Profile
Blog
Photos
Videos
So we left the unbelivably expensive Hue hin for the famous bridge over the river Kwai, we managed to arrange our travel so we would arrive in the dark, with no map and no clue where to go, talk about being organised! We were dropped off in the main square/ bus depo (a large square of tarmac, in the middle of town ) we were at least fortuanate that we were in the middle of town so finding one of the recomended hostles from "THE BOOK" should have been no problem, wrong, we folded like a house of cards when offered a tuk-tuk (which means cheap-cheap in thai, some one should tell the drivers!!) the prospect of hiking in the dark was to much to take, esspecialy when the lady at the food vending stall told us it was 4k to where we wanted to go! We jumped in a tuk tuk and off to the sugar cane, the books choice, we should have known before we arrived, but we stayed in a stilt hut overlooking the river, sounds good? the hut had fou legs, two were shorter than the other two, so the hut listed towards the river, we were worried that in the night the hut would simply tip into the river, we dumped our bags in the corner that was furthest from the river, trying to counter balance the list, then out for food and a well deserved beer, when we got back so had the hut!!(not really, we stayed overnight then checked into a hotel we found that morning,it just sounds as if that should have ended that way)
The big move complete, we hired a flying machine to explore the sights of Kanchanburi, all we had to do was find the tourist information center, ten minutes down the road from our new hotel, no more than two k, so twenty minutes later we knew there was somthing not right, after stopping at a petrol station to ask for directions, yes i know its a man thing not to ask but i knew we had missed it some how, by almost ten kilometers as it turned out, still not sure how, as theres a great bloody sign pointing to it!! With all the maps and local info picked up we set off to the museum for the bridge construction, which is another place where history pulls so hard at your heart strings, and educates you at the same time, the japanesse did not need, want or ask for prisoners to help with technical aspects of the bridge, as they had very well trained engineers, who were the worst for punishing the prisoners, but the acts of brutal crulety inflicted on these young alied soilders made a red mist fall all around me. As we sat and ate our 'free' muffin and drank coffee, hev was unable to stop the rant machine that had taken over, we went to the bridge where there were japanesse everywhere, laughing taking pics of the bridge, it took two chichen on sticks to feed the rant machine, and after a good feed it fell asleep and we could enjoy the bridge, which is not the origanal, as that was partly destroyed by the british, first time of asking, (the americans bombed the bridge four times and never actually hit it with anything other than water) and most of the rest of the bridge has been repaired or replaced over the last sixty years, as there is stil a train service that runs over the bridge. We walked the lenght of the bridge just cause its the bridge over the river kwai, there realy isnt very much on the other side of the bridge, just a dude selling soft drinks and werid bufaloo skin art, he was nice, but that wasnt enough to persuade us to buy any thing more than two cokes. Back on the 'main' side of the bridge we headed back to the hotel for a swim in the river, which was really nice, walk over the river then swim in it, which hev had told me was dangerous, as the japanesse had put crocs in the river to stop prisoners trying to swim to fredom, yeah i cant beleve i fell for it either!
The next day our fabulous flying machine took us to the erawan waterfalls, which are seven tiers tall and fall a thousand meters in total. We arrived numb arsed as the waterfall is actually alot further away than we at first thought, we had allready desided to climb to the highest level first, then take pics and go for a swim on the way back down, so we set off not knowing how far or high we would be climbing,(we are the masters of planning??) after about an hour of up hill slog we figured we must almost be at the top, the sign read 'tier five', the question was raised 'how arsed are you at seeing the top??' the answer was 'we've come this far it can't be that much further' , wrong , it took ages to get to the point we realised, due to bad weather, you couldn't get to tier seven!!Gutted we had to seattle at taking pics of six, lucid, lipid pools of turquoise water, then plunging in to one that had a natural water slid for us to play on, there were an abundance of fish, that as soon as you stopped swimming, or infact moving, they homed in on you feet to pick off the dead skin, which tickled me and freaked hev out, that and the rain ended our day of swimming, we headed back down the rest of the falls towards our bike, then we remembered the ride back, it was going to be long and cold, again masters of planning, no towels or change of clothes, and it was raining and we hadn't taken coats with us, oh and the flying machine had started makeing a funny noise as it had covered one of hevs feet in oil, oh yeah and the front tire had gone flat. (starting to feel sorry for us yet??) Well the sun came out, we got air put in the tire and the trip back is never as long as the trip to some where, cos you know where your going on the way back, plus we figured if the bike was going to break lets see how fast it would go before it did!! On our way to the Erawan we had spotted an electric damn (you know the big damns like hoover damn that makes electricity) so on the way back we pulled in to see if we could have a closer look, by the reaction we got from the armed security gaurds, we are the first tourist to vist the damn.
Once back in town after swapping the flying machine for one that didn't leak oil, we started the alto familiar search for an evenings entertainment, this was provided by two ladies, two south korean guys an aussie couple and 18 pence glasses of whiskey, we had the choice of half a dozen local whiskys and a vodka, of for 25 pence a glass import vodka. Whilst sitting on the street drinking, (not like kids with cider in the park, we had a table and chairs!) we met Captain Jack Sparrow, who owned a bar and wanted me to preform a hop in his bar, as it had been raining the ground was still wet ( the sun lasted till we got back then it rained again) i promised i would tomorrow, we drank local fire water with jack untill he seemed to remember he had a bar to run and legged off. The rest of our night was spent drinking whiskey (which we bought in seven eleven) with locals in the bar over the road where as long as you bought at least your first coke they didn't mind what else you drank (maybe this was the case as we were drinking with locals who knew the bar staff??)
The next morning, or mid morning (im never sure where 11 o clock fits in??) we set out to take a ride on the death railway to hellfire pass, which were used as a prisoner of war camp during the construction of the railway. We got off the train one stop early, not on purpose, by shear luck, (only i think we were lucky) we had been told the cave was at the siddings of the track, so we got off where we thought we should, asked the station master where the cave was and he pointed over the bridge, which was maybe a hundred feet over the river, awesome , we had to walk on the sleepers for a span of about two hundred and fifty meters, i asked hev if she was vok doing it, she said yes and we set off, twenty meters later she had frozen, as she sudenly realised we were walking on a train line for 250m over a hundred foot drop (i know i've used meters and feet, sorry) for the rest of the way she had her hands on my shoulders looking at the back of my head, giving instructions of the speed and wobblyness of our current progress. When we reached the cave, it was less than impresive, there is no plaque or well any sign of any thing, except a buddhist statue, we window shopped in the little market, buying nothing as the prices were crazy, we then bunked on the next train back to our neck of the woods, only to get grassed up by a local woman, and had to pay the fare, which is possably one of the worlds most expensive streaches of rail line (no joke, it was about ten dollars/ person for a fourty min ride).
After another swim in the river, we met up with our local friends for more whiskey, and a series of filmed hops, in everyones bar, we were compensated with a free drink in every bar i hopped in, althought it was one drink and several takes, ussually untill the owner was happy with his or her video, hard work but loads of fun, that would be our last night in Kanchanburi, as the next day we were heading back to Bangkok, to meet up with our friernds from home, Sam and Tarn, we knew we would be in for some very late nights. We left early the next day to make sure we had our room well before we were to meet up with sam and tarn the next day.
thats gona be another story though.
'hey Lazor lips, your mama was a snow blower'
Love and miss you all
the Shoe String Two xoxo
- comments