Kanchanaburi to the Beach

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Our plan for today is to take it a little bit easier. We're starting to wind down towards the end of our trip and it's time to relax a little. Not too much, mind you! So, today we head south, to the beach at Hua Hin. After breakfast (which was served to our room) we headed out towards the Khao Ngu Stone Park. It looks very impressive in the pictures, and it was pretty, but we both felt the pictures oversold it. But as we were approaching the site there were several monkeys on the roadside! Of course we had to stop and take pictures, and a couple of the critters came up to the car! As I rolled the window down to take a picture, one of them came closer and prepared to jump in! I had to snap the picture through a small crack.

We drove a couple minutes further to the parking lot. The place has seen much better times, obviously. The parking lot was huge, but empty, an area was set aside for touristy stalls but most were closed. There were some other people there, but not many, taking selfies and riding the paddleboats on the pond. The place itself is a large outcropping of rocks, cliffs jutting upwards, and a pond nestled between the cliffs. There's a main area as you come in, a footbridge and pathways around the edges of the pond, but the end of the bridge and the pathways were all flooded. I guess they never planned for the water to get so high! So we had a look around, enjoyed the view, the birds and fish, and got ready to go.

We got some potato crisps - actually one potato crisp cut in a spiral from a while potato and skewered in a bamboo stick, then fried, and spices dumped liberally on it all. It was actually pretty good (if oily).

Our next stop was a gamble - Google said Tham Khao Luang cave may be closed but we decided to risk it anyway. There's a very large cave there with a temple inside it. The town of Phetchaburi, where the cave is, is a real backwater. Nothing of interest except the way to the cave. And the cave was closed, but right next to the (closed) entrance there's a temple - Wat Boontawee (Tumklab) - that looked interesting, especially since there were a couple monkeys hanging around the gate. So after a little convincing ("No, they're harmless, really!") Gilat agreed to get out of the car and we went in. The temple itself is just another temple, in need of renovation, but it backs up against a steep hill and there's a bunch of tombs or stupas on it. We climbed up the stairs, being watched closely all the way by a troop of monkeys to explore a bit. The monkeys seemed wary of us but not menacing or scared. Just keeping an eye out. We looked around, took pictures but were respectful of them and didn't stay long.

Back in the temple grounds they have a different kind of guard - two sculptures of large dogs, quite lifelike, and chained to fenceposts. And on either side of the entrance gate was a demon warrior.

We had our fill of wats and monkeys for today, and headed for the beach! We got to out hotel on the Cha-Am beach of Hua Hin and checked in. This place is nice! It's a smallish hotel right on the beach, the room is huge and overlooks the pool and the beach and is very posh for the price!

We dumped our luggage and sine it was still early, we went to find the Sirindhorn Mangrove park. We eventually found it, quite a large area with a few tiny paved roads through it and canals from the sea inland crisscrossing the area. We parked and went for a walk along the beach and to the entrance from the sea into the canal. We watched a fisherman wade in the sea and cast his net, and went for a short walk through the forest (mainly tamarisk and acacia), and found some swampy, flooded areas covered with mangroves too. There were several Thai locals jogging in the park, the first we'd seen on our trip (so the Thai do exercise after all).

Back at the hotel we had a shower and went to find a massage. My back really needs one. Gilat got a foot massage and I tried an oil massage. The tough granny who did me scolded me for not having more massages, she said I need it! I tend to agree...

We went to find something to eat. At one section of the beach there were lots of lights and stalls, so we stopped there and were immediately invited to sit down by the lady who runs a group of stalls. We walked around a bit before returning to her. What can I say, her stalls looked the nicest. We ordered a seafood hotpot and a corn salad, and a bottle of Leo, a local Thai beer. The seafood included some things I still don't recognize (as well as prawns, crab, and chicken, pork, mushrooms, Chinese cabbage and, of course. noodles). Most of it was really quite good and there was lots! The salad and beer were nice too. Still, it was by far the most expensive meal we'd had so far (and yet still far far cheaper than we can dream of for such a meal back home). We did NOT go to bed hungry!

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