I woke up – it was my birthday.  Happy birthday to me!  I open my presents. I got a card from Mum and Dad and Immi, and one from Grandma and Granddad and Lara and Teddy. I got an Ipod and ‘Stitch’ to hang on it, a necklace, friendship bracelet and some lollies.  We then went in a van to the Elephant Park. We fed them, then got on them bare-back and went for a walk in the jungle and then came back and washed them. We went out for dinner and I had tacos!  It was the best birthday ever!

(extract from Phoebe’s diary)

Phoebe’s love of all things involving animals was a bit of a dilemma here in Chiang Mai as it is animal central – the Zoo, the Tiger Kingdom and many, many Elephant parks.  It is always an uneasy decision for me to go to these kind of places – exploitation or not?

I spent a few hours reading through the feedback on Tripadvisor for the various Elephant parks and settled on Baan Chang Elephant Park.  The reviews for this park were consistently high and they didn’t engage the elephants in the practise of pure performance for the tourists by getting the elephants to paint or have the elephants perform by dancing, sitting or standing on two legs.

Our Baan Chang guide took time to explain the plight of the elephants; their loss of habitat and their  future preservation.  The parks twenty-one elephants eat a phenomenal 250-350kg of food each a day (and poop about 70kg back out per day too!). Although the park is run like a tourist business, they seem to display genuine care for the elephants and their environment with minimal exploitation. Each elephant has his or her own Mahout, or handler. The Mahouts live on site and are carefully matched with the elephants personality to ensure a good working relationship.

After getting kitted up in the Thai style loose clothing supplied, our first task was to feed the elephants baskets and baskets of bananas.

Practising mounting and dismounting, and a brief elephant driving lesson were next, followed by an information session and a great lunch.

Our party consisted of only eight; us and two American couples in their mid 20’s.  We rode the elephants bare-back, instead of using the large framed chairs, for an hour and a half through the lush jungle enjoying the scenery and catching glimpses of the rice paddies off in the distance.  Every now and then the elephants would stop to to snatch themselves a treat of bamboo, grass, or leaves from the trees beside the track. While the rider sitting on the elephants neck was safe, the person sitting on the elephants back was warned by the Mahouts to lift their legs as the elephant approached a tree. This proved to be good advice as the elephants always took the opportunity to use a tree to scratch their thick hides, and a human leg wouldn’t last long between a tree and an 3 tonne elephant enjoying a good scratch.

Our trek concluded by taking our elephants to the specially built waterhole or ‘elephant wash’. We cleaned and scrubbed our elephant while they really enjoyed wallowing in the water. In case anyone is wondering, yes – they did use their trunks to suck up water and blow it over us!

We went out for dinner that night by Songthaew literally meaning ‘two rows’ for the two bench seats inside. The ‘red pick-up taxi truck’ can be seen everywhere here in Chiang Mai and they are one form of transport we had not yet tried.

Phoebe enjoyed her Tacos while we reminisced about our fantastic day with the elephants, before heading back  ‘home’ to have the pre-organised birthday cake.

The highlight of the parents day was overhearing Phoebe exclaim to Immi on the way home, “that was the best day ever, wasn’t it?!”.