The park has been a busy place since my return! All the reporters who have visited the park recently have really made a difference. This week, there were 25 volunteers! It's great for Lek - more money for the elephants - but it really changes the atmosphere at the park. Last time I was here, the days were busy with day visitors, but the evenings tended to be a bit quieter, after the visitors left. It's not quite as relaxing & peaceful as it was before, although it's still nice to be back.

On Thursday, all 25 of us set off for Jumbo Express. This is a program that Lek runs, where the volunteers visit a hilltribe village, and provide de-worming medicine for the kids as well as preforming various services for the community. This time we visited a village about 2 hours away from the park (it was probably only about 50km, but it was on dirt roads through the jungle, so the going was slow) We all piled into the back of 3 pickup trucks & set off....

Arrived at the village just after 2pm & started work on one of two toilets/outhouses that Lek had provided the materials for. Spent a couple hours hauling sand & pebbles up from the beach to make cement, finished digging the big hole that the villagers had started, poured the cement, set the toilet (a squatter) and started putting up the walls... Luckily it wasn't too hot a day!

After that, I helped Pom (our guide) make dinner in the "kitchen" (a rustic shack with a fire pit in one corner). Stirfried morning glories, stirfied pineapple, stirfried mushrooms & onions, and fried chicken. Yum! Pom's an amazing cook!

At 8:00, we got all the kids to line up & we gave them all the de-worming medicine, then they each received a toy. Hit the sack fairly early, but seeing as how the roosters started crowing at 5am, that was probably a good thing...

The next morning, we did a bit more work on the toilet, the Malcom (a volunteer from India) led a bunch of us in an hour of yoga (he's an instructor back home). Set off around 11am on bamboo rafts for an hour trip to an elephant treking camp. The rafting was fun. I got to steer - didn't hit too many rocks. ;) The camp was interesting. This is the third one I've visited & it's always an emotional trip. There are always a bunch of westerners milling about, eager for their turn to hop on the elephant's back (or at least, on the bench that's on the elephant's back). Most of these people are completely clueless to what these animals really go through, but for someone who's spent more time with happy elephants, the sadness here is almost palpable. Many of the elephants are incredibly skinny & they all look exhausted. Their day involved treking with 2 westerners sitting on the bench on their back, plus the mahout on their neck. They walk for an hour to a hilltribe village, where the westerners get off, then the elephants have to walk back to the camp & pick up more tourists... Most days they do this 3 times, resulting in over 6 hours of walking every single day. Add that to the fact that they're not really given the chance to graze, and they're burning a higher number of calories - you end up with some very hungry elephants...

One of the elephants, a 20 year old female, had a baby with her (1 year, 2 months). The baby's only 2 months older than Tong Jhan (my favourite elephant at the park), but the differences between the two were remarkable. This poor little elephant is forced to follow her mother every day, while she carries trekers. Babies like to nap through out the day, but I'm guessing this one wasn't given much time to do that.

Another of the elephants had killed one westerner and a couple of mahouts, but she's still being used for treking. Of course, no one's told about her history before they climb on her. Watched a couple head off for their hour trek on her & wondered how they'd feel if they knew the elephant they were riding wasn't quite as sweet & happy as they seemed to think she was...