7 January 2018
There are a few places in Chiang Mai where one could get up close and personal with elephants and a morning at the Lanna Kingdom Elephant Sanctuary is probably the best. This sanctuary is opened by Mr. Pop, the owner of Lanna Kingdom Tours who had provided us with excellent private tour services during my previous trip to Chiang Mai, back in December 2014.
This time round, I booked a 2 Days 1 Night private tour for my travelling group of 3 couples. Lanna Kingdom Elephant Sanctuary was our first stop on the first day.
The site is located in rural Northeast Thailand next to a river, with beautiful rice paddies and stunning mountain views as the backdrop. We were picked up by Arm, our guide and Boon, our driver at 8 AM from our hotel in Chiangmai.
During the hour long drive to the sanctuary, Arm provided us with general information about the African and Asiatic elephants. African elephants are much larger and cannot be tamed. All the elephants in Thailand are the much smaller Asiatic elephants. He also provided important safety information (e.g. don’t stand directly behind an elephant) and simple commands (in Thai!) that we would need to know when we interact with the elephants later.
An important fact I learnt is that the Asiatic elephant has a skeleton structure that not designed to carry load on its back. Elephant riding can contribute to long-term physical injuries for the animals and is hence cruel and to be discouraged.
Oops! I did elephant riding many years ago when I was not aware of this fact. Not any more from this day onwards.
The elephants at the sanctuary were rescued elephants that came from circus, logging camps or elephant riding camps. There is even one who was rescued from a logging camp in Burma. This elephant from Burma does not understand the Thai language commands, so we were not allowed to interact with it.
After being bought by Mr Pop, these rescued elephants are free to roam around on his huge property (no chains!) and are well taken care of by their personal caregivers. Each elephant has a dedicated mahout or caregiver, a one to one relationship.
We were the first group to arrive at the site. After changing into the provided mahout clothes and plastic clogs for our feet, we were given a forearm “tattoo” of our names in the Thai language. The Thai language has 44 consonants, 15 vowel symbols that comprise 32 vowels. The alphabet also has 5 tones: low, mid, high, falling, rising. With these, it is possible to translate English with only 26 letters into Thai easily. The mahouts who don’t speak English could call out our names very accurately using these Thai alphabets. Amazing.
Mr Pop gave us a briefing on the goals of the sanctuary: To rescue elephants, educate people, and support local communities.
Group photo with Mr Pop (second from right), owner of the Lanna Kingdom Elephant Sanctuary.
Elephants eat 136 kilogram of food a day and one big challenge of running the sanctuary is securing enough funding and revenue to cover operational costs.
Then the moment we were all waiting for. A first meeting with an adult female elephant.
This elephant is actually pregnant. Elephants have a gestation period of almost 2 years!
All the elephants at the sanctuary are female and all are adults, except for the 2 year old baby elephant called Lanna!
Lanna was rescued from a circus and is very adorable.
Everyone is charmed by “Spicy” Lanna, the mischievous 2 year old baby elephant.
Elephants have a lifespan quite like human and the 2 year old Lanna is just like a human toddler at that age. Full of energy, greedy for food, playful and mischievous.
Each couple were each given a basket of bananas to feed the adult elephants. Hearing the command “Bon”, the elephant will raise its trunk and we could stuff food directly into its mouth.
Inserting a banana into the elephant’s waiting mouth.
The elephant has no front teeth, so it is perfectly safe. No one lost any fingers and I actually got to touch the silky smooth tongue of the elephant.
Elephants are intelligent animals and love to be praised. “Dee dee” is the praise word to use as positive reinforcement when they respond correctly to our commands. They loved to be patted on their foreheads too. They have thick skin and we have to pat hard for them to feel the pat.
We were to pat the area where there is no hair. Elephant hairs are very course and hard. A few hands were slightly pricked.
After feeding, we walked with the elephants to the river for their drinks.
Next up, we were to make medicine balls for the elephants. Ingredients are tamarind, sugar cane, bananas and a little salt. These were pounded in a mortar until we got a paste, made into sticky balls and then fed to the elephants to aid their digestion.
Making medicine balls for the elephants at Lanna Kingdom Elephant Sanctuary.
Feeding the medicine balls to Lanna, after giving the “Bon” command.
Next activities were the mud spa and bath for the elephants, and a chance to get really muddy and wet.
Coating Lanna the baby elephant with mud.
Bathing the adult elephant at their “swimming pool”.
We were given ample time to have a good shower, changed back to our clean clothes before being served a vegetarian lunch, consisting of Pad Thai (stir fried rice noodles with bean sprouts, eggs and spring onions), water melon and something called “elephant poop crackers”. Just a name for the crispy rice crackers. I am sure there is no elephant by products in the crackers.
The only thing missing from our lunch is a cup of hot coffee. Arm and Boon brought us to a nice coffee joint nearby for our caffeine fix before proceeding on with our private tour.
Overall, everyone in the group, even those who has a fear of animals, enjoyed the interactions with the gentle and intelligent elephants in the sanctuary. It was great to see the efforts made to make their remaining lives better, allow people to learn more about these animals and create awareness on the cruelty of elephant ridings.
A great day out with good friends at the elephant sanctuary.
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