Elephant Nature Park was started up in 1999 by a woman named Lek who made it her life’s work to rescue and take care abused elephants. The success of the park can be attributed to an incredible marketing campaign; The Elephant Nature Park has been covered by National Geographic, Animal Planet, and the BBC among others. Stars including Meg Ryan have come here. The result of all this publicity is that Elephant Nature Park has received donations from very generous donors and can count on Western Volunteers to do much of the labour (paying volunteers I should add). The park is a nature haven, not only do they have Elephants, there are also dogs, goats, and water buffalo, all living together and cared for in this park.
We arrived at the park at about 9:30 am and had about 15 minutes to meet the elephants. The 31 elephants are here due to many different reasons: victims of landmines, inflicted blindness, drugging, poaching, car accidents, or sometimes just general neglect. At about 10 am they were ready for the 1st feeding of the elephants. We ended up feeding Lilly, an elephant who had been hooked on amphetamines. Her previous owner had fed her drugs to keep her working through fatigue.
Lilly is a docile elephant who eats slower than most. We fed her pineapples, sugar cane, and bananas, while patting her huge trunk. The Park has profiles on each elephant which are worth looking at; elephants are different, just like people, with different likes and dislikes, different temperaments and fears. Lilly for example is afraid of other animals, especially dogs.
After the feedings, it was time to bring the elephants down to the river for bathing time.
After bathing, the elephants have “fun time” in the mud pool. You ever been to a dog park where the dogs are going crazy running around and jumping over each other? Elephants do the same.
We had lunch, were shown a video about the history and role of elephants in Thai culture, then repeated the same routine in the afternoon – once more feeding Lilly, then watching the elephants bathing in the river.
At 5 pm it was time to go. The elephants were back in their kralls (they walk there by themselves, familiar with their daily routine), and the goats and water buffalo were likewise back in their enclosures. As we left we saw the dogs getting fed by the volunteers.
The tour isn’t cheap, we paid 2500 baht each, including pick-up from Chiang Dao. It’s easy to criticize Elephant Nature park for it’s success. One would hope that other Elephant parks and camps get their fair share of money for their elephants. Do poor locals resent the fact that foreigners pour money and effort in helping wild animals over people? How about the historical role of the elephant as workers – here they are getting pampered by rich Western tourists. It raises a lot of questions. The park re-iterates that money goes to educating the local population and that it funds different projects in villages. But the bottom line is that Elephant Nature Park has worked tirelessly doing good in the world, helping not only elephants but also other animals. For that I’ll always be happy to dole out a bit of cash.
You can book a tour to Elephant Nature Park here
Have you been the Elephant Nature Park?
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I see photo’s of someone riding AND standing on the Elephants. WTF? I thought this was considered a bad practice? These photo’s don’t make me feel they are any different than the other places that abuse Elephants.
Those are the mahouts who take care of the elephants. I’m sorry, but people like you just have no idea what you are talking about…
I know who and what a Mahout is. The point is why are they preaching about how detrimental riding an elephant is and then show the Mahout standing on them and riding them? Possible you’re the one who has no idea!
Go anywhere in the world and you’ll see elephants with huge carriages on their backs with 2 or 3 tourists on board. That’s bad.
Mahouts take care of elephants, ride bareback, and barely weigh 100 lbs if that…
Animal welfare is one thing, animal extremists is another.
It doesn’t get any better than at Elephant Nature Park. It gets tons of money from sponsors and tourists and because of that they don’t have to make money giving rides to tourists. Elephant conservation in Thailand at ENP is the best you can find in Thailand, most likely anywhere in Asia, and if you can find fault in what they do you then you must be one of the few people in the world who do.
Sounds like a great way to get up, close, and personal with the elephants. Very interesting post and you raised some interesting points at the end of the article! BTW, love the pic of ‘the kiss’…looks like you got some competition, Frank!! 😉 haha…just joking!!
Thanks for the comment Constance!