On Tuesday morning, we drove to the Elephant Sanctuary in Hartbeespoort Dam. This place is more commercially driven than Ukutula, but again we were the only people there and we got to spend a couple of hours being with the elephants, learning all their details, touching them, and even going for a ride. The elephants were extremely calm and very gentle. One wanted to check me out by placing the end of his trunk on my cheek and sucking in, and you can see in the photo below the mixture of mud and slobber he left behind there.
Here are a few pictures from our time at the sanctuary.
Timba the elephant with his trainer. The elephants can respond to simple commands and have developed close bonds with the various trainers.
The elephant "kiss." The trunk is like a thick, wet hose attachment for a vacuum cleaner that has been poking around in the dirt all day.
The muddy aftermath.
Here I am riding Timba with the trainer. Timba was a bit disobedient and kept wanting to let go of the other elephant's tail and wander off, so the trainer was constantly calling out, "Timba! Tail! Timba! Tail! Tail!" So this will forever be the soundtrack to my elephant ride.
Our guide taught us everything there is to know about elephant habits and anatomy.
Before we left, we fed the elephants we worked with.
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