The eye of the Thai-ger

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Kanchanaburi surprisingly does offer more than just the bridge over the river Kwai. We took a 45 minute pickup ride to a tiger sanctuary where buddhist monks look after tigers. When we got there the adult tigers were all gathered in a small canyon. Here you can be taken in by a guide who takes photos of you next to the tigers. Unfortunately it seemed as though the tigers were heavily sedated to allow tourists to do this. It is a real shame for the tigers to live that way and they were not in the slightest bit intimidating, which in my opinion is the real appeal for seeing such animals. The sanctuary did however have unsedated baby tigers who were really playful and like to bite and growl at pretty much anything. The sanctuary also held a huge number of boar, water buffalo and deer. At feeding time a truck ran down a stretch of road and dropped off bags of vegetables. When this happened we were caught in a stampede of all these animals.

The next day in Kanchanaburi we took a bus to the nearby Erawan falls. Here there a seven different levels of waterfalls stretched over 4km. The water was extremely clear and you get to swim in each level and on some levels you can go behind and under the waterfall. The water was really nice to swim in, except if you stayed still at any point a load of small fish started sucking/biting your legs and feet. There were also some massive fish in there who just don't move out the way for you. The waterfalls are also home to lots of wild monkeys. We managed to see them climbing the trees and one even came down for a closer look at us.

After an early start we travelled on coach for 14 hours to Chang Mai via Bangkok. The coach from Bangkok to Chang Mai was amazing. It was a double decker first class bus and we were served with free drinks and had are own pillows and blankets to use on reclining chairs. We were also treated to a jackie chan film with lee evans in and we were soldiers, unfortunately both films were in Thai but I got the gist.

We arrived in Chang Mai in the evening and decided to have a small excursion round the local bars. One bar was an english punk bar decorated with pictures of the sex pistols, the clash etc. The music was a welcome change. There were very little halloween celebrations here but we did experience a few fireworks first hand. While sitting minding our own business, a waitress put down a roman candle next to us and lit it. We just moved out the way in time to see our table and beers showered in sparks. As you can guess, health and safety is not a priority in the South East Asian way of life.

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