk. They just hope you keep feeding them the bananas and sugar cane.
They’ll even pose for selfies knowing they’ll be rewarded with a treat.
Asian elephants are the second largest land mammals after African elephants, and we are always surprised by how quietly they walk. Who would have thought that a 10,000 lbs. animal could sneak up on you and steal a banana without you knowing!?!?!
Sometimes, the sunshine became more attractive to the elephant than the bananas, and they would stop for a break to soak up the warmth.
After we ran out of bananas and sugar cane, the elephant trainers cut down some banana trees for the elephants to munch on. We were mesmerized watching them stomp on the trees and use their trunk to break it down to elephant bite-sized pieces.
After the elephants got their fill, it was our turn for lunch. We were taught how to make our own Pad Thai!
This was some of the best pad thai we’ve had too! We were super impressed with the food spread that the elephant owner provided. In addition to the giant plate of pad thai, we also got stir-fried vegetables with rice, fried spring rolls, honey roti, and one of our favorite Thai treats, Khao Tom Mud (coconut sticky rice with banana and beans stuffed in a banana leaf).
After lunch, our next task was to help make the elephants’ favorite afternoon snack, tamarind rice balls. Our guide dumped all the ingredients into a giant tub to mix together including rice, nuts, seeds, bananas, tamarind, and even some of our leftover lunch bits. He explained that not only do the elephants love these treats, but they also help with the elephant’s digestion.
Once he had it all mixed together, we dug in to help form the mixture into balls.
One interesting fact that we learned was that the elephants prefer to take the sugar cane and bananas from you with their trunk so that they can smell it to make sure it is good before eating it. However, they are totally trusting of the tamarind rice balls. So, we were told we could just plop the yummy morsels right into their mouth.
I was a little nervous to put my hand in the strong elephant’s jaws and was quite shocked when I got licked.
In addition to the tamarind rice balls, we were given a large barrel of chopped-up watermelon to feed the elephants. They just never stop eating!
The owner told us that he really struggled to keep them fed during COVID times when there were no tourists. This model of elephant tourism is a humane way for him to make a living AND to help keep the elephants fed.
After the tamarind rice ball excitement, we strolled to the river to see if the elephants were interested in taking a bath. The day was a bit cool by elephant standards, so they weren’t super interested in swimming but did take the opportunity to get some water.
As we were watching them in the river, one of them walked toward me while my back was against a rock.
At first, I was a bit nervous that she would squish me, but she stopped just in front of me. I’d like to think she was coming over to say thank you for the tamarind rice balls.
We continued to watch them as they did funny elephant things. Butt scratches on rocks…
Bathing in mud instead of the freshwater river…
Seeing the elephants just going about their day in the jungle was such a delight.
Our final thrill of the day was actually a bit of whitewater rafting. We sadly said goodbye to our new elephant friends and were transported to a new spot where we picked up our boats, an experienced river tour guide, and the appropriate gear. Our river tour guide from Myanmar was quite funny, so his humor entertained us during the calm sections of the river while his skill made us feel safe during the rough patches.
Floating through the Thailand jungle passing by villages and other elephants doing their thing was a pleasant way to finish off the tour.
The whitewater rafting was the icing on the cake of an absolutely amazing afternoon spent making friends with elephants. We highly recommend the Majestic Elephant Project. The tour guide/elephant owner was on top of his game and made the experience easy and enjoyable. The homemade lunch was delicious, and learning to make our own pad thai was fun. Elephants certainly are majestic creatures, and we are so lucky to have had the opportunity to hang out with them again.
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