Day 22...Bangkok (Kanchanburi & Tiger Temple)

Hello,

As we were fit for practically nothing yesterday we thought it best to finally get our backsides into gear and not waste another day on the beer or hungover.

So today we were off on a one day tour to Kanchanburi (more famously known for the River Kwai) followed by a visit to the Tiger Temple.

The day started at 6am (as you can see we are definately back to the early starts!) as we had to catch the bus at 7am. There must be at least 500 of these small travel agents in Bangkok that sell one, two, three and more day tours very cheap so it is definately the easiest way to see stuff. What you soon come to realise is that they actually all sell the same tours and its a matter of just playing the price off each of them to get the best deal. Anyway, the minibus worked its way down to our travel agent after picking people up at the 499 agencies before us and we set on the way.

The first stop was the WW2 cemetary for the POW's that died building the bridge (over the river Kwai). Even though it was just a cemetary, it was quite emotional in the fact that you realised over half of the headstones said between the ages 20-30 years - so it like a whole generation wiped out. Being very fair to the area, the cemetary was very well maintained with the grass cut, sprinklers going and flowers on the graves, so they are taken very good care of which is nice to see (even more so surprising as it is not somewhere you have to pay to visit). Our next stop was the museum which carried artefacts from the war both the Japanese side and the POW's. It was really interesting finding out the full history about the war and the building of the railway, if not very sad at the same time. After we visited the museum, Dom and myself walked across the bridge - thats right, walked! There was no barriers on the side or safety net underneath and only room for one person in the middle of the tracks, so pass by other people you had to stand on the rail to the side which was quite scary. You would never be able to do that at home! I kind of figured that the trains must not use the bridge anymore and thats why we could freely walk across it - so you can well imagine our surprise when we hearD an ear blasting horn coming from behind us when we were only half way across!! Apparently they do still use the line!! We were literally on the bridge when the train was going across it - made for a great picture.

I forgot to mention that even though these tours are great, the person who takes you can't really speak English very well, so the two of us got very confused at this point and just went where the man pointed - which was back onto the bus. Next thing we know we have been brought to a train station, told to get on the next train and get off after 40 minutes. It then clicked to us that we were going to ride on the death railway. This was actually quite an experience. To look out the window of a train which is moving on a wooden track which looks less studier than lego is fairly nervewrecking. Still, we got some great photos (which we have figured out how to put up on the website). Oh, we were also able to then give out about the silly people who wouldn't get off the tracks when we were crossing the bridge. And believe it or not, the driver was actually at the other end of the line when we had to get off the train!

A great morning and a real experience into a part of history: we are really glad we did it.

This afternoons adventure could of taken a real turn for the worst had anything gone wrong - without spoiling the ending too much we are here to tell the tale - we went to the Tiger Temple, which is basically a wildlife park predominantly for tigers, but also has pigs, horses, chickens, cows etc roaming free as well. Not to confuse the situation it is the latter animals that roamed free, the tigers don't have that privilage. As you can imagine, Dom being the great lover of animals that he is, he couldn't wait to get in there with the Tigers! The beauty of this place is you can actually touch the tigers. There were about 10 tigers chained in a valley area where the staff would take people in one by one to sit with the tigers and have your photo taken. For every person that goes in there are 3 members of staff continuously watching you and the tiger that you are annoying to ensure you don't get your head bitten off. To no surprise, Dom didn't go in - considering he won't go near Holly at home, I let him off for not going into the tigers. However...I braved them! (although you can see from the pictures I didn't touch them - why annoy a tiger any more than you have too?!?) Twas fantastic though as like walking on a railway bridge, this is something you would never get the opportunity to do at home.

Later on that evening after a day like today there was no beer, restaurants or galavanting. It was dinner off a street stall, (cheap and tasty) then to bed. We switched on a film at ten and fell asleep by five past...zzz...dreaming of the tigers.

Team Domro