Up close with elephants at sanctuary in Thailand, volunteers shovelling dung and sorting mangoes gain insights on the challenges of conservation amid Covid-19 crisis
- The Elephant Nature Park, in Chiang Mai province, is home to 114 Asian elephants – all of whom need feeding, taking care of and cleaning up after
- Volunteer park workers learn about the gentle beasts, the challenges of looking after them and the ways it innovated to keep funds coming in amid the pandemic
A minivan transports day visitors and volunteers – of which I am one – from the guest houses of Chiang Mai’s ancient walled city to the Elephant Nature Park, almost 60km (37 miles) away, in Mae Taeng district.
The anarchic rush-hour traffic doesn’t inspire much optimism, but the anxieties triggered by Thai road etiquette dissipate with each passing kilometre until a river of green supplants the stream of shophouses that have guided our passage north.
The road winds its way around a forested hillside before a clearing in the foliage reveals the unmistakable profiles of Asian elephants – some of the park’s 114 – silhouetted against the glow of the sun. My fellow travellers chorus a gasp.
After a cup of hill-tribe-farmed coffee, guide Sophon “Home” Nanthawan shows me around. To my surprise, no barriers separate man and beast; only the banyan trees are shielded from harm, by stone circles.
“The trees are sacred to Buddhists,” explains Home, before introducing the elephants as if they were old friends. “This one is called Deepor and that’s her buddy Yaiboon. That one over there covering herself in mud is called Pikul,” he says, explaining that elephants plaster themselves in it to keep cool but also to stop insects from biting.
