Thailand's Lakes, Islands and Beaches

Time to reward those aching hill-tribe-trek muscles with a relaxing Thai massage. Or not. There's nothing relaxing about having one leg sat on and the other forced over your head!! Headed for the train station again for an overnight train to Bangkok.

We arrived in Bangkok early int he morning and were met by a driver for a trip to Kanchanaburi via Damnoen floating markets.. The market was alive with color and sound as the women sold their fruit and veges from their boats to eager shop keepers.

Damnoan floating markets

Off then to Kanchanaburi, to the bridge over the river Kwai. There was a good museum centered around the 'Death Railway', a lot of which was really confronting. The railway is still used today, though generally only for tourism purposes. We walked across the bridge but had to run along it to avoid an on-coming train. It would seem that workplace OH&S hasn't made it to Kanchanaburi yet.

The bridge over the river Kwai

Headed back to Bangkok then with a trip to a tiger sanctuary on the way. The tiger sanctuary is run by a bunch of monks who rehabilitate the tigers to the point where they can return to their natural jungle environment, although they very seldom do. We took advantage of the photo opportunity which was pretty unnerving. It was pretty hard not to make any sudden moves when the natural reaction to a tiger moving towards you is to panic and run away!!

Big cat!!

Made it back to Bangkok in time to take in a bit of Thai culture in the form of a lady-boy show. It was a very well choreographed cabaret-style show performed by men, most of whom have had the first stage of a sex-change operation. Their make-up was exquisite and some of them looked incredibly feminine, however there was also a lot of five o'clock shadow. We declined the opportunity to take in a ping pong show in Pat Pong which, by all accounts, was quite rote-learnt and featured a mind-boggling assortment of ping pong balls, darts and footballs.

The following day we boated and song thaewed around Bangkok before getting on an overnight train to Khao Sok lake district. We took a local bus to the treehouses which were quite a novelty- a double bed with a mossie net, toilet, shower and two chairs perched 15metres up a tree and accessed by a ridiculously steep ladder. Spent the afternoon riding down the nearby river in tyre tubes before a nice dinner and a table tennis competition where Glenn's left-handed, one-eye-closed, hopping handicap was more of a laugh than a hinderance but he was soon annihilated by one of the locals.

Lakeside raft houses

We spent the next two days relaxing at rafthouses on the side of the lake. The place is post-card beautiful and we swam (in bat caves!!), floated, canoed, slept and ate for two days.