Luang Prabang, mahout training, elephants, canadian Michael

Luang Prabang is a popular city in northern Laos, but it us no city by western standards.  It is a lovely, quaint town with friendly people and a thriving night market.  It has a distinct character about it - all the buildings and street signs having the same architectural style.  The pace of life is chilled and you can't help but feel relaxed there.

Below: the style of all the buildings in LP

Below below: the streets are transformed into a handicrafts market by night

below: Mandeep with Mama Sandwich

Walking into Tiger Trails we were expecting the usual language barriers with the staff, so it was really refreshing to hear a strong canadian accent from a local looking person.  Michael was instantly loveable, just camp enough to be endearing without being annoying.  At 63 he could easily be mistaken for a 50 year old.  Everybody seemed to know him and his cheerful vibe was infectious.  At one point he asked Mandeep if she is from "the poonjab".  When she affirmed he proceeded to recite word for word the Mool Mantar (the main prayer in Sikhism)!  Turns out he practised kundalini yoga in the 70s with yogi Bhajan himself - the same type of yoga that Mandeep practises.  Looking into the distance he reminisced of his days and experiences with spirituality and wondered why he doesn't practise anymore. It was great to meet a spiritually minded person - a rare occurrence in our SE Asia tour.  Michael arranged for us to spend a day learning how to ride elephants (to become a 'mahout'), and even came to our hotel to see us off the morning we left for the training. 

We were driven to an elephant sanctuary where 10 elephants are kept and used for tourism a half a day at a time, this gives them plenty of rest time and we were happy to see that they are treated well, even having their own doctor.  They are BIG, and as we were mahout training we had to sit on their necks rather than on a bench on their backs.  There are no reigns and no saddle - elephants  being too smart and too chilled out for them to be necessary.  They understand a variety of verbal commands and will even lift their knee up for a mahout to climb up their leg onto their neck.  The cartilage at the top of their ears easily fills a fist and their ear lobes completely covered my legs. It felt weird at first having giant ear lobes slapping all over my legs but i got used to it! They are dignified creatures, majestic in their stride. As large and strong as they are, they respond well to the mahout. Their trunks are incredibly strong and dextrous, snapping thick branches with ease. Eating 250 kg a day, they are constantly looking for food - our guide explaining to us that they don't have stomachs! Their skin is wrinkled and soft, except on their forehead where it feels like dry thick leather. During our time we rode them for several hours, fed and bathed them. We got pretty soaked by them spraying water through their trunks at us but it was a lot of fun! Overall it was a fantastic experience which we'd recommend.

Below: general mahouting around