Kanchanaburi - Frogs, Dogs and Mozzies

  Kanchanaburi, Thailand
Wednesday, April 1, 2009

Hello!

It's currently the 5th of April, but I've dated the blog for when we were in Kanchanaburi. Sorry again for the spelling and grammar, I'm rushed to write theese because it takes time and costs money!

Day One:

I think we arrived in Kanchanaburi on the 29th of March, but I can't really remember, it was around that time! We got there late afternoon/early evening and headed to a hostel straight away. We chose the Jolly Frog because I had read good reviews about the place, and my god were they right! Unfortunately they were fully booked for the cheap 70baht rooms a night, so we had to settle for 290baht double-room a night (145 each), but that included a private bathroom, shower and AC!! which was pretty damn good.

View from Jolly Frog over the River

The hostel was located right next to the River Kwai, it really was a beautiful, peaceful location, apart from the odd jetski, and the hilariously bad Thai kareoke we could hear from the other side of the river at night; it seemed to be the same guy every time, and at one point a floating restuarant went past, which had kareoke, and again it sounded like the same guy singing!! haha. The hostel had a little floating platform on the river, which we chilled out on and played cards on the first night, with the complimentary odd beer and cigarette.

View from Jolly Frog over the River

It was fun to see gekos and frogs jumping/crawling around too. However, because it was next to a river, there were mozzies everywhere! They didn't seem to bother us tat much because we were all dowsed in insect repellent, but they were nearing ever closer as the evening went on, and Toom found out the following day that he had been bitten several times. It was a very nice chilled evening.

Tom & Ben jumping in the River

Sunset over the River

Day Two:
On the second day we headed right down to the far side of the town towards the famous Bridge of the River Kwai (some of you may have seen the film, which I've been told isn't very accurate historically). Before we reached the Bridge we ventured into the JEATH World War 2 Museum, to learn a bit about the history surrrounding Kanchanaburi in the war.

JEATH War Museum

The museum had some amusing looking statues of some of the war heroes, and war criminals of WW2, most notably Stalin and Churchill who looked nothing Stalin or Churchill. Whilst walking around we spotted a rather large lizard lying outside (you may have seen the photos on my facebook profile).

Large Lizard

All of us on the Bridge

After the museum we headed to the Bridge over the River Kwai and walked accrosss it, taking in the views and the sad history as we wondered accross.

Cemetary

Our next stop was Chong Kai War Cemetary, which was a mile or two away from our hostel in the opposite direction to the Bridge. We decided to get a taxi there, but told the taxi driver it was only one way, and we didn't want him to wait and drive us back; which was a BIG BIG mistake! We assumed there would be quite a few tourists there, and of course a few taxis too. Wrong! We were the only ones there, and there were no taxis. The taxi driver saw him oppertunity and waited for us for about 5minutes, but we spent about 30minutes at the cemetary before deciding to head back. It was absolutely boiling throughout our entire time in Kanchanaburi, but thankfully less humid, and we ended up walking around 2 miles back to our hosel in at least 34degrees C heat, without having eating anything at all that day (we normally only eat once a day because we're poor). On the way back several Thai's laughed at us as they drove by on their mopeds; it seems no one walks in Thailand, everyone either owns their own moped, or they get taxis everywhere, you very rarely see Thai people walking around.

Unknown Soldier

We encountered THREE mad-ass dogs on the way home. The first set weren't too bad, just 2 or 3 dogs in the same area barking at us to let us know it was their territory, we briskfully walked along to avoid any danger. About 5minutes away from our hostel 2 dogs came running out of their houses RIGHT up to Chris and Ben, and started barking really oudily and angrily, and I think one of them was trying to block Chris' was through. They followed us for about 10seconds and then gave up. Two minutes later Chris had decided to walk infront of the group to avoid being barked at again (because me and Tom managed to escape easily beforehand). Up ahead was a dog lying down cleaning himself, I always give at least 2-3yards distance from any of the dogs, just as a precaution, and I always try and keep in their eye line so that I don't startle them; Chris did the complete opposite! There was a yard gap between the dog and the wall next to him, Chris decied to walk inbetween this tiny gap, and behind the dogs head! He dog obviously got startled and immediatley jumped to ts feet, went barking crazy and started following Chris. Chris managed to calming walk away quickly, but he admitted afterwards that he was shitting himself inside, I know I would have been! Five minutes later we safely arrived at our hostel;we learnt to keep our distance from dogs, and to get return taxi journeys from some of the more remote 'tourist attractions'.

Day Three:

Day three was by far my favourite day in Kanchanaburi. We decided to head over to Erawan National Park, to see the 7 staged waterfall. The national park had its share of King Cobras and other such dangers, as noticed by the 'beware of the vicious monkey' signs, but we didn't see any of them.

Us at Erawan Waterfalls

The first stage of the waterfall was filled with Thai's swimmng around (they get into the national park free, whereas us 'foreng' have to pay 100baht entry, so it seems like they use the first stage waterfall as a swimming pool). At the second tier we decided to go for a nice swim. I had a) forgotten to wear swimming drunks that day, and b) decided it to wear white boxer shorts, I didn't leave much to the imagination. I had to prepare to go in, because as some of you know, I am mildly midly phobic of natural waters, despite being a good swimmer :p After I plucked up the courage I joined Ben and Tom in the water (chris decided he wasn't going to come in). Tom yelped in small pain because he had been nibbled at by a fish, I thought he was just trying to tease me, but shortly afterwards Ben also got nibbled. I was slightly paniced but just swam away rom every fish I saw, haha! After a bit of time and some fish nibbles later we decided to get out, dry off, and walk to the next stages of the waterfall. Tom and Ben stopped off at nearly every stage of the waterfall to have a quick swim, I decided against swimming everytime because I was worried my half-see through boxers were offensive to some of the Thai people, and I didn't want to be disrespectful.

Once we reached the 7th and final waterfall, Tom, Ben and I went for a dip again.

Rich, Tom & Ben at Erawan. Highest Waterfall

We had a lovely shower underneath the waterfall. There were less fish in this one, so not as much nibbling occured. Chris was taking our photo under the waterfall, but Tom thought he was being nibbled, we then saw about 10 fish right next to my legs slowly building up the courage to nibble my legs, Tom made me panic, so I tried to brush past him, which pushed Tom into Ben, who nearly fell into the water :D It was pretty hilarious as we all tried to stand up right, whilst falling over at te same time; if only Chris had taken then photo at that point. After drying off we all headed back to the start to catch a bus back to the hostel. On the way down Tom and Ben stopped at stage 5? of the waterfall to slide down some rocks into the water, a bit like a mini water slide.

Once home, we had some beers and played cards next to the river kwai.

Day Four:

On day four we caught the train over to Muang Sing, which meant that we got to travel over the River Kwai Bridge (which I was very excited about). We were slightly disappointed by the train journey there because we had heard that the views were spectacular, other than the bridge itself, the views were largely disappointing.
Once we arrived at Tha Kilen train station we had to walk about 1km to the Muang Sing ruins. At the train station, we attracted the attention of a redish-brown dog, we took very well to Tom and decided he would follow us and guide us, all the way to Muang Sing ruins!! It was pretty awesome.

Brook the Dog at Muag Sing

By far the kindest and best dog we've met so far. He even toured around the ruins with us!! as you may see in my photos. There were several shots I wanted with nothing in view, except for the ruins, but Brook (what we named the dog) seemed to want to get in every shot! haha. As brilliant as Brook was, he did, on he odd occasion, attract unwanted attention from other dogs, especially in Muang Sing! On the map there was a part marked 'village', we naturally assumed they were the ruins of an ancient village, but oh no, it was actually a village! I automatically sensed the danger that Brook would cause us in the village, but Tom wouldn't listen to my brilliant mind and walked on anyway. As I foresaw, a pack of 3-4 dogs ran out to bark at Brook, and then us, on our way through. The worst part was that one of the dogs was growling at us, rather than barking, which meant he was on the fucking verge of attacking us. Tom was leading the group so managed to get away quickly, Ben, Chris and I were forced to take a small detour onto the grass and made a speedy escape.

The Muang Sing ruins weren't quite what I was expecting. The first set of ruins were incredible, I was really impressed. However, they slowly went downhill. After ruin number 2, the sites of interest weren't really ruins anymore, just bits of rubble piled on the floor, apart from the ancient skeltons which had been uncovered, they were pretty cool.

Muang Sing

On day five I spent a few hours in an internet cafe writing the Bangkok blog and uploading photos, Tom and Ben visited another cemetary, and Chris wondered around for a bit. We then spent a while together lying in some hammocks under the sun before headng off to Ko Tao (Turtle Island), which is where we currently are. Tomorrow we leave for Ko Pha Ngan, the home of the Full Moon Party!! Oooooh yeah! I'll write the ko Tao blog in a few days time.

Hope everyone is still alive and well back home!
Rich x