Days 104-105 Saturday April 27, 2024, Phuket, Thailand

Arrival: 7:00 Overnight in Port

We have changed back to the captain from the beginning of the cruise. He always arrives early to port. Today was no different.

Janice has booked a Viator to an elephant sanctuary outside of the city. When we left the cruise ship terminal our friends Gayle and Gino were waiting for their pickup as well. It turns out that we had both booked the same tour which was a pleasant surprise.

The weather is again hot with a high of 34 C or 93F. It will take approximately one hour to drive through Phuket before arriving at The Lake Phuket Elephant Home. We are greeted by Dang our guide that lives on the property.

He gives us a brief explanation of the area and what we can expect to see or do while we are on the property.

The sanctuary has seven female elephants as it would be too difficult to include male elephants on the same property. You can figure out why.

Dang provides a little bit of history on the sanctuary and then it is off to make breakfast for the elephants. We take turns using a machete to cut up some bamboo sticks for the elephants to eat. I am glad to report that were no accidents and everyone still had all their fingers although our guide was short a few.

A female elephant is currently alone in her enclosure so she can heal from a hole in the bottom of one of her feet. She was very gentle, and we fed her bamboo shoots and bananas and took pictures with her as well.

It is now time to find the elephants that are roaming throughout the sanctuary and feed them. Each of us is given a basket of bananas and bamboo. The guide leads us over a wooden bridge into the forest. He starts calling the elephants like they are going to come running at the sound of his voice. No the elephants are with their trainers so it was easy to find three on them standing on the road waiting for breakfast. Each of us takes turns feeding the elephants by placing the bamboo or bananas at the bottom of the elephant's trunk and they would bring the trunk up to their mouth to feed. We continued this for about fifteen minutes and then it was time to just follow the elephants to see where they go. Banans are their favorite. A photographer follows us taking pictures of us interacting with the elephants. Later I find out that all these pictures are free for us to download.

It is now getting hotter, so the elephants need to cool down. How do you cool down a one-ton elephant you may ask. Well, let's lead them towards the lake. This is what the trainers did. Two elephants quickly went into the water, but the teenager decided no I will wait a while. When it was her time to enter the lake, she walked in backward and started walking towards an area which she should not go to. Typical teenager, Gayle said. The trainer quickly moved to her back towards the other two elephants.

We were hesitant to get into the water, but I was the first one in the water armed with a brush and a bucket to wash the elephants so to speak. The girls joined me but contracted an infection (UTI) from the water. What were we thinking!!!

With all of us in the water the teenager decides to lie on her side submersed with only her trunk up in the air. It was a great time with the three elephants in the water.

As we left the water it was time for a lunch where we prepared our own salad of avocado shoots, carrots, tomatoes, garlic, red hot Chile peppers and peanuts. A little squeeze of lime juice and sugar was added. Janice did the mulching of the nuts and garlic while I just added the lime juice.

The lunch was excellent with rice, vegetables, chicken, chicken broth soup and fresh fruit or pineapple and watermelon.

A great tour that is in our top five.

Tonight is the second Around the World Event with dinner at the Blue Elephant.

Like the first ATW event in Vietnam our ticket voucher indicated the time to meet in the Insignia Lounge. The dinner was at the Blue Elephant Governor Mansion some thirty minutes from the port.

It must be difficult to find a place to accommodate four hundred guests in one venue. That is what Destination Services is trying to do with our ATW events.

As we disembark the bus, we are greeted by locals dressed in their native Thai costumes who will perform during dinner.

It is an excruciatingly hot night in Phuket. A large open-air tent is set up in front of the establishment. An open table for eight at the back right by a giant fan is secured. I think there are five giant fans on either side of the tent to provide some type of air movement as well as cooling us down. Unless you are at the sides or maybe the second table in the fans do not help. We are glad to be so close.

The meal was prepared and served in a sharing style format with two huge plates brought to each table. A pleasant surprise for Janice and I that we could eat everything on the menu. Starters included spring rolls, pineapple salad, and dumplings. Chicken soup was next with beef curry, sea bass and emerald chicken accompanied by jasmine and brown rice. A delicious coconut flan finished off the meal.

What a perfect day with the elephant tour in the morning followed by a great event in the evening!

April 28

If you look at travel brochures of Thailand and Phuket, you think of pristine beaches. This is what we wanted for our second and final day in Thailand.

We leave the cruise terminal and before being hounded by dozens of taxi drivers Janice goes directly to this female taxi driver wearing a hijab asking her how much she would charge for a day trip to Kalim Beach. The locals say this is one of the best beaches in Phuket.

It was definitely not what we were expecting. The beach was covered with plastic water bottles and food wrappers.

We did find beach chairs that were past their sell by date but we made the best of it. We did not feel comfortable leaving our stuff here so we each took separate walks on the beach.

The driver did wait around for us before we returned to the ship.

For the next two days we are cruising the Andaman Sea towards Hambantota, Sri Lanka 1,046 nautical miles away.