Off early today as we had a long drive to the floating market and to Kanchanaburi. Sun was just coming up as we left Bangkok over the bridges heading west. On our way we passed an area where they were producing salt from shallow flooded areas. Alongside the road were stands selling salt. First stop was to a small place that did hand painted Thais porcelaine. We walked through the room were all the painting was being done and walked about the grounds that had an impressive teak house with a porcelain museum in it. Back on the road we made a quick stop where they were burning coconuts. An old lady chopped the top of the coconut with a machete and gave us straws. No coconut milk in these, it was coconut juice nicely warmed. After you could scrape out the coconut from the inside of the shell but we saved some for monkeys later on.
Finally we arrived at the Damnern Saduak Floating Market. Terribly touristy but fascinating all the while. We got our own private rowed boat which was mush preferrable to the noisy car engine powered long tail scooting about the canals. The whole town is a series of canals and life pretty much revolves around the canals. There are three clusters of markets with the boats of merchants fighting for space with all of the touriat boats but we managed to get there early enough to avoid the bigger crush of tourist that we could see toward the end of our visit. As we floated down the canals we bought a few food goodies (what else?) including these, I guess. coconut dumplings steamed in banana leaves and trays of sliced pomelo fruit, a sort of huge grapefruit but sweeter than grapefruit. We made a few stops then toward the end stopped at a boat making fried bananas. Most unloke any fried banana I've had before they were quite delicious and we gobbled them up quickly.
Back on the road again we drove a short distance to a cobra show (said it was our touristy day). Saw various snakes and reptiles in cages then sat for the cobra show. Somewhat entertaining. From there we next went to a place where they mke hand carvings. Not just any hand carving but huge frescos with 3d type depth to the detail. We saw somr that were custom orders that had signs on them like 8 months, the ampont of time to carve them. We went inside where the had beutiful furniture. If I ever won a lotto I'd probably come back and outfit a house with some of this furniture.
On the road again it was past lunchtime so we stopped an another roadside restaurant that serves grilled catfish. We ordered up one along with sauted vegitables, rice and an assortment of sauces. We drank water but Fraser had a beer. Grabd total for four including drinks? 300 baht (about 10 bucks). Again, the food was fantastic. Suitably satisfied we took off again finally arriving in Kanchanaburi around 2:30pm. First stop was the Thailand-Burma Railway Museum which told the whole story of the bridge on the river Kwai and of the building of the railroad to Burma during WWII. It was fascinationg. Across the street from the museum is an allied cemetary where some 7000 POWs are buried. We probably spent a little too much time there as Ratt had to scoot to get us to the Tiger Temple before 4pm. We would come back and see the bridge after.
We made it to the Tiger Temple just in the nick of time being one of the last people in before they closed the gates. This is a rescue center for tigers, the older ones having been abused in someway. They now have a whole generation of new cubs. We made our way to a small canyon where they had about 8 tigers chained up with Thai handlers and farang volunteers organizing photo ops with the tigers. They take your hand and lead you around to a couple of the tigers while another takes your camera and takes photos. The tigers all seem very docile. One of the volunteers told us that they are fed only cooked meat and that they are quite well fed and used to being handled by humans particularily the youngers ones born in the compound. As we were at the end of the day we got to watch the tigers being led back to their cages which gave another photo op to have your photo taken with while wlking with the tiger.
Back into the main compound were all kinds of animals, boars, oxen, cows, horses, pigs, peacocks, etc all wondering around. Up in the tiger cages were two tiger cubs being playful. Fraser thought that this would be the perfect graduation gift for Ceilidh, give her a ticket to Thailand and set it up for her to volunteer a week or two here. She is just finishing her degree in June in zoology and has always been interested in animals. There could be other places for her to volunteer also. There are several elephant rescue centers in Thailand. Anyway, we finished with this but we were no done yet.
Off driving again we made it over to Nam Tok, the end of the railroad to nowhere line. It's about the only remaining stretch of the death railway. Most of the rest of the track and wood support structure for the railway into Burma was carted off by local tribes people just after the war to be used in building village structures. Anyway, twice a day you can the train from Kanchanaburi to Nam Lok and cross over the bridge at the river Kwai. Just across one of the train trestles is a large cave with a buddha in it. From there we were racing the setting sun to get to Prasat Muang Sing, a Khmer temple complex that marked the furthest west of Khmer domination. The complex was built in the 10th century and consisted of luterite block intricatly fitted together using no motar. Although it was past closing time Ratt sweet talked the guard and we walked around the ruin in the setting sun.
By now we were absolutely exhausted but there was still one more stop! Finally back to Kanchanaburi and a quick look at the bridge itself. Two bridges were actually built, a wooden one which was used as a supply bridge and a concrete and metal girder one that was only used once before Allied bombers destroyed part of it in 1945. What you see today actually contains very little of the original bridge but, yup, it's a bridge and, yup, it crosses the river Kwai ;-)
We started on the long trip back to Bangkok. Bev had been talking about buying a begging bowl for a friend in England who is a buddhist nun and we had talked about pad thai so, of course, Ratt knew a good place for both of them. I was going to take a pass on all because I was so tired I could barely even think. Despite drinking a lot of water I thing I was also suffering a little from dehydration as I had the chills also. As it was 9:30 by the time we got back in the city we all decided to head straight back to hotel. We thanked Ratt profusely for the two great days of touring. We had her for 10 hours yesterday and over 13 hours today and the total cost was less that 100cdn each. We saw and experienced a lot more than if we had just hopped on tour buses.
Bev and Fraser went next door to grab something to eat at the restaurant Bev and I had eaten in on mOnday while I just dragged my self upstairs, into a hot shower and off to bed.
Posted by chezbasson at January 10, 2007 09:39 PM