Woohoo! We're getting an old fashoined train to Kanchanaburi! We get to sit in the special tourist section, which as far as I can tell means we get some padding on the seats compared to the free Thai travel section which is just wood.
Once out of the town centre the scenery, mountains, fields and rivers are really pretty. We meet a new friend from Israel on the train. He did get scammed by the ‘it’s closed’ scam previously mentioned and we have a lovely chat telling him what we know about the history of Kanchanburi and the Death Railway. We must have been super friendly as he sticks with us until the next day. We soon arrive at the River Kwai Bridge, not before my bum really starts to ache on the train though, and it is packed busy! Interestingly this river wasn’t actually called the River Kwai but was mistakenly referred to as such in a book, which was then made into a movie and when the tourists started rolling in the government just renamed the river Kwai to save any confusion. Nice. First stop is the Jeath Museum, a very odd museum about the Death Railway and general Thai stuff they have collected. Some of it is really moving but the weird mannequin models just scare me...I feel like they may just reach out and get me when I’m not looking (hang on, isn’t that an episode of Doctor Who?). We do see a huge lizard though!
Before heading back to our mozzie-ridden hotel we go for a walk along the bridge. How scary this must have been if you were sat on it when it was being bombed as the allies were. L
That night we enjoy some free pool, shoe shopping and watching random guys with Thai girlfriends sat on their laps who we earlier heard asking for a gay bar...
The following day we spend an hour at the graveyard where the allied soldiers who died building the railway were buried. This is the saddest thing ever. Rows and rows and rows of gravestones. We don’t even manage to get round more than 4 rows. Young men, younger than us, starved to death, killed, or dead through infections and disease. It takes us a while to gather ourselves before we go back on the railway to the end of the line that still exists. Looking at the rock that was cut out with bare hands or basic tools is shocking and the railway goes on and on and on and this is only the part that still runs. It really puts into perspective what a thing they died building for the sake of war.
A couple of days later we are in Sukathai, an ancient old capital of Thailand. Most people go to the more accessible Ayatuyhha near Bangkok so it isn’t massively full of tourists here, which is really nice for a change. We do manage to spend our first few hours here drinking capacious amounts of Chang Beer in a mostly tourist bar though – oops! So much so I decide to befriend a girl sat on her own reading a book. Poor girl! Oh and I experience my first toilet that isn’t a flush but a bucket of water thrown down it. Glad I was drunk for that. Sadly, the alcohol also made me forgetful in applying insect repellent and I gather a nice collection of about 20 – 30 leg bites. Oops.
This is the evening we speak to our friends back home, Tom and Clair, and find out the sad news that Tom has cancer and the happy news that they have decided to get married in 4 weeks. Both shell-shocked, Duncan turns to me ‘I have to go home’. I know. We arrange to come home after we have finished Thailand and Chiang Mai but to go back out for Vietnam and Japan.
We spend the next day riding push bikes round the lovely ruins. But it is so damn hot! I have to keep moving to just get a draft to keep me cool. The ruins here are amazing though and we get some beautiful photos. It’s just the relaxing, reflective activity we needed. I mostly enjoy being a tourist attraction for a massive group of Thai tourists, much giggling and staring at the blonde girl, and seeing the Thai flower seller getting the flowers off the monument to re-sell later in the day. Genius.
Over to Chiang Mai a few days later but we have lost a lot of our ‘get up and go’ and I keep feeling heat-stroked every time I go out so we don’t do as much as we could of here. Of course, we made time for shopping at our local Chinese market (more shoes!) and realising we suddenly need to get loads of holiday presents for all the family back home we shop, shop, shop, barter, barter, barter. My Karoooonngg nanananana is coming in very handy – thanks Taya! We also get ourselves sorted with tailor made suits and dresses. So much fun and really well-made (gotta be careful in Thailand and Vietnam as quality can vary drastically). And we find a restaurant that sells English food – would have been great to satisfy my baked beans and jacket potato craving if we weren’t going home in 5 days!
We spend a day on an elephant tour thing which I wish we had never done and would NEVER, NEVER, EVER recommend. The elephants don’t seem to be treated that well and the one we rode had loads of cuts in its head from the keepers knife thing, chains around its feet, and it gets kicked to get moving all the time. I hate it and everyone thinks I am scared of the elephant. Humph. Next we see an elephant show where the elephants do tricks like kicking footballs, carrying logs and painting pictures. Not sure any of these are natural for an elephant...and I find elephants with babies chained in cages with no water or food. Humph. Then we go to a ‘village’ which is just an opportunity for the ladies to sell us more stuff, even bartering over the talking guide. Humph. Then riding ox’s up a dull road that the bus could have taken us up. Humph. And finally we get to see a ‘beautiful’ waterfall, which is man-made as we spot the pipe going back to the top. Humph. Humph. Humph. Rubbish day.
Must end on a high note..... erm we get conned in a taxi in Bangkok again... erm met lots of really rude Indian people in Delhi...erm had an argument with a queue jumper on the airplane ‘Excuse me we are queuing’, ‘oh well, you go first then I’ll go’, ‘Yes, that is how queues work’ ...ok, erm Duncan’s TV didn’t work on the 10hour flight, neither did his reading light, and all his food had nuts or peas in...ok, erm Sarah and Rob met us at Heathrow with a homemade sign and we get to see all our friends again! YAAAAAAY!
