Playful baby elephants tumble down a muddy slope on their knees

Jumbo slide! Playful baby elephants tumble down a muddy slope on their knees

  • Adorable video shows playful elephants sliding down a hill in northern Thailand
  • The elephants were walking in the Elephant Freedom Village on September 15
  • Keeper Non captured the amusing video of the animals tumbling down the hill
  • This is the adorable moment that lazy baby elephants slid on their knees down a muddy hill in northern Thailand.

    A group of elephants were out for a stroll inside the Elephant Freedom Village in Chiang Mai province when they reached a steep muddy slope.

    Some of the fun-loving elephants decided it would be quicker to slide down the hill rather than walk with the other animals, adorable footage shows.

    In the video, the lazy elephants use their front legs to gain speed and let their back legs fall to the floor, happily sliding on their stomachs down the muddy hill.

    Playful elephants decided to slide down a muddy hill instead of walk at the Elephant Freedom Village in the Chiang Mai province of northern Thailand

    Adorable video footage, taken by elephant keeper Non on September 15, shows the fun-loving animals speeding down the muddy slope on their back legs

    Adorable video footage, taken by elephant keeper Non on September 15, shows the fun-loving animals speeding down the muddy slope on their back legs

    Their mahout, or elephant keeper, Non captured the amusing footage of the animals playfully tumbling down the hill on September 15.

    Non said: ‘This is the cutest roller coaster I have ever seen. My kids looked happy and I am glad that they were enjoying the outdoors.’

    Non-profit organisation Elephant Freedom Village said its elephants spend 90 per cent of their time in the forests, with their remaining time being spent in sheltered paddocks at night.

    In the paddocks, the elephants are ‘given fresh piles of food to graze from; enough to sustain them until the morning hours’. 

    The  lazy elephants use their front legs to gain speed and let their back legs fall to the floor, happily sliding on their stomachs down the forest hill

    The  lazy elephants use their front legs to gain speed and let their back legs fall to the floor, happily sliding on their stomachs down the forest hill

    The organisation rescues elephants with the aim of undoing ‘the damage done by humans’ and over time ‘return them to the forest where they belong’. 

    Thailand has at least 2,000 elephants living in the wild and a similar number in captivity.

    They live in sanctuaries, elephant parks, zoos, tourist resorts or with private owners who use them for weddings and religious ceremonies.