Lily Elephant Camp @Phuket — Local services in Pa Khlok

This, by far, is the highlight of our trip! The caretakers are super friendly and nice. They treat the elephants in an amazing way. Mr. OK was very helpful and answered all of our questions! They have 6 elephants, and they are all rescued. They are now looking into rescuing 2 more. You start your journey by getting picked up from your hotel, and you head to the camp. Once you arrive, you are greeted and given some refreshments and cookies. Afterwards, you get a short and informative session about the elephants, types, differences, how to feed them, and whatnot. You then proceed to walk down to the beach with the elephants for about 10-15 mins depending on the elephants since they sometimes stop to eat (300m total) You watch the elephants get in the water and settledown before joining them for a shower and some water fun! You'll be given a brush and a bucket to scrub the elephants. The caretakers are there at all times, so it's fun and safe for everybody. Once done, you take turns to take professional photos with the elephants that you can later digitally purchase. The photos were beautiful! I would definitely recommend this. After which, you walk back up to the camp to shower and change, and then it's feeding time for the elephants. You get to play with and feed the elephants for around 15-20 minutes (depending on how fast the elephants devour the food 🤣). At the end, we went and fed the baby elephant and its mama then depending on your package, there might be extra activities that you can do. We chose the feed and shower package, so once that was done, we said goodbye to the elephants, enjoyed a small coffee break, selected our photos, and were taken back to our hotel. The whole activity, including pick up and drop off to Patong, took around 5 hours. Make sure to wear water shoes and bring a towel and change of clothes.

Its definitely worth doing, and I would highly recommend doing this activity and supporting the care camp as all of the funds go to the elephants and their wellbeing and you never know you might even get lucky and get to bathe the...

Elephants are amazing friendly giants. The youngest ones Yaya and Pola are just wonderful, I really enjoyed being and interacting with them. Staff is nice and friendly and they love elephants, as we have seen they only speak and control elephants with their voice without any kind of violence.

This camp is new and I understand they trying their best to make everything work, but the management should take seriously into consideration some fails in customer service. Before our visit we have received an email from camp personnel asking us to come earlier due to tide, cause we had bathing and feeding of the elephants. When we arrive, one of the employee said we should come later, in 1h, and we have to wait. We tried to explain that we have received an email from camp staff, but he replied "I don't know who wrote you, it wasn't me. It is incorrect " Since I work in Customer service more than 12 years, I can say, it is the worst thing that you can say to a customer. Never say - "I don't know who sent you this email" or "I didn't sent this email" - these phrases are absolutely forbidden in Customer service. Instead you can say "I will check this for you" and check this situation with your team and fix it.

Fortunately we were able to go to the elephants without waiting, but the overall experience was clumsy, when we came other group was already swimming with elephants and we joined them, and it took about 10-15 minutes and then we walked up to the hill and returned to the camp. (It would be wise if there was some spot to wash feet before going on a walk with elephants, walking with sandy feet is not fun.) Then we had a shower with elephants in a group of people, again a bit unorganised. Finally we were feeding elephants and it was nice and pleasant process.

As a conclusion: elephants are sweet and amazing animals, people are nice too but not so well organized. Please fix your organization of processes and communication in the team.

P.S. photo service: 250 baht per 1 photo, which is almost 7 euro - unreasonably high price. Some photos might be good but...

Have you ever gotten kissed by an elephant 🐘? I have at Elephant Care Camp in Siray Phuket!

💲You get a few different bundle options a) basic @ 900baht includes and short tour and feeding the elephants b) includes a shower with the elephant for about 50% more.

🗓️ I did not book ahead, and there was about a 15 minute wait for the tour to start.

🏍️ I took a grab taxi for 100 baht, but honestly it's pretty far out there. There is a monkey attraction a bit further towards the coast, and the driving is pretty scenic, so if you can I'd rent a moped instead and make it a scenic day tour.

🪑When you get there is has a nice lounge area with free coffee and eater or paid sodas and other things. If they were smart they'd offer some snacky foods as well. Maybe some fresh cooked local treats like sweet rice rolls. Becuase I would have gladly purchased one to snack on.

🙆‍♂️The tour guide / elephant 🐘 handler was a great character, lively and extremely friendly. That's the great Thai spirit we all hear so much about - it was abundant in this tour guide.

🐘 Elephants were very friendly...they have all ages there from young to over 75 years old!

🌅 It was beautiful out and I really enjoyed interacting with the elephants. I would have liked if it had been a bit longer for 1000baht. But at the same time, I'd gladly donate to a great organization like this anyway Because they do such important work for the elephants.

Over-all I enjoyed the tour and I'm grateful I could support great people, doing important work for the elephants. I hope they expand their offering to include more fun activities...