Elephant Hills Camp - Khao Sok National Park

Khao Sok National Park is situated in Thailand’s largest remaining forest, and contains some of the oldest-growth evergreen rainforest in the world. Stay at a luxury tented camp in the hills, experience elephants up close and explore this ancient and magical world on foot and by boat.

After the 1989 logging ban in Thailand, thousands of working captive elephants went from being a source of income for their owners to being a prohibitively expensive pet, virtually overnight. Fortunately, tourism has come to the rescue of these animals, which now play a part in helping to educate visitors about the priceless and delicate forest ecosystems they were once used to exploit. The Elephant Hills experience offers a comfortable, low-impact way to come into contact with one of Earth’s truly unique places, while helping the elephants and those whose livelihood depends on them to survive in a new, more ecologically-conscious world.

On your first day you’ll embark on an extended Nature safari, beginning with an exploration of the flooded mangrove forests by speedboat, a swampland ecosystem riddled with a maze of river channels with unique flora and fauna. You’ll be able to deepen your experience with the opportunity to paddle a canoe around the area and discover it for yourself. You’ll then be able to relax over lunch on board an elegant Burmese Junk while it cruises along the waterways before travelling back to Elephant Hills camp for a well-deserved evening meal. The next day brings you face-to-face, and hand-to-trunk, with the elephants themselves, when you can get to know these amazing beasts up close and find out all about them from their mahouts. On the third day, you’ll finally enter the jungle on foot for a guided tour of this fabulous place - and finally convince yourself that yes, this is really happening!

This tour is a “soft” adventure, meaning it should be suitable for anyone in good health. Indeed, children of four years of age and older are welcome, a fact which will no doubt meet with approval from many four-year-old elephant enthusiasts and budding explorers. The camp itself is well-established and very comfortable, offering a stable base for forays into the forest, and the organization has strict environmental policies designed to limit the negative impact potentially inherent in running excursions in such a sensitive area. There is also a real emphasis on sharing information about the elephants, the forest, and the culture of the region, and learning how all three are interconnected.