Phuket, Thailand and the Elephant Safari

On another day Miles and I went with Siam Safari to an elephant camp. We got to ride an elephant through the jungle, and meet and play with some fabulous baby elephants, and also learn a lot about history and culture of the people of Thailand including daily life.

This was our elephant. We could not understand her name. Sad. But she was a happy girl and very sweet. Her Mahout (keeper) talked to her the entire trek. We laughed ourselves occasionally because he had full on conversations with her and occasionally laughed and laughed at whatever it was he said in Thai as if he was telling her jokes. We chuckled at how cute that was and how funny it sounded as we did not understand a word of it and yet the elephant must have because she responded very well to his calming voice and his funny stories.
I love her toes! Aren't they pretty?
Our elephant was hungry the entire trip and made frequent stops along the trek through the jungle for light snacks. This was a huge grassy hill that our tall elephant was eye level with and her trunk could reach the "good stuff".
We loved being able to talk to her ourselves and touch her. She was very rough and hairy all over. We found out that she was only 7 years old. Elephants are born with very dark skin and lighten and get more wrinkly and spotted as they get older. She was still very dark skinned and oh so pretty!!!

My new friend.

Pretty eyes! Her finger at the tip of her trunk she used to point directly to the baskets of food. She knew she deserved a snack of watermelon and bananas. She was so smart!

After our ride we got to go to the baby elephant camp. It was one of our favorite little adventures on this safari. We met three babies there who did all sorts of things to entertain us and introduce us to who they were. They were well fed and very well taken care of.
Hello Baby elephants!
The elephants did tricks for us. Here they were being introduced to us as they walked around a ring holding each other's tails. Their "Mahouts" (mah-hoots) meaning "keeper" walk along side them and are the caregivers or personal trainers. Each elephant has his own Mahout who has been with them since they were little...some since they were born. A very trusted and respected honorable position to be an elephants Mahout. They kicked and caught soccer balls to us! Yes, we were playing soccer with baby elephants. It was incredible! The little one kicked a ball rather hard and straight to Miles. He caught the ball and handed it back to Baby.

And if that was not cool enough, they played harmonica too!!! All three of them at once played their version of their 'song" which was wild and crazy and all over the place but the baby had a final note that was a perfect clear note that rang out in a finale and it was so cute, and quite funny. These lil guys were so clever! And so proud of themselves!
This elephant's name was Hutchu. He was so talented. He painted pictures with many colors. The Thai taught them colors that also correlated with the days of the week. Hutchu was very excited to paint and used several bright colors to paint us a very lovely painting. Yes, we bought it and are so excited to show it off to you all when we get home. **

Lastly, they waved goodbye to us with little red handkerchiefs and seemingly blew us kisses with their trunks. So sweet!!!! Sa wat dee kah, baby elephant!

You can check out all the videos of the elepahants and their tricks on the next post.

We even got to feed them! The little one LOVED bananas and watermelon...and was quite grabby. Hutchu on the other hand (far right there) was doing a funny little dance the whole time...shaking his backside as if to say, look at me...i am cute too....I want watermelon. It was so funny. We fed all three of them and it was so satisfying.


After waving goodbye to the baby elephant camp we went on to see other parts of the camp set up in stations and got ourselves an education about the daily life of those who live there. Cooking, plowing, harvesting....it was amazing!
One of the other amazing things we got to see was how to extract the milk from freshly shredded coconut. SQUEEEEZE it! Who knew? To make the oil we learned that they boil the freshly squeezed milk for 6 hours! We got to taste it at every step of the process and it was oh so good!
Petting the buffalo. He really was sweet even after he worked very hard plowing the fields, he was willing to pose nicely for us to take a picture. All he wanted to do was jump in the mud and cool off.
It was rather hot and we cooled off with some Thai coffee with coconut milk at the bottom. It was some seriously good coffee. Wish I had the recipe to share.
We watched a woman harvest rice (jasmine) which was an amazing process. I had no idea rice came in so many colors and was so wonderfully fragrant. They showed us how to hand mix Thai spices and meat and fresh pinapple and mix it in with fresh rice....It was delicious!
I was amazed at all the colors.

This trip was such an amazing journey. The things we got to experience were once in a lifetime and the memories made here in Thailand will be treasured. It was a magical place with hospitalble people, amazing food, jungles, and water in shades of blue I had never seen before. It was wonderful and we recommend this place and experience to everyone. GO!

(Don't forget to check back again soon for all the videos. They are uploading now)

-Jenny

**Hutchu's painting is now framed in our home. Photos of that to come!