Tour day started at 6:30am. Before we headed out, we visited several other hotels in the area to grab some more folks. To my dismay, our journey included a stop on Khao San Road, which, due to the traffic, added another 30 minutes to the trip (it's only about 5 miles from where I stayed). Once everyone was sufficiently packed into the smallish van, we started the 2 hour north-westerly drive to the river.
Saddled next to me was a fairly chatty Californian who lived in the Philippines, but was vacationing in Bangkok; a ridiculously chatty American ex-Army solider who wanted to discuss all the ways that the US is corrupt; two hispanic guys from Las Vegas who I originally didn't really care for, but as time wore on, they grew on me, and we became friends; and a guy from the Netherlands. There were a few other older Indian people, but I didn't spend much time speaking with them.
Getting to the Kwai River took about 2 hours and it's located northwest of Bangkok.
The first stop was the war memorial cemetery that was built by the Thai people to commemorate the soldiers (predominately British and Australian) who died during the bridge's construction. According to our tour guide, the majority of the people who died during the construction succumbed to disease; not the first bridge's destruction (more about that later). While walking around the memorial, it was really sad reading some of the inscriptions on the memorial headstones. The saddest ones to me were the personalized ones that talked about how much the wife, family, etc. missed the solider. I captured a photo of one, but you may need to expand it to read the text...
From the cemetery, we piled into the van and drove another few minutes to the River Kwai itself. Seeing the bridge in person hammered home how ridiculous war can be. The original bridge, was destroyed of course, and I believe I read where the bridge that exists today isn't even the second one; I think it may be the third or fourth. The story about the bridge is crazy. I'll get to that in a minute.
We started in a museum area about 500m (see what I did there?) from the bridge itself. In the museum, there were more stories about what actually happened (which is VERY different from the book and movie's depiction):
The Japanese used the captured soldiers as slave labor to build the bridge. The conditions for the captives were unbelievably brutal and several soldiers died in captivity. The bridge's construction took longer than necessary because the soldiers kept sabotaging it (then they would be tortured). They did crazy things like trying to put termites on the bridge (the original was made of wood).
Eventually, as the Allies (particularly the Americans) pushed towards Tokyo, they decided that they would bomb the bridge to cutoff a key supply route for the Japanese. I'm not sure how the Japanese got wind of this, but they did, and in an attempt to thwart the bombing efforts, the Japanese put most of the captured men on the bridge. The captured men watched in horror as the incoming Allied planes began their bombing route, and the men waved their hands and screamed at the Allies to stop the bombing raid. Unfortunately, their cries didn't work, and the Allies annihilated the bridge, killing all of the captives on the bridge. Supposedly, there was so much blood in the river that the villagers downstream couldn't use the water for several weeks...After the war, the metal bridge was put into place, and some version of that metal bridge exists today.
Here's the museum area -- you can see the bridge from an outside balcony area. There were TONS of tourists around, so unfortunately you're going to be subjected to some pics of random people. The weird thing too is that the machines and vehicles that were used to construct the bridge were not restored, so I saw lots of broken down and rusted motorcycles, trucks (complete with flat tires and broken glass), tools, etc.
Done with the museum excursion, it was time to hit the bridge. We walked to it, and along the way, in a tribute to the delicious randomness that is Thailand, a guy had a baby cub that could be used for a photo op. I was waiting in line to do it, when the cub, after finishing its bottle, decided to swipe at the American military guy who was in front of me. I figured that I would skip the photo op. hehe Moments earlier, I did manage to get a pic of a woman with it, though, because it was a freakin' cute cub...
After the cub scare, I continued past more street vendors and arrived at the bridge. The bridge is, well, a metal bridge. I didn't anticipate taking two bridge visits on this trip -- I'm no sort of bridge connoisseur, but there I was, facing a fairly non-descript metal bridge. This is what people died over? Ugh. Well, of course I had to walk across it.
While walking over the bridge, I was approached by two Asian girls (probably in their late teens) holding a camera out to me. Naturally, I grabbed the camera and got ready to take their picture (as an aside, I think that this is the one thing upon which all humans universally agree -- it is our duty to take someone's picture with his or her own camera if we are asked by that person to do so). One of the girls shook her head, and gave the camera to her friend. I stood there, puzzled for a second, until she grabbed my arm and pulled me close to her. Her friend then aimed the camera at the both of us, and took a picture. Both of them giggled hysterically after the photo op. Ha!
I continued across the bridge and talked to the Dutch guy from the van, a guy named, "Evo." We exchanged taking pictures...
The next leg of the trek found us waiting for a train that would cross over the bridge. At this point, my phone was down to a little more than 10% juice remaining, so I tried to be a little conservative with the pics. The train ride was good times. Each car was made almost exclusively of wood, and we had wooden window frames that opened. I sat next to Evo and a French couple.
The ride was fairly jarring, which I liked, and we moved at a decent pace. As it turns out, this wasn't just a tourist train -- we were actually on a regular route and made several stops along the way. The train journey lasted about 2 hours and we got to see some really beautiful countryside. Mountains wrapped around us, and random "villages" popped up every once in awhile. One of the cooler parts was when we went over "the most dangerous bridge in Thailand." It was a very narrow wooden bridge that was carved into the side of a rocky hill. If you stuck your head out of the window at the wrong time, you could get decapitated.
Strangely enough, with the windows opened, it felt like it was about 50 degrees outside -- I had been really lucky in Bangkok because it was unseasonably cool the entire time I was there. I was shivering pretty badly about halfway through the ride. Once we got to our destination, the sun came out a little more, and I warmed up nicely.
These pics are taken from a moving train, so they're not the greatest, but I think they give you a feel for the action.
From here, my phone yelled at me for juice. I kept my fingers crossed that I could get just a few more pics outta it.
The train had taken us to a riverside restaurant where we ate Thai food buffet-style. Evo had apparently signed up for a slightly different tour, so he went to a different locale after lunch. Attached to the dock were these small boats that we used to float down the river. The river current was strong enough that we were pulled against the current by a motorboat. Once we got about 500 yards from the dock the motorboat was untied and we floated back down the river with the current. It was amazingly quiet and serene.
While chilling on the boat, I chatted up the guys from Vegas (who were funnier the more drunk they got) and we all enjoyed the ride...
Unfortunately, this is where picture time ends. My battery died, so you'll have to deal with the written word from here on out.
Once we returned to the dock, we loaded up in the van and drove off to elephant land. This is where I'm kicking myself, because the view here was spectacular. We were in a valley with mountains all around us, and at the top of the mountains was a large cloud layer. All of the vegetation was lush and fertile, and this area just really seemed to be untouched and pure.
This particular site had three ride-able female elephants. I was loaded onto the smallest one driven by a 10 year old kid. Sadly, the kid held a 3ft long wooden stick with a curved metal hook on the end. When we started our journey, he whacked the elephant with the metal hook, the elephant roared, and started to walk. Yikes...
Riding the elephant felt like riding a really solid, large animal. I sat in a metal chair that was roped around the elephant's tail. She lumbered fairly slowly, but was agile enough that I never felt in any sort of danger of failing. The "driver" sat on her neck with his legs straddling her.
I had my picture taken just as we headed out, so I do have some proof that I did it -- the picture was really cheap; slightly more than $1, so I figured that I'd get it. You all with have to wait for me return to see it ;o
Walking with the largest elephant was a really cute baby elephant. It was chained to its mother, and made really soft thumping sounds with each step as opposed to the thunderous sound the others made during the walk. Every once in awhile, the elephants would stop to eat. For the most part, the "trainers" would allow this, but if the elephant took too long, another stick whacking occurred.
As we came over a hill, a giant male (complete with crazy large tusks) greeted us. He stood about 30 yards away, and as we passed him, he seemed to have a "these are my bitches" look about him. The entire ride took about 15 minutes and then we were advised that we needed to wait for our van to return.
Off to the side, somewhat removed from the elephants, two monkeys were tied to a tree. There was a sign declaring that we were not to touch the monkeys. As I sat at a picnic table watching the monkeys, two local kids started really screwing with them. One kid treated a monkey as if it was made of rubber, and he proceeded to grab the monkey's rear legs and started stretching the monkey as far as he could. The monkey got pissed and hissed and clawed at the kid.
The coolest part was when one of the kids was poking one the monkeys like crazy, and the monkey waited for the kid to turn around for a second, and then the monkey grabbed a high branch, swung his body, and drop kicked the kid in the head. It hit the kid hard enough that the kid fell over. I ached with laughter.
A Thai adult appeared with a puppy and placed it next to the monkeys. The monkeys immediately calmed down and started petting it and pulling bugs from its hair. I really wish I had pics of it, because it was definitely an "ahhh" type of moment...
From the elephant area, we headed off to a waterfall that was billed as Thailand's most amazing waterfall. I would agree with that if Thailand was the size of a postage stamp. This was more underwhelming than seeing the Alamo for the first time. Virtually no water trickled down the waterfall (there were some pictures from the rainy season displayed on a bulletin board, and it did look impressive), and we had a mere 15 minutes to check it out. Unlike the elephants, the lack of pictures doesn't really matter.
By this point, it had been a fairly long day, and I was ready to get back. We loaded up, and made one last stop before heading home. We stopped at the tiger sanctuary (that was apparently not part of the deal I chose), and waited to rejoin our group. While we waited, a herd of wildebeest paraded through. That was almost disgusting as most of them looked really malnourished and sickly. Once the animals had passed, everyone ushered back into the van and we headed back. I slept most of the way back, and we got back around 8pm. Yet another good day. :)
No comments:
Post a Comment