Kanchanaburi

We arrived at the bus station in Kanchanaburi and luckily for us our guest house was only a 2 minute walk away from the station. We had done some research and it seemed like the only way to get to Myanmar was to go back to Bangkok to get a bus from there to the Mae Sot border crossing (There seemed to be three land crossings from Thailand to Myanmar that we could use- the far south, far north and middle of Thailand, Mae Sot being the middle one). Also that the border crossing on the Myanmar side had only one road from it, and the road was one way on alternate days. If you arrived on the day the road was running the wrong way, you would have to wait until the next day. There was no website or place to get the information about which way the traffic was running on any given day, just one blog online which said on the day they went in January 2015 the traffic was going this way. It all seemed like a very complex procedure, and because of the day we thought we might have to arrive at the border, we had only planned for one day in Kanchanaburi. So anything we wanted to do would have to be squeezed into this time.

Beautiful views on the River Kwai

Kanchanaburi is most famous for having the bridge over the river Kwai. Some people may have seen the film (which is actually very inaccurate) and there is also a book. Basically in World War 2 the Japanese used their prisoners of war, mostly British, Australian and Dutch to build a railway line between Myanmar and Thailand. The conditions were horrendous, and many died from starvation and disease. The building work also included a bridge over the river Kwai. When the Japanese heard of the news that the bridge was going to be bombed by the allies, they sent many of the prisoners of war to go and stand on the bridge to wave, so that the allies would not destroy it. However, the bombing went ahead and apparently the river was still running red with their blood for a week afterwards.

War Cemetary

So of course the main thing on our list was to visit the bridge, which was about an hour walk from our hotel- a very sweaty walk as the temperature was 39 degrees. There was also a museum next to the bridge which we visited, which explained the history of the bridge and the railway (with some very interesting choice of translated English words).

Really the best use of 'higgledy piggledy'?

The museum

 Next to the museum we also found another set of museums, one of which seemed like a store of herbal medicines but also contained dead snakes and animals in jars, not one of the nicest sights.

I have never seen these stocked in Boots chemists before

After a walk over the bridge and back again, we headed back towards the hotel via one of the war cemeteries. We also passed a few travel agents, and thought we might as well ask them if there is an easier way to get to Myanmar without going all the way back to Bangkok- the first one said unfortunately that was the only way, but the second one who hardly spoke a word of English pointed to a place called Phunamron on the map after we had done all sorts of mimes and pointing. Thinking he probably hadn’t understood us, we resigned ourselves to going back to Bangkok. However, when we looked up Phunamron online just to double check, it turned out that this was a new land border crossing that had opened up in the last 2 years, which not many people were aware of. And there was a regular direct bus from Kanchanaburi to this border- success! This meant we were no longer in a rush to leave, and could spend at least another day here (we heard there was some beautiful waterfalls around). We also needed another day for Jonno to get his second rabies vaccine shot, and to sort out the currency for Myanmar. On our research into Myanmar, we had also discovered that money was also not going to be easy for us. According to the guide books and the internet, we would be lucky if we found an ATM in the country, maybe in the big cities like Yangon and Mandalay, but other places had yet to install them. This meant that we should take all the money that we think we might need in cash before we entered the country in case we did not find any ATMs. As you cannot get the Myanmar currency, kyat (pronounced chet) outside of Myanmar, this would need to be in US dollars. The hotels will accept payment in dollars and you would then need a currency exchange in Myanmar for kyat for food, transport and most other expenses. However, the dollars also have to meet a specific criteria- they have to be crisp, clean notes with no folds or creases or marks, otherwise they cannot accept them. This was not going to be easy! We reckoned that we could get a hospital visit for Jonno and the bank visit for the dollars sorted the next morning, which left us an afternoon to go to one of the nature reserves which had some waterfalls.

The bridge!

Compulsory walk across the bridge

The hospital trip went fairly smoothly and on schedule, and we returned back to the hotel to rent a scooter for the rest of the day. What we didn’t realise is that the scooter came from a shop on the other side of town, so this took about 45 minutes to organize. The scooter was also not the safest one- it had gears but no clutch, and every gear change the bike bucked around like a rodeo. So we set out on the death machine to sort out the dollars, reckoning that most banks should have dollars which met our criteria. However, after the first few banks we visited said they did not have any US dollars, we realized it was not going to be quick and easy to sort out. One place recommended a currency exchange that opened at 1pm, so after some hanging around we got to the desk and were relieved to discover they did have dollars. We accepted the exchange rate and handed over our Thai Baht, but when the woman gave us the dollars they had a few marks on them and all had been folded in the middle. We had no idea how fussy Myanmar was going to be with the dollar criteria, but decided not to risk it and had to ask the very unimpressed woman to change it back- I think she thought we were just being difficult. After a few more banks and no success, we finally found one that had the perfect dollars we were looking for- it was basically the same feeling as finding the holy grail.

By this time it was too late to go to the waterfall but we still wanted to visit it, so we decided to delay our departure for another day. Instead, we spent the remainder of the day on the death machine, riding around the area. We crossed the river and came across a sign for a cave, and decided to investigate. The place seemed completely deserted apart from one old lady carrying fruit. She didn’t speak any English at all but pointed us towards the stairs down into the cave. The first level was fairly big and spacious, with many shrines and statues of Buddha, but as we continued down through the network of alleyways, the spaces became smaller and we could feel bats swooping around above us. We went through one tiny tunnel and found that it lead to a kind of meditation room, which was filled with bats. We sat in there for a while in silence, feeling the bats flying around our heads and avoiding us at the last minute, before making our way to the exit. We also found some beautiful temples and monasteries to explore.

Inside the cave

Ominous red arrow pointing deeper into the cave

The bat room

After a while, the skies started turning grey so we decided to head back to the hotel. On the way we spotted a park area with some gym equipment, and had a play around on them before the rain started and we hurried back to the hotel.

The woman in front getting the most exhilarating workout

Jonno on the equipment that seemed to work on thrusting movements

It looked like time to get to some shelter...

The following day we went in search of the Erawan Waterfalls after swapping the death machine for something a little less deathy, about an hour and a half drive from Kanchanaburi, which wasn’t so comfortable on the scooter and also not helped by badly fitting helmets that kept slipping off. It was lucky that Jonno was the one riding at the time because we passed a police checkpoint and had to stop and show our license to the police- I don’t know if they would have known the difference between a full and provisional UK driving license but I’m sure I would have had a guilty look on my face which revealed all if it was me riding. We arrived at Erawan, a national park, at about midday. From the entrance, it is a short walk to the waterfall and you can continue walking to a further 6 levels of waterfall. The water was a beautiful shade of blue and each pool was filled with fish- the smaller ones being the fish that like to nibble on your feet. At the beginning I was pretty disgusted by it (I am not keen on fish at all) but I manned up and after a few attempts, let them do their weird fishy sucky thing on me.

The first level of the waterfall

At first I was afraid, I was petrified....

Wouldn't say it was the nicest sensation ever but I did it

The walk up the levels took a while but was definitely worth it when reaching the highest level, as it was beautiful and very few people were at the top by the time we reached there. We climbed into the water here, the floor of the pool very slippery with algae, and the occasional fish trying to nibble you as you walked (luckily I’d had the training before this or I’d probably have freaked out quite considerably). After a few moments of enjoying the cool water in contrast to the heat from the sweltering climb up, we had the surreal experience of being submerged in water and torrential rain from above, which was incredibly refreshing although after a while a little too cold. A great reward for a long climb up though!

Feeling like a mermaid!

The national park had decided that the way to stop people dropping litter around the waterfalls was for everyone to pay a deposit for each water bottle they had with them, and they could get the deposit back upon showing the bottles at the end. We had 2 bottles, which equated to about 80 pence. However, we did not realise that the deposit counter closed at 4.30. When we casually strolled down at 4.45, the desk had been completely cleared and there was no staff member in sight. However, I was not going to let go of the deposit that easily- we had played by the rules, had our 2 bottles in hand, and they had run away with the money! We managed to find an information desk towards the entrance of the park and jumped on the nearest unsuspecting staff member. I think they may have been a bit confused as to why we were chasing around after 80p but I couldn’t let the system win! The staff member made a few phone calls, and asked us to wait for 10 minutes. We saw a car pull up, and a stocky, grumpy looking man got out, asked to see our bottles and returned our money- I think he might have been the man at the desk who finished at 4.30, went home, and then got called all the way back just to return 80p. Still, justice was now restored.

If there ever was a sign to lure backpackers in...

After another painful hour and a half ride back, which involved a downpour of rain and an almost empty fuel tank, we returned to Kanchanaburi and found a night market to get some dinner. We looked around the food stalls, and what I really fancied was a salad similar to the one we had in Prachaup Khiri Khan. I did spot one place, which had a few similar items, such as sweetcorn, the green salad jelly and something that tasted a bit like potato cubes. It also had other strange things which seemed like multicoloured jelly worms, but I thought I could get away with ordering a small bowl of the things I knew and even though it would not be a proper salad it would have to do. I started pointing at items- first the sweetcorn, then the potato cubes, and before I could carry on the woman behind the counter started pouring some white coloured sauce over it and then put a scoop of crushed ice on top- not what I had in mind at all! Turns out it was a kind of dessert and the sauce was coconut flavoured- I have no idea why they would put sweetcorn and potato in a frozen dessert. When trying new things though I guess you have to expect things to go wrong sometimes. After the disappointing starter/dessert, we found a stall that had some nice looking noodle dishes. Jonno ordered crispy noodles which tasted pretty awesome, and one local man recommended I should get their pad thai. Unfortunately again for me, this pad thai came packed with tiny little shrimps, which I am not a fan of. That makes 2 disappointing courses. And then the day was saved- we found a dessert stall which made huge crispy pancakes with chocolate that were unbelievably good! Feeling more satisfied we returned to the hotel.

Amazing pancakes

The next morning we had decided that Myanmar had waited long enough for us and it was time to leave Kanchanaburi and Thailand. We dropped the scooter back at the rental shop, and on our way back to the hotel went via the bus stop to check what time the bus left. We asked one woman, who confirmed the time we thought it would be and then pointed to a large shifty looking woman sitting on the bench who laughed and mimed that she was driving the bus. Not being entirely sure whether to believe her or not but not really having much choice anyway, we got our bags and returned to the bus stop. The shifty woman turned out to be the conductor, and it was lucky that we could follow her and another woman who pointed the bus out as there was no English writing on the bus for us to understand. We sat ourselves at the back of the bus, and after getting quite a few stares, one man who spoke a little English asked us if we knew where we were going. After telling him we did, he said that he had never seen a foreigner on this bus before. After dropping off people at various destinations, including bags of rice and other produce to a few shops, we were told that we had arrived at the Thailand-Myanmar border. Onto the next country!