Pattaya Elephant Village

This guide to Pattaya Elephant Village follows what happened to Thailand's logging elephants after the government banned commercial logging in 1989, and how a refuge founded in 1973 by Khun Phairat Chaiyakham became a lifeline for animals and mahouts with nowhere else to go. You'll hear how Khun Phairat designed the daily routine here himself, insisting on what he calls an ordinary day in an elephant's life rather than a show. Watch the bathing and feeding as you listen for what he says it takes to earn that claim.