What To Expect

What‘s Included

Reviews

• Great Experience

  JerseyCl,Mar 5, 2026

  - Review from Tripadvisor

  5.00

  Absolutely great experience from start to finish. Interacting with the elephants in an ethical way with their welfare the main goal. Can’t recommend highly enough.

• Horrendous

  195smartb,Feb 23, 2026

  - Review from Tripadvisor

  1.00

  We booked through Elephant Sanctuary (since 2007) after reading on a blog that it was an ethical place to visit. However, we ended up arriving at Rang-Tong instead. We were picked up by a driver and co-driver along with 12 other people collected from various hotels. The driving was extremely reckless. There was no consideration for the passengers in the van, moped riders, or other drivers on the road. The driver was speeding and undertaking unnecessarily. I genuinely feared we would crash or seriously injure someone. Throughout the return journey, the driver was also repeatedly sniffing, which made the situation even more concerning. When we arrived, I did not feel any genuine love or care towards the elephants. The overall energy felt very off. Despite being told there wouldn’t be large numbers of visitors at once, there was a constant stream of people arriving. It felt overcrowded and not at all what had been described. The elephants were bathed in a pond — not a river as expected — and there was constant feeding by visitors throughout the day. The whole experience felt commercialised rather than ethical. Overall, it was a very sad and experience. I was very relieved to make it back in one piece.

• Misleading & Not Ethical – Very Disappointing Experience

  Fearless02272440160,Feb 20, 2026

  - Review from Tripadvisor

  1.00

  We booked this elephant sanctuary experience because it was advertised as an ethical, observation-focused program. The description promised that we would mainly observe the elephants walking freely in the jungle, help bathe them in a river, prepare their food and vitamin balls, and feed them in a natural and respectful way. Unfortunately, the experience was nothing like what was advertised. First, the shuttle was over an hour late. On top of that, we were made to wait even longer for other guests who were late for pickup. The day already started off unprofessionally and disorganized. Instead of taking us to the sanctuary we had booked, we were taken to Ran Tong. From the moment we arrived, it was clear this was not what had been promised. There was no river, no jungle walk, and no opportunity to prepare food or vitamin balls for the elephants. The grounds were poorly maintained and did not look like a well-kept sanctuary. The only thing visitors were allowed to feed the elephants was corn. Rather than being an observation-based ethical experience, it involved a lot of petting and directing the elephants to move where trainers wanted them to. It did not feel natural or ethical at all, and it did not match the sanctuary-style experience that was advertised. We chose this experience specifically because we wanted to support ethical elephant tourism. Instead, we left feeling misled and disappointed. I would strongly recommend future visitors double-check exactly where they are being taken and carefully research the company before booking.

• To be avoided

  818claudior,Feb 19, 2026

  - Review from Tripadvisor

  1.00

  We booked through the website elephant-sanctuary.org convinced that it was a save & rescue center. We were promised to have a lesson about elephants’ life an behavior, prepare food for them, walk with them in the forest, bath with them in the river and all this in full respect of the animals. The day of the experience we realized that elephant-sanctuary.org is just a tour company and they took as to Ran-Ton where there were 7 elephants surrounded by at least 100 tourists that continued touching them and taking picture. There is no walking in the forest, no food preparation, no lesson about the elephant and no river where the elephant can bath. In the place, which is a very small area, there is just a little pond. We personally decided not to participate in the experience since the animals did not look good or at ease. I have to mentioned that after insistent requests, we were fully refunded what we paid.

• IMPORTANT TO READ elephantsanctuary.org is not a reliable website

  jonnyl50,Feb 17, 2026

  - Review from Tripadvisor

  1.00

  You book an experience at Elephant Sanctuary but they will take you to Ran Tong Elephant Center. Apart from the problem with the pickup service (over 1 hour waiting) you don’t get the experience you pay for: no small groups (between 25 to 30 people), no food preparation, no bathing with the animals, no walk in the forest, and, most importantly elephants are not treated ethically. We refused the experienced and asked them to take us back. Several others took same stand and they were therefore forced to arrange for a van to take all of us back to the hotel.

• Great up close and personal experience w these amazing animals

  StorkRN1,Feb 16, 2026

  - Review from Tripadvisor

  5.00

  Added this day on to our tour to visit elephants. It was a great experience getting to feed them, prepare sugar cane for them, and help wash them off. I felt like they’re ethically maintained and managed there. When the elephants had enough of the water, they left. When they didn’t want to be touched and fed by tourists, they had free will to leave. We had a great day and were glad we went!

  

  

  

• Lousy.

  Cecilia H,Feb 15, 2026

  - Review from Tripadvisor

  1.00

  We decided to make this visit after reading that it was an ethical sanctuary. From the photos, it looked like a big place, where you could walk and see the elephants from afar and, if they wanted to come close, we could feed them and bathe with them. From the beginning the tour showed what would ultimately be a disaster. They came looking for us later than planned. The van they drove us to the shrine was crashed, dirty inside and out. We had been told that the group would be small and there were actually about 10 people, but before there were two more groups, so we had to wait for all the activities. The guide of the sanctuary could not even speak in English, he did not understand anything and had us for a long time (waiting for the other groups) talking nonsense and playing the joke. In turn, it got really crazy if someone stepped away (it's a small place) from where he was. The worst thing was that it wasn’t really that if the elephants wanted to we could approach them but that with the food the guides were manipulating the elephants to go one way or the other. The elephants, who said they were about 16, were only three!! The stream was very small too and the place was small. That afternoon I dropped my ray ban glasses and they never got back. It was a waste of time and I very much regret that the elephants cannot act freely there. I don't recommend it.

  

• Fab

  Guide733701,Feb 14, 2026

  - Review from Tripadvisor

  5.00

  Would recommend! Bring bug spray

• Incredibly rude guide & very poor experience.

  Anonymous,Feb 11, 2026

  - Review from Viator

  1.00

  I have been travelling thoughtout SE Asia for more than 15 years, and have been on countless tours. Funny that I had the best and worst tours ever on consecutive days on this trip in Chiang Mai. Unfortunately, this tour was the worst. The pick-up was late and the food provided on the lower scale of what one can expect on these tours, but that wasn't a big deal. What was simply unacceptable and shocking was the person at the sanctuary who lead the group. She told us her name was Siri, and from the very first minute, she started to scream at us to hurry up, fill out the insurance forms, etc. She also insisted that there were 8 people in the van in which we arrived, but there were only 7. We were on the van, so we should now, right? But she didn't believe us and keep looking for the right person and was not interested in our feedback. After about 20 minutes of her acting like a drill sergeant, I had to finally tell her to stop screaming at us. She did, but then she basically checked out. I have never in my life experienced such a rude and unpleasant guide. And especially in Thailand, this is very unusual, as people tend to be incredibly friendly and helpful. So basically she ruined the experience for the entire tour group. Of course we talked about her afterward, and we all felt the same. She also didn't offer to take photos of us with the elephants, which is also very unusual. I will contact Viator and request a refund. The only good thing to say about this tour is that the elephants seemed to be taken care of very well. Skip this one and take the 4 in 1 Elephants, Long-neck Village, Rafting and Sticky waterfall tour instead, also offered on Viator in Chiang Mai. This was the best tour I have ever been on.

• A little disappointment

  Marek H,Feb 10, 2026

  - Review from Tripadvisor

  3.00

  Rate 3. For this kind of money I would expect smaller people groups. We were like in 15 to 20 people. They have around 5 to 8 elephants that you feed with grass and fruits. In the whole are the groups of 20 people are changing stations and feed the same elephants. The elephants seems to like it, but taking the photo was sometimes to much disrespectful from my point of view. Our guide was kind of funny but spoke not good level of English and a lot of times we just could understand the meaning and connections between solar system and elephants and so on. So it was nice see the animals from near and feed them, but would be nice if they do it not so obviously digging the money from the whole thing.

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