Elephant World

We spent a whole day at Elephant World, which is an organisation in Kanchanaburi that takes care of unwanted and old elephants in Thailand. This was something we had been excited to do for a long time. It is basically a place where people come to work for the elephants, rather than the elephants working for people. Some of the elephants had been abused and treated very harshly by their previous owners. The oldest one was 73 and the youngest (John) is 15 years old. They are the hugest but one of the most beautiful animals I have ever seen.

We made sticky rice for the old elephants and fed it to them, which they loved. We also did some field work, collecting sugar canes for them to eat. Fed them about a billion bananas (they eat a lot), and took part in all their medical care for the day. You can really notice how the elephants are really happy and appropriated everything that is done for them. My favorite part of the day was when the elephants were taking a bath and we joined them, giving them a scrub on the back. They were playing around and sometimes even going under the water that it was hard staying on their back, very funny.

Then they let us ride on their back up to the ‘house’ where they get fed more bananas. This is one of the best experiences I have had in my life. The work that the volunteers and everyone at this organisation are doing is just fantastic, and it was amazing to get up, close and personal with these incredible creatures.