Sarah + Mike: Ahh precious elephants

Right so here's the scoop on those gorgeous Ele's. I can't even begin to go into details because everyday there were about a thousand incidents and dramas and amazing things happening and the 9 days felt like 9 glorious months to us! However the basic program is this. In the mornings after brekky we take the elephants for a walk. Yep just like taking out the dogs for a walk, well we do that too as about 20 of them come along as well, for a few hours through the forest. To me that was the best experience, just walking beside those beautiful animals. You're chatting away and suddenly you turn around and there's an enormous beast right behind you, another one by your side and a couple in front.

Then it's back to the ranch where the truck from town pulls up with a few people out there just for the day and bags and bags of fruit. We chop it up and then hand-feed the elephants from a platform. Again a humbling and beautiful experience.

When the elephants have finished it's time for our lunch which is an unbelievably delicious spread of about ten or twelve Thai dishes, mostly vegetarian. If lunch is good, dinner is orgasmic. As Michelle (the Aussie girl who has worked there for 2 years with her hubbie Karl) puts it, "Dinner shits all over lunch". Michelle and Karl are also absolutely amazing people. Michelle deals with all the volunteers and has such knowledge, passion and enthusiasm that you can't help but be fascinated by every word she says. Her ability with people is only surpassed by her ability with elephants... and dogs. Karl is the mahout for Max - one of the tallest elephants in Thailand and a very regal and impressive looking bull - and is so good with him. Their dog is a huge beautiful chocky-coloured beast called Kane who, as alpha dog, lords it up over the whole motley pack.
Karl & Max:

Kane:

After lunch it's off to the river to wash the elephants. Yep get right in there with scrubbing brushes and buckets, it's so much fun. Just so the elephants can throw dirt all over themselves two seconds after getting out... But that's alright because we wash them again just before dinner!

Between the two washings it's just hang out arvo time to either watch the elephants interacting with each other or try to help out the place by doing whatever you can - weeding, planting trees, making signs etc.