Elephant sanctuary

Good morning. It has been another very busy few days here in Malaysia. Five days ago we set off early to kuala gandah for our project and were taken to Rasli's homestay. He has been our very welcoming host over the past five days and has let us have full run of his house for which we are very grateful.

On arrival at the elephant sanctuary we were split into two teams. One group were given the task of painting the car park and the other the seating huts and fences. Between these jobs we were able to view and feed the elephants.

A large number of the boys have been in with the elephants cleaning the paddocks and have fed the youngest of the baby elephants milk in the morning. One group gave the babies a wash in the river with the other group getting about two minutes due to torrential rain and a thunderstorm. The staff at the park work really hard and conservation is at the heart of everything they do.

On day three we took the boys to Deerland - this is a small petting zoo where you can feed and hold the animals. The only difference was that it consisted of lizards, deer, some large pythons and an ostrich. Some boys really overcame their fears here and a special mention to Adam who genuinely did not want to be anywhere near them and finally touched a snake and to Ben M for holding one for the first time. Others, like Sam, took it in their stride and it got to a stage where we had to take the snakes away from them. Ben F and Colin had the ostrich taking the food from their head and hands - it was quite a  vicious animal and reminded me of scenes from I'm a celebrity...I have been stung by my first Malaysian bee - not an experience I recommend and I apologise in advance for any of the language that I may have used shortly after. Max managed to drop his entire bowl of food as one hungry deer came at him.

Teresa has had an interesting experience with one of the baby elephants who I think must have confused her with its mother. I am not sure if it is appropriate for the blog but it was very funny! Oliver S and Spencer have some good photos of them bottle feeding the baby so keep an eye out for these when they get home.

The truck journeys have been very entertaining with lots of singing. One day the rain chucked it down as the boys and I were stuck travelling back in the truck. A large number of the locals have found this very amusing and were waving as the drove past.

Lots of photos below so please take a look.

Some of the boys have plays an impromptu game of cricket back at the house on what turned out to be a scorcher of a day. Calum has an interesting sunburn of his money belt on his back and incredibly Adam has hand prints - a lot of work must have got done that day.

On our last day we were scheduled to meet the director of the elephant park for the certificate presentation. On his arrival I was a little embarrassed that he was the man I had earlier asked to find toilet roll as the boys have been running out of loo roll. This was then followed by Ben M getting a fly stuck in his eye. This was a persistent little creature and took Teresa and I a good 5 minutes to find and extract. Jamie has just finished his day successfully as leader and will now get his day off so that he can enjoy his birthday.

Back in KL and most of the box have decided on Subway. However three of the boys, Ollie P, max and Frazer came with frank and I to eat at the china town stalls and they have now eaten stingray for the first time. The rest are now in bed and getting ready for the diving phase where Alex is due to take over.