Results tagged “Elephants”

Hello people. We just spent seven great days on safari in Botswana and spent most of it with the same guide named Charles. He was really nice and had a great personality. Charles came with us to two different camps, so we had two different trackers when we were with him. Our first tracker (they look for the animals) was Mr. Mo and he was really good at spotting stuff. Our next tracker was "Kenny the Cat." He was really amazing at spotting big cats.

The first camp we stayed in was called Lebala, which had really nice tents. On our first day there we saw a big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big herd of elephants. We saw babies playing and male elephants pretending to fight. I was amazed watching all of them together in such a huge area.

Hello everyone. Let me start out by describing the tiny airport in the city of Kasane, Botswana.  When we got called to board our flight, we were really surprised that we weren't getting on a normal plane like the ones you enter through a gate and all. Ours was a six-seater prop plane that was no longer than 15 feet! It was really cool to be in such a small plane and even cooler to be able to look down the aisle and see the pilot working all the controls of the plane.

After the 45-minute flight, we landed at an airstrip that was no more than a dirt clearing for the plane to land on. When we got off, we were greeted by Charles, who would be our guide for the next five days. He drove us for about 15 minutes through the African bush to Kwando's Lebala Camp, where we spent our first three nights in Botswana.  

After settling into the camp, we went for our first game drive. One of the first things we saw was a huge herd of elephants. There were easily over one hundred of them. There were some young male elephants in the group that would play fight and it looked like they were having a wrestling match with their trunks. At one point, a big male elephant came right up to our tracker, Mr. Mo, who sits in a small chair off the hood of the jeep, and tried to intimidate him by swinging his trunk around. Mr. Mo knew it was all a big show and didn't budge. Eventually, the elephant left us alone.

Hi everyone out there on the Internet. We are in the bush of South Africa and having a great time. The first animal we saw was an elephant as we were driving into the lodge of Sabi Sabi. Then, there were monkeys that live in the trees right at the lodge.  

When we went on our first game drive, we got lucky and saw a leopard. I was so excited that I thought I was in a dream. Afterward, we saw a giraffe, some water buffalo, and zebra. Very cool! We saw three of the "Big 5" that day and we also spotted a honey badger, which is really rare. Our guide hadn't seen one in two years and I got to see one my first day.

The second day we saw a lion, but not just one lion, a whole pride! There were five females and a whole bunch of cubs with them. They were really cute when they wrestled. After that, we had seen four of the "Big 5" African animals. We just needed to see a rhino to finish it off.

Hello everybody. We saw elephants five out of 16 days while we were in Thailand. The theme of Thailand was elephants ... elephants, elephants, elephants!  

1. We saw elephants for the first time at FantaSea, which is a theme park about Thailand. We took a ride on a big elephant. Then, we saw a spectacular show with lots of elephants in it. The elephants were my favorite part of the show.

2. The second time was at a nice hotel called Marina Phuket. A small, three-year-old elephant came in during the mornings. He was so cute! Tyler and I got to feed him little bananas. We also took rides on him. The trainer made the elephant bend his leg so I could hop on and sit on his neck. The elephant's name was Nimone and he was our favorite.

3. The next time we saw elephants was on Halloween, when we got soaked. I told you about that in my last blog.

4. My family and I went to the Thailand Elephant Conservation Center, where they train elephants and teach people about elephants. We saw a show about how they used elephants for pulling logs in the forest. That is also where we got a picture of an elephant mommy and baby. The really cool thing about the picture is that it was painted by an elephant and we watched her do it! The artist was a really cute four-year-old elephant. We thought she was the cutest elephant there.

Hello, everybody! I'm going to tell you about the Thailand you haven't heard about yet. Here are the five highlights of our Thailand trip, starting with the best.

Coming in first place, is the bat cave we visited before Halloween. The bats flew around and squeaked. The cave also had cool rock formations and stalagmites, the big pointy rocks on the ceiling of the cave. We were guided through this cave by gas torch and floated down the rivers on bamboo rafts.

Coming in second, is our boat trip in the canals outside of Bangkok. We went around in a boat. It was a strange trip because merchants grab boats with their canes to display their stock.

In third place, comes the Bangkok Traditional Puppet Theater, where we saw "The Birth of Ganesha." The show was about how the god, Ganesha, got his elephant head and saved heaven from the demons.  From then on, Ganesha became one of the most famous gods in Thailand -- the God of Wisdom.
 
Coming in fourth place, I chose the temple ruins in Sukothai, where we went to see all of the old city ruins. Sukothai used to be the capital of Bangkok, dating back to the 1200s. Although the city is in ruins, some of the Buddhas and temples remain. Many Buddhas were repaired because they are considered sacred items.
 And last, but not least, in fifth place, comes the reclining Buddha at Wat Poh temple in Bangkok. Laying down, the Buddha was 45 meters long (135 feet ... about half of the size of a football field). The entire Buddha was painted in gold leaf except the bottom, which is black and has 108 scenes carved from mother-of-pearl. It was cool on the way out of the temple because people would put tiny coins into metal pots, so all you hear is the soft clang of the coins landing in the pots.

So, there are my highlights from Thailand (and all the elephants of course).



Now, we're off to New Zealand!