I must admit, elephants make good photo models. There are probably too many photos here, but I already deleted several hundred.
Ethical Elephant Tours
There is a great deal of debate about which tour is the most ethical. From a Western perspective, we can rule out riding of elephants for sure. Many tourist don’t care. We heard that some elephants, like people, don’t like to be touched. Many tours allow touching, even if they purport to not. Apparently, some elephants don’t mind it. We also heard that it is unethical to swim with them and give them mud baths. Many tours advertise this. Having watched the placoderms poop in the water, not sure this is our cup of tea. We opted for a “watch” tour.
In Thailand, there are about 3500 wild elephants, and 3500 domestic elephants. The former hang out in national parks, and are really the only “pure” ethical way to see elephants, albeit without guarantee that you will see any. The domestic elephants tend to be rescues from logging, circuses, street begging, and calves born in captivity.
Did you know that elephants sweat near their toenails. Or that elephants eat about 10% of their body weight daily. Here is a link to a fact sheet from the Elephant Jungle Sanctuary.
We started with a bumpy 1.5 hour ride south of Chang Mai to the park. Our half day tour was in the first park with 5 elephants, the oldest being 76 years old. We had a brief lecture on elephants, then cut a bunch of squash and watermelons to feed them.
Then the elephants were fed bunches of corn stalks.
We go on a walk with the elephants.
Lunch
Bathing
