After another successful overnight train journey back to Bangkok it was straight in a taxi across town to the bus station to catch a bus north to Kanchanaburi. The journey took about 3 hours on a local bus where we were the entertainment being the only white people on the bus. We had been given a recommendation of a nice place to stay in town which made battling the touts even easier and after some hard core haggling that would make my brother proud we got a pickup truck to the hotel. The recommendation was a great and the hotel was perfect for our 2 nights here and in the 40° heat the swimming pool was an added bonus. As we were only having a couple of nights here we booked up straight away to go the tiger temple that afternoon. The tiger temple is a source of great controversy in Thailand with very mixed opinions on its status as a tourist attraction. Originally it was a sanctuary set up by monks to house and care for rescued tigers and visitors could pay money to visit the temple and get up close encounters with the big cats knowing the money they had paid was going towards the care of the tigers. Over the years however there has been speculation of mistreatment of the tigers by the monks and that the whole operation is a giant money making scheme with little care for the welfare of the tigers. An upclose encounter with a tiger has been something we have wanted to do while in Thailand so we decided to visit with an open mind and formulate our own opinion on the tiger temple. We arrived and headed straight to tiger canyon and when we got there it was unbelievable. All around the canyon there were about a dozen tigers lying around, some sleeping and some sitting all completely relaxed as guides would come and take people by the hand to meet them. We had expected one tiger and one photo and here was a canyon filled with tigers and from the look of things we were going to get up close with quite a few. As we only had one camera we had to go round with the guide one at a time so I went first and was taken by the hand to the first tiger. You only get a few seconds with each one however its long enough to get a few photos and to touch them and in some cases tickle their tummies. It was a very surreal experience as you went from one tiger to the next its hard to believe that you are so close to such a beautiful animal, having seen tigers before on TV and in Zoos and here we were touching them. Once I had visited about 5 tigers and had copious photos and videos taken it was time to swap over and let Mike take his tour of the canyon for his up close encounter. The whole experience was over in about 10 minutes and we wished that we could do it all again as it was amazing and definitely a once in a lifetime. After leaving the canyon we walked to a different part of the sanctuary to visit some of the newer arrivals with 2 six month old tigers and they were really cute if you ignored the massive teeth and huge paws they were successfully growing in anticipation of adulthood. We were able to have our photo taken together with one of the babies and ask some questions to one of the English speaking volunteer's. By the time we had finished it was almost closing time so we stayed behind to watch all the tigers being walked back to their enclosures before heading outside to get our taxi back to town. We had shared the taxi to the temple with another couple and having got chatting to them on the way back to the hotel we made plans to meet with them for dinner and a few drinks later that evening and as predicted we had far to much to drink and were anticipating sore heads in the morning.
As predicted we were both rough the next day and even after a full English breakfast and a litre of water we were still feeling a little worse for wear, so either our hangovers are getting worse as we get older or the heat intensifies the suffering? Another 2 litres of water later and things were starting to look up enough for us to hire a scooter and take a tour of the town. The first stop on the tour was the bridge over the river Kwai one part of the infamous "death railway". The history lesson goes like this, during the 2nd world war when Germany was taking over Europe, Japan was taking over Asia. To aid with the transport of supplies they wanted to build a railway link from Burma to Bangkok. They decided to use prisoners of war as their labour and over the course of 18 months they worked many of the prisoners to death with poor living conditions and grueling work schedules. The bridge is only a small part of the railway however it is famous because of the film the "Bridge Over the River Kwai". When you arrive at the bridge you certainly needed some imagination as it was really just like any other bridge however after a trip to the accompanying museum it did have a little more significance. The museum talked a little about the war itself and how the railway came about as well as talking about the conditions the prisoners had to live and work in. It was really no surprise that thousands of British, Australian, Burmese and Thai prisoners died as the conditions they had to endure were horrendous with no sanitation and minimal medical care. After the museum we took a walk around the war cemetery where all the soldiers who perished during the construction of the railway were relocated from their unofficial graves in the jungle. We then took a tour of the town on the scooter before it was time to take it back and return to the hotel to cool down and relax in the pool with a cold beer.