Today we had booked elephant riding and For only $5 more we could also bathe them in the Mekong river; bargain!

We were taken right into the forest to meet the elephants. Along the way you could see how much the landscape had changed due to logging, which was a shame. The driver left us in the middle of the forest and told us to walk up a hill. It felt like we had just been dumped on the words and was rather scary. Luckily after about 5 mins another man turned up to show us the elephants. The elephants were quite different to African ones. They were a lot smaller for one thing. They have a seat on the back of them which we started off on. It is not a comfortable ride! After a while Dan got to slide onto his neck but its even more scary there as there is nothing to hold onto.

We went through the forest which was really pretty but the mahoot- the elephant's leader- was not very nice. He was always shouting and throwing elephant poo at its feet to make it move. It was very different to how you see African elephants in the wild doing whatever they please and although fun we probably didn't find it as enjoyable as other people who haven't seen wild elephants would. We also kept getting hit into spider webs which we couldn't divert away from and had to go head first into a few. Next it was my turn on the year and I found it was much more comfortable than on there seat which I really thought I was going to fall a couple of times.

After this we went to the river. We got our own elephants for this and both rode on the necks. Dan literally got to ride the elephant on his own but my guy liked to sit with me. Which was probably for the best as there was one point where my elephant diverted into some trees and I genuinely thought I was going to fall off and the guy had to pick me back up and sit me upright again! Dan however was a natural and could manage his elephant easily.

The way to the river was extremley muddy I didn't know how elephants could get through and any one point the route was so skinny the elephants just slid through on either sides which makes it a good job they were going to get bathed! The water was freezing and filthy brown. The elephants had been taught a trick to blow water out of their trunks and Dan got sprayed about 5 times mine however wasn't interested and didn't even move in the water, whereas dans elephant loved it and was swimming around and Dan got kicked underwater! I was very jealous! It would be that I got the grumpy elephant! We headed back and could pay a dollar to get some bananas to feed the elephants. That was really fun and they were really greedy!