When you come across mating elephants on a bamboo raft, dismount raft and climb to safety
We had a great adventure during a free day after our orientation and before starting ministry with Love Acts (I will be getting into our ministry in the next blog). We got an opportunity for a fun day of seeing a waterfall, elephant riding and bamboo rafting.
The day started out with a songthaew ride, a form of taxi adapted from a pick up truck, which has bench seats in the back. We ventured off through the beautiful countryside of Thailand outside of Chiang Mai, to observe the Mae Wong waterfall. On our way there we learned that the Songkran festival, a water fight to cool you off during Thailand’s hottest months and also to celebrate the New Year, had already begun in some places. We were unexpectedly smashed with water thrown from a bucket or two on the side of the road. The force actually knocked one of our squad mate’s glasses right off, which thankfully Jesus caught and folded them nicely on the step outside the songtheaw. Many people participated in swimming, fully clothed of course, as wearing less than shorts and a t-shirt would be inappropriate here.
Next stop, elephant riding! What beautiful creatures! Half of our party went on the elephants initially, we heard screams and squeals while waiting and wondered why…. then we had our turn. We began walking down the trail following our friends, which was a steep hill and we had to hold on very tightly and started getting a bit frightened as we felt that we could fall off the seat we were on. We continued on when our “driver” decided to hop off the head of the elephant and leave us at the elephant’s disposal. For some reason our elephant decided to take the lead. He was soon distracted by some grass up the steep side lining the trail, he proceeded up the side eating grass, until finally decided to resume along the trail, again walking down a steep hill leaving us to feel as though we could fall off the seat we were in. We then realized our driver was walking behind us, now, smoking a cigarette. We tried our luck with riding on the head of the elephant, which was pretty fun, but again, it kind of felt like we could fall off, and I got the joy of getting green plant snot shot up onto my face by the elephant who we named Bubba. Eventually I moved back to my seat alongside my friend, Marielle, and the driver hopped back on to resume guiding our elephant correctly. We continued to get green snot shot at us through Bubba's trunk, about 5 or 6 more times. Then, eventually, after a stop at a water hole, where we then got shot with water from Bubba's snout, we got onto the road with our elephant and driver and walked back to our starting point.
The next leg of the race was bamboo rafting. I can't say that I ever thought I would go bamboo rafting in Thailand, but what a tranquil experience – well at least for me and the two other girls I was with. We started off down the gentle river with our guide using his bamboo stick to take us gently down the river. There were some tiny rapids here and there. We watched other rafters whose guides tried to knock them off the rafts into the river, but our driver was just going for gold. There were some minor rapids, rocks, bridges, people swimming etc. Near the end of our tranquil ride we came upon an area where a baby elephant was playing, and pooping in the water, a man actually threw a large chunk of the elephant dung at a passing raft and hit one of the girls with it…yum. There were also people riding elephants through the river. Then we came to an area where people were in the spirit of the Songkran water festival as they splashed us with water, even occasional ice water. We finally finished our ride ending with big smiles as we enjoyed the beauty of Thailand for a brief moment. Soon more rafts came ashore and a girl from my team, Beka, came over to our songtheaw with a gashed toe. We soon heard her bamboo raft story, which is much better than mine, so here goes. As they drifted along, they heard the trumpet of the elephants. They came around the corner to see elephants playing…nope, they were engaging in activities that should remain behind closed doors. They soon realized that their raft was heading directly toward them, and the likelihood of being trampled if they proceeded was extremely high. So their next plan of action was to dismount the raft and scale the rocks to get out of the river. Beka lost her shoe and amidst trying to step on the raft she cut her toe badly, she ended up with 2 stitches. So we are very thankful that our ladies did not end up under the feet of mating elephants. So let this be a warning to you. If you are ever bamboo rafting in Thailand, please beware of the potential for mating elephants!
