Why do they call this Elephant Island?

This morning Laurel and I were picked up bright and early and taken to the Ban Chang Thai Elephant riding place. As with the snorkeling yesterday, we were picked up by a little pick up truck and driven down the treacherous roads to the area where they did the elephant ride tours.

It was just us this time, so we didn't have to shove in next to any giant Dutch people or annoyed looking Thai women (^_^)

The area was right next to the forest and there were large shelters for the elephants on 2 sides of a large open square. Between the two long shelters was a tall platform to help people get on the elephants. We climbed up the stairs and they brought our elephant, Sidiporn, a 33 year old elephant, around for us to get on.

We rode on this big saddle, seat thing and the elephant trainer guy sat on the elephant's neck. The trainer guy didn't even need to use the steps to climb up onto the elephant, but had developed enough of a relationship to where the elephant would just bend it's leg and help the trainer up onto his back.

The trainer carried a small tool like a hammer, but with a long sharp curved end just in case the elephant got out of control. He hung it on the elephant's ear as we made our way into the jungle and sat rather bored looking on the neck of the elephant. Every once and a while the elephant would stop to eat something or try to go off the path and he would speak to it, telling it to stop messing around. The elephant was very cooperative actually. They seemed to understand each other quite well.

I couldn't help feeling a tad bit foolish sitting on the back of this elephant trekking through the jungle with a Thai man urging it along the path. I find that living in a foreign country has intensified my "White Guilt." I often feel like apologizing for being excited about something that is different to me or for being capable of paying $20 to ride an elephant for 2 hours. The feeling is generally easy to suppress, but it is sometimes awkward. Riding along on the back of an elephant with a guide who spoke very little English (and me speaking zero Thai), I was the epitome of a tourist, which is something I try to avoid here in Japan.

Even though I felt kind of silly, I really enjoyed myself. Riding an elephant is an interesting experience. You are very aware of the power the animal below you has, mostly as a result of its size, but it is so large that it cannot move quickly. It is also a sweet animal in general. And as we found later, they are quite playful.

Our guide took us through the jungle and at one point jumped down and took pictures of us, while calling the elephant to continue along the path. Then, we circled around and went over the road and over to where they have a river. At the river we got off and then they took away the bench/saddle we had been sitting on. Our guide changed into his swimming shorts and then helped us get onto the bare back of the elephant for swimming. He led it into the water and the girl employee took pictures from the tall platform on the other side of the river.

This is when the elephant got a bit mischievous. It seemed to really enjoy the river and delighted in trying to "buck" us off its back. Laurel and I both fell off the first time it dove under water. The guide swam around us talking to the elephant and we finally realized that he was encouraging it. He was telling it to dive and then to blow water at us. Even so, it was really fun.

The elephant tried to avoid going back out of the water and kept swimming away from our guide, who was grabbing onto its ears. It was really funny to watch the two of them battle it out.

When it was over they gave us free pineapple and water and tried to sell us photos they had taken of us on our trip. Again, I was struck with feelings of guilt. They were horribly over priced, but they had framed the photos to try to get us to buy them and I couldn't help feeling that the 2 men were talking about us being rich snobs as they walked away...

After that we went back to our hotel to shower (it did not sound like fun getting on a plane smelling like elephant...for me or whoever was stuck next to me) and check out. We then decided to get a bit of food before heading to relax on the beach. We were both too shy to go up to any restaurants so we ended up getting some stuff from one of the private fruit stands. One of the fruits had a spiky reddish skin, sort of like the koosh balls we used to play with when we were kids, that revealed a white, kind of chewy fruit with a very mild flavor. It was really good. Another fruit was in a harder brown shell with pointy spikes on it. It had a peach colored fruit inside that I didn't like at all. We also got one of the big, really bright pink fruits.

We stopped into 7Eleven for some drinks and the moment we stepped outside, the hot sunny weather changed suddenly to rain. It was a light rain at first but as we reached our hotel across the street, it began to pour.

That ruined our beach plans, but it didn't really matter. We sat in the open air lobby of the hotel and read as the rain became more like a deluge. The peacocks took refuge in there with us.

The rain stopped about 30 minutes later and the skies were clear so we went back to the beach. We were enjoying the sun until one of the porters came to tell us our bus had come early so we ran off to head back to Trat so we could make our flight to Bangkok before heading back to Japan.

The bus was full of really loud foreign men speaking a language we couldn't quite place. Made me realize how spoiled were are in Japan. And how annoying foreigners are.

We caught our flight out of Trat without issue (except that Laurel had left the sunscreen in her regular bag and the security people got a bit nervous) and then bought some gifts for people back in Japan before getting on the flight back to Osaka.

We got into Kameoka at about 8:30 am on Friday and I pretty much went straight to bed.