After that, we headed to Lampang and our hotel, which was listed somewhat romantically as being on the river. Well, as it turned out, while I guess it was a river, it was sort of like being on the Los Angeles river. Like a concrete aqueduct. The hotel itself looked decent enough but everyone in our group was complaining of bed bugs the next day. We weren't there long anyway, though. I wouldn't personally recommend Lampang to anyone.

After breakfast we headed towards Chiang Mai and stopped at an elephant park on the way there. The main elephant park had elephant rides, elephants painting and such and was an overall educational park all about elephants.

Elephant painting.

Now if only we can teach them Photoshop!

At the start of our elephant ride here, not that you can see the elephant in this shot!

They also make paper out of the massive amount of elephant dung that's generated by the park's residents. Seems pretty eco friendly and the proceeds go to the park.

Mmm mmm. Poop!

Near the elephant park was an elephant hospital. They showed us a film to educate us about what they do and introduced us to some of their elephants. In the area around the border with Myanmar, people illegally use elephants to haul timber. And in that area, there's a ton of landmines. Once in a while, an elephant gets their foot blown off or is otherwise injured. And this hospital helps those elephants.

You can see his injured foot.

We donated some money to the hospital, bought some shirts and such. And otherwise, we had a pretty nice day. The elephants were pretty cool. Sad to see the injuries sustained by the hospital residents, but nice to see the hospital taking care of them!