Look Ma, No Hands!

So i don't have an snl or Dr. Seuss reference for elephants, but I do have elephant jokes!!! just kidding. I won't waste blog space with those (yet)... And I swear that I will post pictures of all of these adventures as soon as I have access to a not-public computer that has usb drives.

Anyhow...we rode elephants today, and it was awesome! The place we went is a sort of conservation/rescue mission, but the elephants that we rode were domesticated. According to the literature, domesticated elephants are mostly used for logging, and compared to that, hauling around a couple of tourons (tourist/morons) and getting to play in the river is a pretty sweet deal. In fact, most of the elephants at Elephant Village (where we were) came from the logging industry (we think), and it seems like many of the mahouts have been with their elephants for a long time.

What was it like? Surprisingly easy. You ride on the back of their neck, and even though their shoulders kind of jostle you up and down, you can perch your knees on their ears and your feet on their shoulders and you basically ride it like you would a horse.

When we first arrived, we took a short walk in a seat on the elephant's back. Our elephant was named Mae San, and her mahout (owner) Pan. Riding in the seat was actually a bit scary at times, because it just was, but on this ride, we went down to the river, and in the river, Mr. Pan turned to me and asked if I would like to ride on her neck. Umm, of course. So we switched places. And riding on her neck was soo wonderful. Scary at first, because of the wobbliness, but I was sitting on an elephant's neck! Her ears were flapping against my legs and she was curling her trunk and splashing water around!! Then, after a while, we switched and Liz got to ride on her neck.

We got back to the main camp (which is actually pretty spiffy--kind of reminded me of a new exhibit at the Sedgwick County Zoo), and learned how to command an elephant, Mae Uak. Bai--go; How--stop; Sie--left; Qua--right; Dun--back up (I'm guessing at the spelling here). Sung--I want to get up (so the elphants lifts his front leg and you use it as a step to hop on her back). Hep--I want to get down, so the elephant knows you're hopping off. A short ride bareback around the main camp (alone!) where we got to feed her some sugarcane, and then lunch.

After lunch, we rode bareback style--one person to an elephant, with the mahout--down to the river to bathe the elephants. And by bathe, I mean that we basically went swimming with elephants! The elephant that I was on this time was Mae Pua, and her mahout's name was Lam. Mae Pua was a feisty little bugger. She took her time on the bank of the river, but once she was in the water, there was no stopping her. She particularly enjoyed ducking under the water (and bringing me along with her!). To bathe her, we splashed water on her head, and i used a brush to scrub at her skin. Not sure how effective my scrubbing was. Her skin was pretty thick and grimy, but I think that she liked the way it felt. Also, she liked the dunking.

Halfway through, Liz and I switched elephants, so I was back on Mae San with Pan. And once Liz got on Mae Pua's back, there was no stopping the dunking. up and down and up and down they went, so Liz got soaked. But the mahouts were sort of egging Mae Pua on, I think, because each time she dunked her head, they laughed uproariously.

Anyhow, we finished bathing after a while, and took the elephants back to their food station. Then we went on a boat ride down the river to end the day, which helped us dry off a bit. Also, it was gorgeous.

OK, I can't resist: What's grey and lights up? An electric elephant!

What's the difference between an elephant and a plum? Their color!

What did Tarzan say when he saw the elephants coming down the path? "Here come the elephants down the path!"

What did Jane say? "Here come the plums!" (She was colorblind).