Kui Buri National Park

Wednesday afternoon, and four days after the Khao Yai expedition. I was in the back of another pickup truck, bumping along a mud track into the jungle. This time the location was Kui Buri district, 300km south west of Bangkok on the Thai Myanmar border. This national park is also well known for its elephant population, which in the past has frequently made Thai news headlines for their ongoing battles with local farmers. This was finally solved when the government bought the farmland nearest the elephant’s forest homes and created a buffer zone between the primary jungle and the rest of the rubber plantations and pineapple farms.  Driving through the farmland towards the forested hills and distant mountains, it’s obvious that the local herds are still drawn to the commercial crops as there are 10 foot high electrified fences at the sides of the road, plus lookout towers and other less sophisticated solutions, such as rows of empty beer bottles strung along lines of wire, dangling down to around six feet off the ground. Not particularly effective I was told! The park itself is very quiet. With Thailand still shut to foreign tourists, we set off along the track at 2pm and were the only people apart from the rangers in the park – which was great for us! Five minutes bumping along through the light woodland and a great hornbill flew across in front of us - no chance of a photograph, but still a good sign. We carried on, the terrain gentle dipping towards a shallow river flowing directly over the track, and just before arriving at the ford, we abruptly stopped and cut the engine. Thirty or so meters away through the trees to our right, were two elephants, a female and youngster around three years old. Fantastic, my first wild elephant sighting. It was a such a good moment, seeing the two elephants grazing naturally in the forest, keeping an eye on us, but not appearing too bothered. The trees weren’t dense but still it wasn’t easy getting a photograph through the tangle of branches – although getting a shot didn’t seem so important – seeing these great animals in the wild was really what the trip was about. I did manage to take a few manually focused shots though (too many obstacles between me and the elephants for autofocus to work) – a good memento of my first wild elephant. After watching them feed for five minutes or so, the pair walked off further into the forest.  We drove on through the clear fast flowing waters of the river, scattering hundreds of yellow butterflies from its wet muddy shores, then spotted the rest of the herd -  five more elephants including a larger tusked male, a few hundred meters downstream amongst the trees. It was a fleeting glimpse though as the herd vanished into the trees shortly within seconds.

The hours following the elephant sighting were largely uneventful – the afternoon sun was relentless; we sat on the edge of a grassy plain, watching Indian Roller birds fly by whilst sheltering under trees avoiding the suns’ direct rays. It was just too hot for the wildlife to venture out of the forest. Just as we were about to walk back to the pickup truck there was an almighty roar – an elephant, which sounded very close. The scream echoed through the trees and was followed by an unnatural hush – no bird song, no rustling in the tree canopy or undergrowth, even the insects seem to fall silent……an eyry silence. It’s not easy to tell how near something is in the forest so I looked to our guide for an indication; wide eyed and with a creased brow, they had a startled and concerned “lets’ get out of here” kind of look – and we walked at pace towards the truck and main track 50 or so meters away.  I was glad to climb into the truck – although an open pickup truck wouldn’t help very much if you were unlucky enough to catch an elephant on an off day. Exciting though! On our way back to the main entrance we came across another small elephant herd feeding in light woodland not too far from the track we were on. We cut the engine and sat and watched the nearest two elephants feeding 30 meters away – the rest of the herd were around 60 meters in – just tan smudges through the green foliage. As the two elephants moved closer we lowered the handbrake of the pickup and rolled silently down the track, trying to keep a reasonable and safe distance away. The elephants slowly made their way to the edge of the track and looked like they were intending to cross, but our presence obviously spooked them and after a brief pause on the side of the rusty red dirt road they turned and melted back into the trees. Fantastic! One of my top wildlife experiences. We drove on for a couple of minutes and stopped again – three gaur (also known as Indian bison) were feeding in a small clearing in the trees. This species is the largest wild bovine in the world and one of the rarest. In the fading light, they looked a deep chocolate maroon in colour, with a gold crown and gold “socks” on each leg, and an immense size – second only to the elephant in Thailand. Their bodies were bulging with oversized muscle but with a reputation of being quiet and passive they didn’t seem interested in our presence and carried on feeding on low hanging leaves. As the light faded they too faded into the now murky blue forest, just one last sighting as a gaur crossed the track in front of us as we drove back onto a tarmac road and passed the electric fences and hanging beer bottles. What an excellent afternoon!