While Gary and Gail were visiting us in South Africa we traveled up to Zebula Lodge in Bela Bela to stay a couple nights and enjoy their game drive and animal interactions. The lodge was located in their own game reserve and comprised of a spa, gym, restaurant, 18 hole golf course, playgrounds, and several homes. We rented a home that even surprised me with all it's features. My main goal while Gary and Gail were visiting was to introduce them to as many of Africa's wonderful animals as possible. This weekend they were able to get up close and personal with some elephants.
At first an elephant handler gave us some great information on their elephants then another handler walked us though all 5 of their large elephants. With the first elephant, we were able to feed her pellets to her trunk which the elephant then carried up to deposit in her own mouth.
Next we fed her straight into her mouth while the handler gave the elephant simple commands. Each elephant was quite trained to do a variety of things and this own showed us how she could shake her head "yes" and "no" on command, and even pick up a stick with her trunk.
The next elephant laid down for us and showed us just how hard it is to get up when you are carrying around that much weight. She did a great job of letting us pose for pictures with her as well.
All of the elephants had an ankle bracelet of sorts that was chained to the ground just in case any of them decided to run off. Of course there were plenty of other animals running around like ostriches, warthogs and meerkats. One would think the opportunity to interact with an elephant would keep you attention, but evidentially Adalyn has been in Africa too long as she was only interested in a friendly meerkat (though he looks a little scary in this picture).
Adalyn would not touch nor pose for a picture with our large friends, I guess their size might have been a little intimidating to her.
With each elephant we were able to get some great photos, I made sure Grant got in on the action too as he has slept through most of the other animal interactions thus far.
The last of the elephants showed us how they could kick a soccer ball, blow water from their nose and without warning Gail lined up for the final trick. The handlers advised her to take off her glasses and on command, the elephant swung his trunk up and gave her a kiss.
A kiss of an elephant goes like this: he swings his massive truck towards your face (scary enough) which lands on you with incredible aim and then he begins to suck (felt like a slimy snail stuck on you) followed by a hard blow leaving all sorts of "treats" on your face from food to water and everything in between. After witnessing this gross display, I of course could not pass it up and lined right up for my kiss.
We were fortunate enough to only have 4 other people join our interaction so it was very personal and we got plenty of time with each elephant. The gentle creatures felt like rubber with lots of little cracks and the hair on their tail felt like wire. With our hands we were able to feel their bodies rumble as they "talked" and stroke their soft ears. Life in Africa never gets old with adventures like this and I am glad we could share them with Gary and Gail.
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