Aussie/Thai Boy 101: Elephant Riding

Last week on Tuesday we had a day off from the hospital due to a Thai national holiday… so we decided to go to the Maetaman Elephant Camp where other volunteers from our program “Friends for Asia” worked during the week…

Turned out to be an AMAZING day!

When we first arrived, it had been raining all morning, so I was a little worried… I had wanted to ride an elephant since the moment I got off the plane in Thailand, but now it looked like the rain was going to wreck all my fun.

Well, as the day progressed, the weather got better, so I decided there was no better time to do it than now…

UNTIL the lady at the front desk told me it was 1500 baht (~$40-50 USD) to ride an elephant… Well, 1500 baht just wasn’t in my budget, so I had to say no… DISAPPOINTMENT!

So I told the other volunteers what had happened and they told me to just wait till the end of the day… Then I could ask a mahout (elephant trainer) to let me ride for FREE!

Well I waited… and waited… and waited… and then finally at the end of the day, they let me ride… totally FREE! It’s nice being a volunteer and having connections (haha). And not only did I get to ride an elephant, I got to help bathe them in the river and feed them… SHHHHWEEET~

Pretty miraculous day… here some pics to share my adventure.

On top of an elephant!

Maetaman Elephant Camp

Washing/scrubbing the elephants

One of my fav pics

All of us in the river

Feeding Dumbo his elephant snacks...

Coming out of the river

Taking off... ready... set... GO!

Probably the scariest part of the ride... Going DOWN into the river. You're something like 15 ft off the ground... there's really nothing to hold on to... and one wrong move will send you plummeting to the pavement below... eek!