Day 7- Elephant Nature Park

The day started out being picked up by the van from the hotel, and Bee our guide informed us about different aspects of the nature park. It was started by Lek in 1995, a girl from a hill tribe village and granddaughter to the village shaman. Her grandfather was given an elephant as payment when she was young and this started a lifelong love for these gentle giants. She was granted government land in 1995 for a few elephants that she had rescued to graze on called Elephant Heaven. A wealthy American couple heard about what she was doing and bought the land that the sanctuary is now based on, over 200 acres in a beautiful valley surrounded by jungle. Her story is truly inspiring, she went from four elephants at Elephant Heaven, to nine elephants at the original Elephant Nature Park. Today there are 34 elephants at the park. These elephants have been rescued from abusive situations or neglect, a minority have been donated to the park by their owners so that they can live out the rest of their lives in peace. Many of the abused and neglected elephants were rescued from illegal logging camps, from the streets of Thailand where they worked along with their owners as beggars, or from trekking companies operated for tourists. The stories behind each of the elephants is truly heartbreaking. A few have stepped on landmines in their lives and blown off half of a foot, many have been forced to breed so many times that their backs are injured and quite a few are blind from when their owners used slingshots to shoot at their eyes for misbehaving.

 The process of "breaking" an elephant so that they can be used to do tricks or work is called phajaan in Thailand, and it takes the baby elephant(usually around 3 or 4 years old) away from its mother for the first time and pens it in a cage too small for it to move, then every time it does move it is beaten. Phajaan literally means "to break the spirit". The video that they showed us on how it is done had me with tears streaming down my face and hiding Reese's face so she couldn't see. It is awful, it is inhumane, it is cruel and I understand that the Thai people think it is necessary to control the elephant, but it was absolutely heartbreaking to watch a clip of it on tv, I can't imagine what its like to watch it in person. The Phajaan lasts anywhere from 3-7 days and nights until the elephant is exhausted, broken and in agony, and from there they are trained. It makes me want to RAGE on someone. 100 years ago there were over 100,000 elephants in Thailand; today there are only 5000, so the "revered elephant" that Thailand apparently holds so dear, is endangered.

Here are some pictures of the park and the buildings that are on it, the park is run by staff but also helped out by volunteers. You can volunteer for the day like we did, or for two days, a week etc etc. I can't wait to return and volunteer one day!

Free to roam

The Bathtub

Inside the main structure

Hallway to the food prep area

Where the people eat :)

looking out to huts/shelters

One of the two feeding areas

The circle of life.......Elephant Graveyard :(

It was absolutely beautiful

One of the elephants sheltering from the rain

There are 30 females and four males on the sanctuary, one has just had a baby and another is pregnant. Elephants are pregnant for two years!! ( can you imagine!?!)
This is a picture of Richard and Reese with their hands on her belly, and we could feel and see the baby moving around!!!!

Each elephant eats about 10% of their body weight every day, and the one elephant weighed 4 tonnes!!!! We fed them pumpkins, bananas, rice mash, and bamboo leaves. Some were eating pineapples too. Each elephant had a specific diet and they were ALL eager to eat!! You put it out and they grabbed it with their trunk and shoved it in their mouth, a few tried to grab the baskets so they could have a free for, and at the end of the feeding you had to hold up the basket to prove that it was empty!! Hilarious :)

The mahouts were with the elephants at all times, they are the ones that train, care for and ride the elephants and are the most knowledgable person for each particular elephant. Some came with the elephant when it was rescued if they had forged a special bond. It was lovely to see them interacting with the elephants.

There was a 1 month old baby named Navaan there, he was a surprise because apparently his mother had not appeared pregnant at all.  The baby was absolutely adorable. Weighing in at a respectable 150kg at 1 month old and gaining 1kg per day on average, he's sure to be a BIG boy when he's grown up. They were isolated in a caged area until it was safe for him to join the herd. Three elderly female elephants were keeping watch outside the cage as each wants the chance to be adopted as his "nanny/auntie" when he emerges!!!

Get ready to squeal!!! Here he is :)

Seriously don't you just want to snuggle with him!?!?!

I think his nose is tired

"AHHH What's that Blond thing?! Hide behind Mama"

"Hey wait a sec, there's a picture of something that looks like me on her shoe!!!"

"Not so scary after all"

And I'm spent

Naptime

Waiting to see who Mama will choose as "Auntie" How fascinating!!!!

interviewing one of the Aunties ;)

I have always loved elephants but I've never been able to be up close and personal with them so this experience was a dream come true for me. They are much gentler, and have much more personality than I'd imagined!
Here are some detail shots of the elephants as well as some of the different elephants in the park.

Using a post as a toothpick :) This is Sao Yai which means Big Girl in Thai. She was born around 1990 and was rescued from an elephant show/trekking in 2011. She is currently one year into her two year pregnancy and was absolutely lovely.  

There are also other rescues at the park including a few hundred dogs(most in the kennelled area across the road but a few wandering in the elephant section!!) and water buffalo.

Symbiotic relationships at their best :)

Next up it was time to help bath the elephants. This was a blast so if you go to ENP prepare for this!! Elephants spray mud on themselves to cool down, keep bugs away and it serves as natural sunscreen for their sensitive skin. As you will see from the pictures they seemed to enjoy getting bathed in the river (I swear in the one picture the elephant is SMILING!!) but then they went from that straight back to the mud pitt and sprayed themselves all over again. FUN GAME!!!! hahaha

Pre-Bath...that is one dirty elephant!

How does one wash an elephant? Throw buckets of water at them!!!!

See what I mean!!!!! They enjoy it :) If that's not an elephant smile I don't know what is!

Getting creative with the water tossing

And we have a clean ear!

i think this is either Mintra or Tilly but I'm leaning towards Tilly. Mintra was hit by a car street begging and hurt her back/hips but I think this is Tilly who has that awkward stance/gait from a forced breeding program/illegal logging. She was born in 1965 and was rescued from a trekking camp(look at the poor thing, how could she do ANY trekking!?) in December 2010.

Splish Splash we were taking a bath

Mae Boon Ma- Which means Merit Comes. Born in 1950 and rescued in 2003. This is unofficially a "white elephant"

Snorkelling

And back out we go to the mud

 

That's better :)

This place couldn't survice without volunteers and donations so if elephants are something that you love and you wish to give to conservation and an elephant sanctuary please visit the website and learn more about the herd and how you can help!!!!! Hey, if you're reading this and you're very wealthy you can pull a Bob Barker and pay the funds to rescue a few elephants, he did :)