Chiang Mai Elephants

The amazing adventure continues...

The next Friday, June 17th, after teaching all week, I took an overnight bus (14 hours) to Chiang Mai to meet my sister, Lola and her friend. The plan was to go Elephant trekking on Saturday morning, continue on a hike to a hidden waterfall and then after lunch experience bamboo river rafting ... on a raft of long pieces of bamboo tied together with twine. We were told to leave our stuff on the van and no cameras, unless they were waterproof. So no photos. The chant became, "its not fun if your not wet." WE got soaked!

The elephant Rita and I rode was seasoned... just like us! Really, I guess the word is old, but that just doesn't sound as nice, and "BO" agreed, that was his name and every so often he would just stop and wait for us to feed him some bananas, which of course we did. Bo also did not go along the path with the other elephants, he trudged along to his own beat as we swayed in the rickety wooden seat. I tried to take some video but the bumpy ele-motion made it impossible.
The day was beautiful and the forest incredibly lush and green. It is rainy season now in Thailand, so we did have a downpour at lunch.

Bo also took the short way down to the river. Why go the long way around if you know the shortcut? I guess that is one if the benefits of age, wisdom! After he led the other elephants into the river, he decided to walk along the bank, another senior perk.

 We were lucky enough to have a baby elephant trek with us, he was just adorable and stayed very close to mama. I promised to ride an elephant and so another one gets checked off the list!  Buddha Blessings