Sam and Haydens day 4- Luang Prabang(Laos)

Helping to save the elephants

We started day four with a 7:30 wakeup call. After a nice breakfast of bacon and eggs, fruit and pancakes, we split up into small groups and climbed into our tour vans. The smaller vans were more suited to the narrow roads heading to our destination. We travelled through teak plantations and pineapple fields for about 45 minutes on the dusty trails of around Luang Prabang.

We finally arrived at our destination – The Elephant Village Sanctuary.  While we were waiting for our turn to ride one of the eleven elephants, we had the opportunity to pat and get our photos taken with one of the elephants as well as learning about their plight and difficult circumstances.  We also went for a walk looking for a spot to fish in the river with our guide ‘Sing’.  Once it was our turn to ride the elephants we climbed up onto the platform where we waited for our elephant to pick us up. We climbed onto the elephant’s saddle and began our trek.

We headed down a tributary of the mighty Mekong river where when then took our turns learning to be elephant drivers or Mahouts, riding safely on the elephant’s heads to the other side of the river. When we got to the other side of the river the elephant handler took some photos of us sitting on the elephants. {We hope to have the photos posted when we have a better connection] We then continued our ride back to the elephant camp where we got off the elephants. While we were waiting for the rest of our group to get back, we enjoyed a game of “Badong” {Like Bocce) with Sing our guide.

Once all of group had returned from the ride we went and had a nice lunch. For lunch we had a selection of rice with curry, stir fried vegetables and fresh salad. Whilst eating our lunch at the restaurant we had amazing views of the river and the mountains beyond. We could also see other people riding the elephants through the water.

After lunch we all headed back to the camp and got some bananas to feed the elephants. It was really cool to watch them take the bananas out our hands and eat them.

We then all gathered up into a group and started our trek to a traditional Hmong village called Hoify Village. We all gathered at the edge of the river where we then walked across the bridge (we did not catch boats to the other side, there was indeed a bridgeJ ) After crossing the ‘bridge’ we started our 2hr trek through the forest. As we were walking all we could hear were complaints about how hot the weather was, but everyone soldiered on despite the heat.

Once we reached the village we all had a seat at a table where the teachers gathered the books that we had purchased at the big brother mouse organisation the previous day. This is a non-profit charity that allows people to purchase educational material to be donated back to be use in villages to help children learn.  We then presented the books to the chief of the village who was more than happy to accept them on behalf of the village. The school was on holidays which meant that we couldn’t give it to them directly.

After we gave them the books we had a walk around the village taking photos of the children and buildings. The return trek in a different direction included a stop at a waterfall which gave everyone had a nice relaxing break at the water’s edge.  After everyone was ready to set off we returned to the Elephant Park, where we got back into our vans and headed back to the hotel for a short rest before dinner.

Sam and Hayden