Water Market and Tiger Temple

---

Got up early and was picked up outside the guest house at 7:00.

Today was going to be a busy day with lots to see and do. Having said this it did take a while to get us going as the train of mini buses spent aprox over an hour caining it through the city picking up people from all sorts of Guest houses around bankok.

First stop was the famous water market. On the way up (1h and 30 drive) I talked to a very nice australian couple. We stopped of half way through the journey to check out some small market by the road side which wasnt great.

Finally we reached the point in which we were to jump on to the high powered river boat that was to take us to the market. Once arriving at the market we changed to a small paddle boat.
The market despite being only one small stretch of water way was good fun. A hive of activity, colours and smells. At some points it would get so busy that viewed from above it was almost impossible to see the river. Didnt buy anything apart from a few snacks from the stalls.

Later went to a snake show. This was good fun. We watched intently as the crazy snake charmers riled cobras and other deadly snakes for our amusment. There were a couple of times when it was a little close (the week before it transpired, one of the charmers lost there index finger to one of the larger snakes) some of the younger charmers were easily distracted by the flash photography.

Later we took another short ride to Kanchanaburi and to the war cemetry. This is where the infamous bridge on the river Khwae was built as part of the railway of death (15000 allied POW died plus, correct me if im wrong, 100,000 civilians due to forced labour.) This was the somber part of the trip as after visiting the cemetry we went to the site of the bridge and informative museum.

We then stopped for lunch by the river.

Afterwards we headed for what we had all been waiting for, the Tiger Temple. The journey was made all the more interesting as I swear the driver was starting to fall asleep behind the wheel. What it is, is a monastery where orphaned tigers are taken in and raised. Here you get the chance to sit with them and pet the larger pussycats. This was quite interesting as the "monastery" seems to have become (or heading towards becoming) something of a theme park with new pens with waterfalls, state of the art toilet facilities and food kiosks being erected.
The chance to sit next to one of these large beautiful beasts was quite an experience but they all seemed a bit dopey. When talking to Antony (Irish New New Yorker) we came to the conclusion that they had all been druged or something.

We headed back to Bankok.

That Evening I went and had a bite to eat then met up with Antony and a mate of his at Gullivers bar for a few drinks.

---

Comments

[Andy C]

Tigers
Awesome! Loving those tiger pictures, they're grrrreat! (sorry, couldn't resist!)