Why we offer tours where you can ride elephants
Elephant Special Tours offers a variety of tours to give people the special opportunity to get to know elephants in a unique and intense way.
Our tours allow elephants different paths through the forests of Northern Thailand, where they have plenty of time for physical exercise, as well as numerous opportunities to find and eat natural food. In addition, sufficiently long breaks before and after the tours ensure the recovery time of the animals safely.
In our opinion, this combination represents an optimum for the preservation and promotion of the health of the elephants.
If riding – then only with Elephant Special Tours!
Asian tradition and the western look on it
The riding of elephants is criticized in Western media often one-sided as being bad for the animals. It is argued with physical overload of the pachyderms or too much mental pressure by humans, which would harm the elephant permanently. This may apply in individual cases to elephant projects.
Elephant Special Tours, on the other hand, has committed itself to high standards: animal welfare is always top priority – we are an elephant project, which is co-financed by tourism – not the other way around.
Having a program in which our tours last minimum 3 days, we introduce our guests to elephant riding – a tradition of direct human-animal contact practiced in Northern Thailand for centuries.
Why we offer Riding
Instead of “pouring through” as many guests as possible in the shortest possible time as some elephant project practice it, we enable the animals sufficient exercise, healthy food and different routes in their natural habitat. It has to be noted that constant loads and same riding routes can disturb the musculoskeletal system of the elephants in the long term.
Through our approach in dealing with the animals we prevent one-sided strains and monotony on the health level as well as the natural behavior of the animals.
We carry out our tours individually, conscientiously and diversely, so that the needs of animals and humans are met in considerate harmony with each other.
One Person, One Animal, One Day
It is very important to us to introduce people with heart and mind to our beloved elephants. In our individual tourism concept each guest receives his “personal” elephant for the duration of the tour.
Each animal has its own personality with preferences and peculiarities, which we intensively bring close to our guests.
With much peace, time and know-how, our guests learn from our experienced elephant experts how to safely and comfortably ride the neck of these powerful animals through the beautiful nature in the valley Mae Sapok. Each elephant is always accompanied by his own mahout – the elephant leader.
Is it also possible without riding?
Guests who want to get to know the animals intensively, but for whom riding is not in the foreground of the visit, we recommend the two-day elephant encounter.
In this tour you will walk through the beautiful nature of Northern Thailand together with the elephants and have enough time to observe them eating and bathing.
Of course, if you have any health or other needs, you can walk with the elephants instead of riding on all our tours.