Lions and Tigers and Bears...Oh My

Yesterday was quite a crazy day! One of those Marathon days where you try to squeeze as many adventures in as possible. That's kinda how you have to roll when Saturday is really your only day to do stuff.

We woke up at five thirty so we could be on the road by six (let's be honest we weren't really on the road by six but an honest effort was made.) Luckily, Chai, Thienchai's driver was nice enough to drive us so the rest of us could just sleep.

About two hours later we arrived at our first stop--The Bridge on The Rive Kwai. Maybe you've seen the movie. I hadn't even heard about it until after I had heard about the bridge. So here's a little history lesson for you. Back during WWII the Japanese were trying to build a bridge from Bangkok to Burma so that they could move their supplies. To build the railroad they used American POWs as well as some of the locals. Unfortunately, as you can imagine they didn't treat them very well and living conditions left a lot to be desired causing over 100,000 of the 200,000 POWs and laborers to die. That's why today the railroad is referred to as the Death Railroad. The actual bridge on the River Kwai was bombed just months after it was built but it has been reconstructed since then as a memorial to the men who lost their lives while building it.

After a leisurely stroll across the bridge and back we headed off to our next destination--With its seven levels of falls you could spend a day in and of itself just at Erawan. Unfortunately we didn't have a whole day and we were only able to make it to the bottom 3 tiers. It was still amazing though. The water was such a pretty color and the perfect temperature for a dip, that is if you could handle the swarms of fish who would follow you around and nibble the dead skin of your toes. Ick, I really had to focus on breathing and not thinking about it. At the second fall you could go under the falls and come up onto the rocks from behind and jump into the water from there. The third fall was a natural water slide.

We had to rush from the falls in order to make it to a last destination--the real reason we had come to Kanchanaburi in the first place--(That's the province where all these places are by the way)--The tiger sanctuary/temple. Pretty much the pictures speak for themselves....