Flashback Friday: Elephants

I wanted to make sure that some of these Flashbacks had memories of Dallas in them as well...he was feeling a little neglected.

Today's flashback goes back to the summer of 2009 when, for our one year anniversary, we traveled all over Thailand for a few weeks.  Dallas served his mission in Thailand and it was so much fun to hear him speaking the language with locals and recounting stories from when he lived there.

After a rather long string of flights from San Francisco to Tokyo to Bangkok to Chaing Mai, we settled into our hotel and crashed for a few hours.  We then caught a ride out to the Maetaman Elephant Camp in the nearby jungle.  It was easily one of the most fun activities we were able to do while in Thailand, because it was so unique, very touristy, but I can't blame them for targeting the masses.

The tour started with an amazing show, where elephants were brought out and given paint brushes, paint, and a canvas.  It was incredible to watch an elephant literally paint a self portrait with it's trunk as a hand.  The trainers taught us about eating and sleeping habits, and answered any questions for the audience. The show continued with a few stunts and ended with the elephants coming into the audience to collect tips with their trunks.

After the show, we were taken on our very own elephant ride through the jungle.  We rode for over an hour through some of the most gorgeous land I had ever seen.  We had to cross through the river twice, which was fun to watch the elephants submerge up to their bellies and see boats floating by.  Dallas also was able to feed our elephant.  His trunk kept swinging up and back, which was a definite sign for food.  They have them trained so well to where they will pose for pictures if you feed them.  I'm sure it's just another ploy to get money, because we had to pay for the food, but I thought it was totally worth it from the pictures we were able to get!

After the elephant ride you have the option of taking a traditional bamboo raft down the river.  Even though I thought the littlest move was going to capsize the bamboo sticks, it served it's purpose.  

I loved seeing all the elephants getting baths along the river's edges.  It is very common for trainers to be raised and work with one elephant for most of it's life.  The boys in the picture below, looked to be maybe in their early teens, laughing and playing with their elephants.  It was a pretty amazing thing to watch.

I absolutely love traveling and I am SO grateful I married someone with that same love.  It's been fun to think and plan all sorts of adventures we want to have over the course of our life together.  This was just hopefully one of many of our firsts.