Elephant Walk

Elephants have always been special in this culture, partly because their life is so similar to our own. Gestation is 22 months, after which the mothers goes off by herself and a 'midwife' elephant to give birth. The midwife removes the amniotic sack and gives the baby a chance to stand on all four feet - the equivalent of our baby's crying. They spend 5 years with their mother, 10 years in training, their prime years are 25-40 and a domesticated elephant is retired at age 60. The population is declining since teak wood logging is illegal, more traffic accidents, stepping on land mines, and few reproduce in captivity. Their primary use today is for tourism. The elephant controller is called a Mahout. An elephant will only tolerate one or two mahouts, so typically this passes from father to son.

Elephant walk

We watched them bathe the elephants in the river, followed by a show where the elephants showed how they were used in the logging industry, how their mahouts mounted the elephants, playing soccer, and painting.
Then came our elephant ride through the nearby forest for an hour. It was a slow paced trot with the mahout mounted on the head of the elephants and us on a chair behind. Periodically we stopped for a feeding booth, for 20 Baht (60 cents) we got sugar cane and bananas, fuel for our trip. It was a unique experience.
Then we took a bamboo raft, poling down the Ping River. Mary was worried that she couldn't get up and down on the low wooden seat after knee surgery, but she made it.
In the afternoon, I walked to the old city, still surrounded by a moat with some of the city wall still standing. Wat Chedi Luang built in 1391 is the tallest temple in Thailand. It's an interesting ruin with elephants on the side and an 80 meter spire. Nearby was a beautiful modern temple.

Wat Chedi Luang

In the evening, we sampled teas from various herbs and walked through a herb garden. Then a cruise down the Ping River from the suburbs back into the city. The highlight was the lighting of a Kom Loi - a balloon made of rice paper and powered by burning bamboo. We let it go and watched it soar high into the sky for over 10 minutes.

Lighting our Kom Loi