Elephants!

I miss them.

One of the best things we did in Chiang Mai was visit Lanna Kingdom Elephant Sanctuary.  They rescue elephants from riding camps, logging camps, and circuses, and bring them to live peacefully, without being forced to work.  They just eat, play, and roam free.

 

We learned so much, and heard about the elephant hospital in Chiang Mai, and the ambulance used to get them there if needed.  They are so well taken care of at the sanctuary.  It was really sad to see the scars on the elephants from both the riding chair, and tattoos they were given when being forced to work.  Some arrived at the sanctuary with broken backs, and others had holes punched through their ears for riding.

Lanna, the three year old we met, was rescued from the circus, so she still does some things that she was trained to do, like give kisses with her trunk.  She's a fun little girl, with loads of personality.

We love her.

And she loves having a bath!

We mud bathed the elephants; it's very good for their skin, and helps keep bugs away:

Then we washed the mud off in the water, and brushed them:

We wandered around with them, fed them bananas (Lanna liked to steal bananas), made and fed them herbal medicine balls, and pretty much had the best time.

And then we had lunch with a view!

We think a fun retirement gig one day would just be volunteering at the elephant sanctuary.  We can't wait to go back.

Ethical tourism is something that is really important to us, so we definitely did our research before going on this trip.  Getting our picture taken with drugged up tigers, or or gawking at the people of the long-neck tribe seems so wrong to us; there are also crocodile shows, monkey shows, snake kingdoms, etc., but we had no interest in supporting these unethical businesses.  If you're ever in Northern Thailand, and want to spend time with animals, I highly recommend Lanna Kingdom Elephant Sanctuary.

What's your favourite animal?