Tiger Temples and the River Kwai

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After a pretty good trip up from Chumphon on a sleeper train last night, we arrived in Kanchanaburi early this morning. Kanchanaburi is about 2 hours west of Bangkok and only about 40km from the Myanmar border. We have come here to visit Hugh Cope, one of my Dad's friends from the HK Telephone company, who has retired here with his wife Siriporn. However, as we were not meeting them until tomorrow, we decided to go to the Tiger Temple today.

We have been wanting to visit this place for a couple of years now, ever since we saw Katrina Rowntree show it on Getaway. It is a sanctuary for tigers that have been harmed by poachers or rescued in the wild, and it is run by monks. I was really excited to go there as I thought it was a place that probably wouldn't get visited by many people and we would get to play with the tigers. Wrong. There are actual tours that are run from Bangkok to the Temple, and there were loads of tourists there with families. However, it was still a wonderful experience. After paying 300bht to get in, you could pay another 100bht to be lead round the tigers by hand and have your photo taken with them. It felt a bit contrived but I guess the money is going to a good cause, and I couldn't resist stroking such a beautiful beast!

However, it was after meeting the tigers that we had our most enjoyable experience. Once the tigers were lead to their respective "homes", we followed a path up to open area. Spontaneously, animals of all types wandered into the area out of the bush; there were peacocks, goats, buffalo, donkey, chooks, wild boar .... everything! It was quite a menagerie - a real Dr Doolittle Zoo!!! Apparently, the temple grounds are also a sanctuary for other animals and they were coming out of the bush for dinner time. A ute soon drove through dropping bags of turnips out onto the road, and all the animals came together to eat. Other than giving the buffalo a wide berth, all the animals ate together quite happily - it was really beautiful site!

After our trip out to the Temple we were in need of a Tiger Beer 😉 So we headed to the Buddha Bar near our guesthouse ("Sam's House - fantastic find). We met Ami there. She had worked for Peace Corps for three years in southern Thailand in the eighties as a teenager, and was back to revisit the place. She was fluent in Thai, which was very impressive. She now works as a biologist in a National Park in Arizona - sounds like a wonderful place to visit sometime!. Off for an early night as Hugh is picking us up at 8am.

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Photos

Stef and Tiger 1
Stef getting up close to the Tigers at the Tiger sanctuary

Stef and Tiger 3
Stef getting up close to the Tigers at the Tiger sanctuary (this one was loving his back scratch, quite brave of Stef)

Comments

[Jayne Crocker]

Can't believe it!
Good God Stef - you are brave. I'm thoroughly enjoying your updates so keep them coming! Many thanks, Jayne