Kanchanaburi - last days of the tour

The last part of my tour was two days spent on the River Kwai kayaking. I took to this sport like a pig on water - very badly. We had two people to each kayak and, rather than giving is formal training, our guide's advice was to 'get in the water and give it a go'.

I shared a kayak with Yosuke, he was steering at the back, and my job was just to paddle evenly to propel us forward. After two hours of our boat spinning sideways instead of going forwards I broke - I screamed to the tour guide like a spoilt child 'I'm not having fun...this is too hard...I DON't WANT TO DO IT ANYMORE!'. We stopped for a break and some guidance.

After the break I got back in the water, this time with Charlotte in the front and me steering at the back. Within a minute of being in the water I managed to steer us towards overhanging tree branches. With both of us unsure of what to do, I burst out laughing and tried hard to paddle, and Charlotte, well, she stuck her leg out of the kayak and tried to push the branch up. The branch won the fight. Our kayak turned upside down, flipping us out.

The current of this river is really strong, so immediately our oars whizzed off downstream. I held onto the tree branch with my legs and the kayak with my arm, with Charlotte at the other end holding the kayak. The kayak instructors made saving us look easy, they flipped our boat, dragged it to the riverbank and went downstream to collect the oars and Charlotte's flip flops. Sadly, I lost my sunglasses *sniff sniff*, but luckily I brought three pairs on holiday.

That night we stayed in a village with an elephant retreat. It's an unusual sight to wake up and see five elephants eating their breakfast.

The next day kayaking was MUCH more successful. We found that the less effort you put into paddling, the better. We didn't go very fast, but at least we went forwards instead of sideways.

After kayaking we went to Hellfires Pass to see the railway carved into the rock in the mountain forests. The memorial is a brilliant and quiet relic - the memorial is the railway and path cut into the mountain rock. The museum contained lots of information, rather than relics, mainly because the prisoners of war and Thai people who worked on this railway had few possessions.

Then it was on to Tham Krasae bridge, the 'death railway' immortalised in the film 'Bride Over The River Kwai'. This is another section of railway built by the POWs, and it is still in use today.

The bridge is wooden, with steel tracks, and has no sides or handrails. Yet we were expected to walk along it. On setting off, the bridge curves around a corner so that you cannot see its' full length at the outset. It takes around minutes to walk along the full length and, as it's on a hill, there is a steep rocky drop on either side. Rather helpfully, a passing tourist informed me that we should hurry up as the next train was due in a few minutes. Walking this bridge was the most panicked I felt over the whole trip so far. It's just so high up and rickety, and as you walk you can see the ground below through the slats. It makes me shudder now just thinking about it! We all made it to the other side though, and lunch was our reward at the other end. Turns out the tourist wasn't right and the train wasn't due for another hour anyway. The photo I've added of the bridge is one from the web, as mine are all on my camera and I can't transfer them on the go.

Intrepid tour - first week

It's been hectic this week. We spent two nights and three days hiking in the mountain forests south of Chiang Mai, it was harder than I had anticipated, the inclines were steep and there were often big drops next to the path which made it more stressful. We stayed at two different villagers and had Local guides, Sam and Superboy, who led the trek and taught us about the villages. The villagers were of the Karen tribe and they are farming communities.

During the tour of the second village a group of children followed us everywhere, so we played football with them and gave them our cameras to play with. In the evening we cooked the children dinner and then taught them English songs and dances like the Hokey Cokey!

Our guides cooked us Thai food, but catered to western tastes by ensuring the food wasn't too spicy, the guides ate different food and were kind enough to let me try theirs. One pork dish had 26 chillies; I ate it all, but it made my lips tingle and I dreaded the bathroom trip the next morning! I also tried ant soup, it actually tasted really good, it had ant eggs that popped in my mouth.

After returning from the trek our group went elephant riding. It was more scary than I thought it would be - there was no seat and I was told to position myself on the elephants shoulders, just behind its' head. Halfway through the ride my elephant must have got itchy, because he found a mudbank and bent down to scrape himself along it. I would have fallen off had he not pinned my leg against the bank. I have a graze on my foot but nothing major, I was pretty shocked at the time. He also sprayed me LOADS with mud. We walked though a nice lake and he found the muddiest patch to squirt at me. We got off the elephants, or rather the others all got off and I was pulled off and pushed in the water by one of the elephant trainers! He thought it was hilarious and I was glad to get the mud off me. We helped wash the elephants before heading back.

The last two days have been spent on a cycling tour of Lamphun district, south of Chiang Mai. We cycled 100k over two days. It was nice and flat, and the constant breeze made the heat more bearable. We stayed in a posh hotel - a yoga retreat with a huge pool. One of the king of Thailand's granddaughters ate in the hotel restaurant on the same night as us.

We returned from cycling yesterday and last night went out to a ladyboy cabaret show in Chiang Mai. It was fabulously camp, the costumes were outrageous and the ladyboys were brilliant, lip-syncing and picking on men in the audience. We went on to a Thai blues bar and drank Thai whisky called Samgsom. It was only 60 baht for one whisky at this bar, which is about £1.20. There was a band playing live blues and the bar got busier towards the end of their set, so they played 'one last song' about 5 times!

Finally had a free day yesterday, so I slept in until 11am and then lazed by the pool all day with my kindle. We've just arrived in Kanchanaburi and it's 38 degrees so I'm off to the pool. We're spending the next two days kayaking in the river Kwai.

First few days

Having a great time in Bangkok, it's very hot and humid but fairly cloudy at the moment.  I can smell coconut milk and fish sauce all the time here, I'd heard the city is smelly but I can just smell lovely food all the time.  The tourist centre of Khosan Rd is crazy, very busy and touristy, but it's a good base from which to explore the rest of the city.

Yesterday I spent the day exploring on my own, I walked around for hours, along the river and then south to the Golden Mountain.  It's a temple with hundreds of steps and views across the city.  Then I went ot the Queens Gallery, I had the whole gallery to myself!  I walked some more, got very lost and then got a tuk tuk back towards where I'm staying.  I actually enjoyed getting lost though, there's tuk tuks everywhere so you know you can always get back on track easily.

I met my tour group in the evening.  There's five of us, four girls and a guy.  Our tour guide is called Sunit and he's from Chiang Mai.  Went out to a local bar last night with my roommate Charlotte, an Aussie girl.  We think we'll stick together after the tour and head to Southern Thailand together, she is keen on hitting the beaches and parties, so I think we're going to get on just fine!  They have live music in a lot of the bars here so we listened to a Thai guy singing Oasis and Bob Marley, his renditions were, erm...unusual!  Very enjoyable though.

Today we did a four hour cycle tour of Bangkok, which was extraordinary.  In the photo where I'm with my group you can see a big bridge in the background, and we cycled over it later that morning.  We went through tiny backstreets and saw loads of shanty houses and little street stalls.  I just wish I could have had a camera strapped to my head, as you can't take photos when you are cycling and it was all so beautiful, I would love to be able to show you what I saw.  Because it's so hot we cycled early and finished at lunctime.  I'm going to go for a swim now and then we're getting the overnight train tonight to Chiang Mai, where we will go trekking for 3 days.