We all got early and had breakfast. We then met up with Bruce, Tik and the family. Our plan today was to go and visit the elephants.
After we had all changed into the local Thai outfits, we met Papa Joe elephant and his three girlfriends. There were also two baby elephants. Just gorgeous! We were told by the sanctuary owner about how elephants are capable of feeling emotion. When they were overworked in the forest 50 years ago, their numbers started to drop as they were too unhappy to breed. They have now been taken away from all this and instead, to a life which they and the visitors to the sanctuary can enjoy.
Our first job was to feed them sugar cane. We were astounded how much they could eat. We then walked them down to the river.
When we were at the river, we threw water over them gave them a good brush. They seemed to love it.
After lunch, we were taken in bamboo rafts down the river. Hundreds of Thai teenagers were also on the river, getting very drunk on rafts. It was chaos but good fun!
After lunch, we drove back home. After a quick pit stop, Tony wanted us to have some more driving practice so took us to a new temple, built in 1996. We climbed to the top and looked back over the countryside. Egged on by Bruce, Russell, David and I took up the challenge to run from top to bottom and back again of the steep steps up to the Buddha.
What fun!! We then made our way back through some lovely countryside.