Don’t pass up this opportunity!!
LasBrisasGal. Atlanta, Georgia
There are MANY tours on the company’s website, so I’ll provide the title and code. We took the Tiger Cub @ Wildlife Sanctuary & Elephant Ride Day Trip (Code:1508)
A friend and I took this tour this week and had an absolute blast. It was definitely the highlight of our trip.
There is alot of driving involved, and they do ask you up front if you have any evening plans. Bangkok traffic can be quite overwhelming – taking as long as 45 minutes sometimes to go less than 3 km. So my advice to you would be to leave your evening open if you choose to take this tour. We did arrive back at our hotel as planned around 4:30 PM, but I wouldn’t want to ruin an evening by getting stuck in traffic.
Our tour guide has 3 names, but of course I only remember the English name “Eight”. Eight took good care of us, not to mention playing photographer as well as tour guide throughout our adventures.
The first stop is the Bridge over the river Kwai. This is a short stop filled with history. You may want to see the old movie and learned about the history before going there.
On the way to the elephant camp, Eight explained to us how to ride the elephant and the commands that they use. On this tour, you will ride the elephant bareback with a trainer sitting behind you. You’ll straddle the elephant near their neck and put your palms on the top of their heads. Then it’s your job to ‘rock and roll’ with the elephant’s stride. Eight’s advice to us was to stay relaxed, and he was absolutely right!
In addition to riding the elephant, they will have you hold them, “kiss” them, sit on a “bench” made of two elephant trunks, and be lifted up onto their heads (using their trunks) in a move that they call “Superman”. It was quite humorous!
The stop for lunch was great too! They brought out multiple dishes and rice – one vegetable dish, two different chicken dishes, and a plate of fresh pineapple. YUMMY! One note: while lunch is included, drinks are not, so bring some cash to the restaurant (a Coke Zero was only 60 THB – they did offer beer, but I don’t remember the cost)
At our next stop, there were three felines that we could choose from: a leopard, black panther, or a tiger. We chose Moana, the largest of the three. She is currently about 6 1/2 months old. After removing our shoes and washing our hands, we sat in the tiger pen with our backs against the fence. The trainer brought Moana over to us by moving her bottle, and Moana climbed on our laps. She’s a beautiful tiger! We also got the opportunity to pet her while she was playing with a stick and paper.
*** Tripadvisor didn’t share the entire review with me when I got a message about my error in including a URL to the tour, so I’ve had to add this part back in. I’ll make it brief.
- The driver will pull over on the way to the bridge where you will pay the balance on the tour and pick up some snacks. (We brought our own though.) I didn’t want to tip before doing anything for the day.
- So if you want to tip, especially on the individual stops, make sure to keep that separate and with you on the stops.
- At the lunch stop, drinks are an extra cost (60 THB for a soda – they had beer but I do not remember the cost).
- At the bridge stop, the toilet is 5 THB. The toilets at the lunch stop and the Safari are free.
Date of experience: October 2018
