Mason Elephant Park & Lodge: The Ultimate Family Adventure in Bali 🐘

Imagine this, being picked up by an elephant for dinner, swimming bareback with these gentle giants and having an entire jungle paradise to yourself. Sound great? Well, today we're taking you inside the Mason Elephant Park in Lodge and Bally for a once-in-a-lifetime experience for families and animal lovers alike. But is this resort right for your next family vacation? Stick around because we're sharing our personal experience, tips, costs, and everything you need to know. So without further ado, cue the intro and let's get into it. What's up, YouTube? Trevi from The Adventure Buddies, the modern travel family, bringing you another video filled with tips, tricks, and inspiration to make sure you maximize your next family adventure like we always do here at The Adventure Buddies. Welcome back to The Adventure Buddies. We're a family of five passionate about sharing stress-free travel tips, unique adventures, and honest resort reviews to help you plan your dream family getaway. So hit that subscribe button for more travel tips and adventures. Without further ado, let's get into this week's video. So before we get into the resort, we need to talk about where it is. So again, as I mentioned, it is in Bali. So if you are coming from the United States, it's gonna take you quite a bit of a ways to get there. So we're coming out of Los Angeles out of LAX where it took us 20 hours, yes, with a two-year-old baby, Olivia. Comment down below if you wanna learn more about how we survived that long travel. So 20 hours on a flight to the international airport in Bali, then a two-hour car ride up to Ubud where we finally got to Mason Elephant Park. But again, a long travel day, but entirely worth it. So let's go ahead and get into this resort review. So without further ado, let's just go ahead and dive right into all the activities you get to do here at the resort, particularly those with the elephants. The main activities that you're gonna get to do here are absolutely incredible. So that first one is you have the opportunity to give an elephant a bath. And it's just what it sounds like. So you're gonna spend 15 minutes with a hose, a brush, et cetera. And you're gonna get up close and personal with these elephants. And so you're gonna get in there and scrub super hard. You're gonna be able to take a ton of different photos and you're just gonna be up close and personal with these gentle giants. Then the second activity that you're gonna wanna make sure you do here at Mason Elephant Lodge is the elephant swim. So just like in the name, you're gonna go swimming with the elephants in the man-made lake here at the resort. You're gonna hop on the elephant's bare back. So again, no saddle with you and the elephant trainer. You're gonna go into this lake and you're gonna get all the way immersed in the water. The elephants are not just here for the ride. They're just here for the good time. So they're gonna go all the way underwater. They're gonna come up on their two hind legs. You have to hold on for dear life like riding a Bronco. And then they're gonna continue to splash you and throw up their trunks and spray out water. It is just an incredible time. And if you're even lucky enough, they may even let you do a backflip off of them like our son Jake did here in this video. Check it out. So to be honest, this was probably our favorite activity out of everything that we did here at the lodge because this was the most unique. Who in their right mind can say that they actually swam and interacted with elephants in this manner? This was definitely a bucket list worthy activity and an adventure that we highly recommend you check out here at the resort. And then the next activity you're gonna get to do here at the lodge is that after you dry off from your swim, you're gonna head over and start to feed the elephants. And so they're gonna bring over a number of different elephants where you can buy food and actually feed them from your hand. Plus you can take several of those Instagramable pictures along the way. So they're gonna have anything from the baby elephants all the way up to the full grown ones. So definitely an activity that you have to check out while here at the lodge. Then the next activity hopping back on the elephants is the elephant safari ride. So this is gonna be about a 10 to 15 minute safari ride on an elephant, just like it says in its name. So instead of going bareback, you're actually gonna hop on a saddle. That saddle is super comfortable. You're gonna have a seatbelt so you're super secure and you get to go into the Balinese jungle with an elephant. So how cool is this actual experience? We absolutely had a blast and definitely something you need to make sure that you do while staying here at the resort. But we're not done yet. There's actually one more opportunity throughout your day where you get to actually ride an elephant for one more occasion. And we're talking about when the elephant chauffeur picks you up from your hotel suite and takes you to dinner. Talk about riding to dinner in style. So next let's talk about the actual lodging options you have here at the resort. So there aren't a ton of different suites to choose from because the resort in a sense from a lodging standpoint isn't all that big. It has about 20 plus different suites all scattered throughout the park. So there are a variety of different options, but the one that we stayed at was one of the largest ones on the suite and housed a family of five with no problem. So we stayed at the Tarot suite and this suite was absolutely incredible. Not only did it have all the amenities, comfortable beds, two bathrooms, a jacuzzi, but our favorite part, it had a full wraparound porch with views that led you right to the elephants. And so every morning we were able to wake up, go outside on this porch and our elephants were right there to greet us and say good morning. Such a cool way to spend our time here in Bali. So next let's talk about the dining options while staying at the park. And so if you wanna go for breakfast, that's typically going to be included in your stay and that's gonna be at the Mammoth Head Bar. So they have a la carte options, sometimes they have buffet, et cetera. But if you do go there, we highly recommend you trying out the banana bread French toast. We've never had or even heard of such a combination and probably the best thing we tasted our entire trip to Bali. So next let's talk about the lunch and dinner options here at the resort. So there is one main restaurant where you're gonna have lunch and dinner. Both there's a buffet option as well as a la carte. And there's Balinese options or the tradition American route such as hamburgers, hot dogs, pastas, et cetera. So there are a ton of different varieties for you to choose from. And everything that we ate over our stay here was absolutely exceptional. And then finally, probably our favorite place to eat on the entire resort was Tree Tops. Why? Was it because of the drinks and the happy hour menu? Maybe, but more importantly, the atmosphere and how we got there. So Tree Tops allowed you to take a tree top walkway. So you went on a wooden walkway that suspended about two stories and took you all the way across the resort. To your left or to your right, you were masked with nothing but elephants roaming the resort. So just a really cool walkway to get there. Plus you had great scenery while enjoying a cocktail, a beverage, or even some small food items. So next let's talk about some of the other amenities they had here at the resort. They had a museum where you can learn all about the elephants. They actually had a real life replica of a woolly mammoth, which was super cool. They had an art museum where you can actually see various artists' renditions of elephants and all things related to the elephants. Then they had a gym, they had a spa, and then our favorite was the pool. So not only was this pool fun just to swim and splash around and have a good time, but as you look outside, you're surrounded by elephants. So next let's talk about the overall staff. How do the staff treat us in terms of our customer experience? Well, we couldn't say enough good things about the staff here at Mason Elephant Lodge. Not only were they super friendly and engaging, but anywhere from the trainers of the elephants to the staff that took care of us, to the babysitting services that they offer, everyone in between went over the top to make sure that our stay was exceptional, and it was. And so we really enjoyed having the staff here. They got to know us fairly well, which was evident by our baby Olivia running up to them and asking for a hug and asking for them to hold her. Maybe because they also knew that if she did this, they would help her feed the elephant. All right, so last let's talk about the overall cost of our experience here at Mason Elephant Lodge. So we'll start off with the rooms. So from a nightly basis, the rooms are gonna cost you anywhere from about $200 to $600 per night for individual's rooms that you're looking for. However, it should be noted that you could add on additional packages. So there is an all-inclusive package. What's included in that all-inclusive package? Well, you're gonna get breakfast, and then you're gonna get all the elephant activities that we included. So for our days that we stayed there, we were able to do breakfast, we were able to bathe the elephants, we were able to swim with the elephants, we were able to ride them in safari, as well as getting picked up again for dinner right on that elephant's back. So a super cool, unique experience just by doing that. So we highly suggest you go for the all-inclusive package because it's actually gonna run you about 20% cheaper than if you did everything a la carte. So it should be mentioned that if you aren't staying at the actual resort, there's still an opportunity for you to get a day pass to come into Mason Elephant Lodge where you can just spend the full day with the elephants. And so you're gonna be about a $25 entry fee into the park, then you're gonna purchase some a la carte options. So you're gonna be able to bathe with the elephants, you're gonna be able to swim with them, everything that we said you're gonna be able to do, but it is gonna cost you a little bit more if you weren't staying there. So again, you do get that 20% discount if you are an actual guest at the resort. It should also be noted that if you are staying at the resort, you get to start those activities earlier as well as get to do them a little bit later so you can avoid the crowds on either end of the day. And that's something that we took advantage of. And so during the middle part of the day, because you're in the jungle, it is also really hot and humid. And so we wanna make sure we knocked out our activities when we wanted to, to avoid the crowds. And then the last section is, is this resort good for those families? And so our particular response is absolutely yes. So again, we traveled with a two-year-old, plus we had two teenagers and each of them had a great unique experience in themselves. And so we felt that the babysitting and the staff did a great job of including Olivia. And while she couldn't ride the elephant into the lake and do the swimming portion, she was able to do everything else. And so our older kids loved it, our baby loved it, and we couldn't recommend this resort enough for those. So there you guys have it, our full review and breakdown of the Mason Elephant Park and Lodge here in Bali. And this was just an incredible experience. Our one time to Bali, and this was definitely the way to spend it. So the next time you're considering a family trip, consider coming here to Mason Elephant Lodge because you're not gonna be disappointed. So if you liked this video, please consider giving us that big thumbs up. Hit that red subscribe button for more travel tips and adventures. And most importantly, remember, life's an adventure. Who you going on it with?