You just never know what's around the next corner, do you? For these bikers in Thailand's Khao Yai National Park, it's an unexpected elephant roadblock.

One of the country's biggest national parks, Khao Yai is home to at least 300 wild elephants – but the roads that wind through the area are also a big draw for bikers, making encounters like this one pretty common.

Luckily for these riders, the elephant in the video seems only mildly curious, and ambles off into the forest after a brief mid-trip bike inspection. 

But not all motorists get off as easily as this pair. After several close calls last year, park authorities were forced to impose curfew restrictions for vehicles in an attempt to prevent dangerous encounters between humans and pachyderms.

“When you see an elephant do not honk, do not flash your car lights, do not take photos and keep your engine running,” park chief chief Kanchit Srinoppawan warned after one incident in January last year. (That's advice the selfie-taking bikers in the video don't follow all that closely.)

The elephants, particularly the bulls, are more likely to behave aggressively during mating season, or when there are young calves within the herd. That's a lesson this rider in the park learned the hard way when he tried to bypass a herd and got just a little too close:

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Top header image: Arati Kumar-Rao, Flickr