Alyssa and I had originally planned to take the night train to Chaing Mai, but since they were sold out, we were forced to buy flights instead. Since we hadn't planned on staying in Bangkok an additional night, we hadn't reserved our hostel room and there was no availability. Luckily, there was another nearby hostel that did have a room. We packed up our stuff and I took mine to Jane and Te Tee's hotel to store it until we got back later that evening and could check into the new hostel.
Te Tee had set up a private tour for us to see the sights around Bangkok. We had our own luxury van for the five of us along with a driver and tour guide. It was very fancy compared to the tours Alyssa and I usually take and we were happy to have so much space. It was a few hours drive out to our first stop, the floating markets.
The floating markets used to be a legitamate area of local commerce but now, they just exist for the tourists. We got our own motorized boat which our guide manuevered through the narrow, man made waterways. There are little shops set up along the side of the river as well as vendors that sell food and other goods from their boats. We spent an hour crusing through the area, mostly trying the delicious food since all of the items they were selling were the same ones they sell at every other market we've been to.
The next stop on our tour was at the Kanchanaburi war cemetery. After entering WWII in December of 1941, the Japanese forces overran most of SE Asia. They needed a shorter and more secure line between Burma and Thailand so they used prisoners of war and civilian labor to build a railroad between the two. Two forces worked at opposite ends and met in the middle in October 1943. The project cost the lives of 15,000 prisoners of war and 100,000 civilians as a result of sickness and mistreatment. The Kanchanaburi cemetery was built as a final resting place for those who died during the war.
After visiting the cemetery, we went to see the bridge over the Kwai river that the Japanese had built. It has since but updated but the original tracks are also still in place.
After walking across the bridge, we had lunch at a local buffet. They had pretty much any kind of food you could want so we all found something that we liked.
Following lunch, we headed to the main attraction of our tour, the tiger temple. The temple was also a sanctuary to many other species of animals which we got to see as we toured the grounds.
You could pay extra to have "play time" with the lions but we had opted out of that option, so we stood behind the gate to watch the people inside. The trainers flailed plastic bags tied to sticks around and the tigers would jump and claw at them. This seemed like a very flawed plan to me considering the tigers were not chained up at all and the people were pushed up against a wall with no where to go. Often, the trainers would pull the bags into their body to hide them from the tiger which seemed like just about the stupidest thing you could do. They say that there haven't been any attacks there but I have a hard time believing that. Even if the tiger was just trying to play, they would still really be able to hurt you.
After watching the tiger play time, we got to take pictures with a baby tiger. He was really cute but we got the impression from the trainer that the baby tigers could be even more unpredictable and they kept a very close watch on them. You had to approach the tiger from behind, sitting down slowly behind it and gently touch it's back. I wasn't afraid but Jane and Taya definitely were.
Next, we headed to the adult tigers. You basically did a photo rotation with over ten different tigers. You had a person to guide you around to each tiger and then a photographer who would take your camera and take your picture with the tiger. These tigers were chained up and seemed pretty docile. They say that the tigers aren't drugged, they are just tired from being full and hot but it seemed questionable to all of us. They paraded all of the tourists through the area so that it was almost impossible to get a picture without a ton of other people in it. I did have a few tigers that seemed agitated and would growl or move, which freaked me out everyime, but overall I wasn't scared of them. It seemed like they were used to this sort of thing happening day in and day out.
After the tour, I wasn't sure how I felt about the tiger sanctuary. Tigers are endangered in Thailand so it is good that they are trying to maintain a safe place for them, but they purchase the tigers from the black market which really only perpetuates the cycle of poaching from the wild. The tigers also don't have much of a natural habitat and their space seemed pretty limited which was sad. It was amazing to be that close to a tiger though.
It was quite a long drive back to town and traffic only delayed us more. Te Tee was starving when we got back to town and wanted to eat dinner right away even though it was only 6:00pm. Taya, Alyssa and I really needed to go check into our new hostel before reception closed for the night, so we decided to do dinner separately and meet up later in the evening. We grabbed our bags and trekked to "In A Box" hostel. This hostel was a few dollars more expensive than our last hostel but was very nice. There hadn't been enough beds available in the female dorm for all of us to stay in there so I offered to stay in the mixed dorm, which of course ended up being all men. I put my stuff away in the room and met up with Alyssa and Taya so that we could go get dinner. We had some delicious green curry at a local street restaurant near our hostel. I love how delicious and cheap the Thai food is!
When we met up with Te Tee and Jane at their hotel, Jane had bought us some delicious chocolate filled bear buns for dessert. They were too cute!
We decided just to stay in our area for the night and looked for a bar nearby. Luckily there was one right across the street from the hotel, so we ordered a beer tower and settled in for some people watching. Te Tee had half a beer so after about an hour, he was ready for bed (he is allergic to alcohol). We all called it a night since we had to be up early for our flight to Chiang Mai the next morning. Although I went to bed at a reasonable hour, I got absolutely no sleep because the guy in the bed below me snored so loud I could feel my internal organs vibrating. I downloaded a white noise app to my ipad but it took a few hours to download because of our shitty wifi connection so I just lay there, stopping myself from smothering the guy with a pillow.
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