ETHEREAL NATURE WALK 09:00 – 10:30

Overview

The Ethereal Nature Walk at the Freedom Elephant Reserve Phuket offers visitors a unique opportunity to spend quality time with elephants in their natural environment, as well as an understanding and insight into their history, stories, and behavior, as you create much-loved lifelong memories of your time spent with these amazing mammals.

We start by going out into the reserve and calling the elephants over to meet you, as they are often foraging in the jungle for lush green grass and fresh baby leaves to eat, you might be able to see them as they come striding towards you.

Our guide will introduce you to our herd and will explain the individual stories of each elephant. During this time, you and the elephants can become comfortable with each other’s presence, as our guide explains the type of behavior they’re exhibiting.

Then it’s up to the elephants, and what they would prefer to do today. Typically, they first head for the mud spa. This is where they use their feet to mix the mud with water, creating a muddy slush, before sucking it up with their trunks and blowing it all over their bodies. Once they have completely covered themselves in mud, they will most likely move onto the sand pile.

The sand pile. It’s a little-known fact that elephants love to play in big piles of sand. This is because the sand moves under their weight, and they can lie down in comfort as the sand shifts to the shape of their bodies. It also acts as an exfoliant, and the elephants can often be seen rubbing up against each other as they help themselves exfoliate their skin.

Next, they head to the big pool to keep cool. Our big pool is so deep that our elephants can completely submerge themselves and disappear from sight. Elephants love to fully submerge as it helps release all the heat their bodies have absorbed throughout the day, and they take this time to relax and play in the water.

Just like humans. Once they’ve finished having fun, exercising. It’s time for dinner! Once the elephants have cooled down, they will get out of the pool and head straight to the feeding area, and wait for some bananas and sugar cane to be placed in the feeding area. Elephants need to consume 5 – 10% of their body weight each day to maintain a healthy weight, and they constantly eat throughout the day.

As your time with our herd comes to an end, you can take some final photos of them, and then, sadly, it’s time to wave goodbye to your new friends and head safely back to your hotel to cement today’s memories into your mind forever.

It truly is a wonderous experience.