Ton Tuey Floating Raft Houses Surat Thani

I've never seen the film Bridge Over the River Kwai. Not that I can recall, anyway. The closest I can remember is the comedy Volunteers with Tom Hanks and John Candy from back in the '80s. Not quite the same, I'm sure. My point is that I wasn't sure what to expect from the bridge. Or the Kwai River. Or the town of Kanchanaburi. The town turned out to be the perfect combination of small-town comfort and ample ameneties. Our bus rolled into town late in the morning. We headed west towards the r...

All my anger has left me. The topic of this entry occurred so long ago that all of my passion regarding it has gone. I can only relate this episode as I remember it now. The four of us left Kanchanburi for Erawon. We took a public bus which maxed out at 15mph because it was an old Mercedes deisel from the 1950s. But eventually we arrived at the Erawon market. Our instructions were to get off the bus there and find transport to the farm by asking for "Mr. Hay". The driver would know where to g...

For the first time in several months, we were heading away from the beach, and inland towards the jungle. The trip was easier than we'd imagined, we got the bus to Surat Thani from where the ferry dropped us, then another bus to Khao Sok National Park, easy as! Then where the bus dropped us off, there was a wealth of bungalow owners mooching around, waiting to bring us to their places! The accomodation round here was super cheap, only around 250 baht a night (that's around 4 quid) for our own...

Just got back from having a last meal with the group. I'll meet my new group tomorrow at the ungodly hour of 5am so I'd better go to bed soon! The last few days have been very varied. On Saturday we saw the bridge over the river Kwai and travelled on the 'Death Railway'. We then continued by bus to Hellfire pass. The museum there was built and is run by Australians and is excellent. The walk down to and through the pass itself was very moving and I felt quite emotional even though I don't kno...

Another over night train (and definately the worse one) we arrived in Surat Thani, from here we drove in to Khao Sok national park - full of jungle and lakes.

The first night we stayed in luxury tree houses (complete with branches going through the rooms) and we went tubing down the Khao Sok river, which even in the monsoon-like rain was good fun and rather relaxing (until you got beached on the rocks!).

For the next 2 days we travelled over to Raja Phrata lake, travelling for ...

We arrived in Surat Thani around 7am this morning and it was so steamy and hot!! We had breakfast at a local cafe and walked to 7/11 to get some supplies for the treehouses. We drove to the Treehouses through the Southern countryside in a songthaew...it was the most gorgeous limestone karst scenery ever! Dramatic dark green rolling hills, wild banana trees lining the road and regimented orchards filled with mangosteen trees. Just beautiful. We arrived at the treehouses and explored the area. ...