Journey to Erawan Falls

After using 5 different types of transportation, we finally made it to Kanchanaburi! We found a lovely place to stay that had AC and hot water for rougly $20 for the night! (the next 2 nights we got a different room and the only difference was that it didn't have a tv and it was half the price!). I met some people from Ireland that evening who had been traveling all over and I got some great advice from them and got contact info for help in the future! We had a bit day ahead of us so we woke up early and found a place to rent motor bikes for the day for about $6! Erawan Falls was our destination and it was about 70km away (45 miles). I was so glad that we decided to get the bikes. It was a gorgeous ride.  The wind in my face, the sun beating down on me and a breath-taking landscape at my fingertips!

I will admit it wasn't all roses. I've mentioned before how the traffic here is a bit hectic and there were a few times where I felt cars zoomed by me, just inches from my bike! I was constantly getting peeped at, which I was annoyed with because I was trying to get over as far as I could, but I later found out that it is just a nice gesture from them to let me know they are coming! 

Every now and then I would stop off and snap some pictures. This one was particularily interesting to me and reminded me of one of the Indiana Jones movies! It is a billboard for food...the top is not the part that I questioned...it was the bottom and what appeared to be a monkey head on a plate! If it is true, I guess I wasn't aware that they ate monkey brains here!??!

Once we got to Erawan falls I was actually a bit disapointed about the lack of wild we saw on our hiking up the falls. We did spot this little guy though I was thoroughly impressed by his colors! So bold!

Also on our hike up to the falls we ran into this next group of people. All we did is just pass by them and make eye contact and smile and the next thing we knew we were invited over to eat with them and they offered us water.  Unfortunately we had just ate. I was still overwhelmed by their hospitatlity.

This is a view of the lush landscape and terrain that surrounded us.

Going into this journey we heard that the falls are alot better during the rainy season, but they were still brilliant. The color of the water was magnificent. One new experience that I encountered was having fish "clean" my feet. (It's a big touristy thing I've seen in Bangkok where you pay a good deal of money for this fish massage, where they eat all the dead skin off of your feet!). All you had to do is sit on a rock and dangle your feet in the water and within minutes you had an array of little fish nibbling at your feet! I might have squealed the first time or two, but then I started to enjoy it. I will admit though, my feet came out of the water pretty quickly when a big fish came around! 

We actually got to slide down these big rocks. It took me a minute to work up the courage but when I did it was quite enjoyable! There was another part of the falls where you could jump off this cliff into the water, but I didn't feel like breaking any bones!

I'm excited to go back to the falls in the rainy season when there is alot more water. This next picture satisfies a dream of mine...I've always wanted to crawl under a waterfall! It was an invigorating feeling to have the water crash down on me.

Maybe I haven't been to alot of national parks in my day but I found it very interesting that on our way into the park we had to pay a deposit on all the water bottles we were carrying with us. This was to prevent people from littering. I thought it was a brilliant idea! Again, I'm not that brushed up on my rules in national parks, so maybe this is standard! I also had to surrender the munchies that I had brought with me for our hike because of the "fierce monkeys" that lurked in the woods! I was disapointed that I didn't have any encounters (albeit maybe next time I'll sneak some food in so the monkeys find me!).

Something else that I have found intriguing since I've been here is that basically anything that you have to pay to get into...parks, tourist attractions, etc....farangs (foreigners) ALWAYS have to pay more....a significant amount more! Can you imagine if we tried to get away with that in the US? Charging different people different prices....it would never fly! Could it work to have some sort of sliding scale depending on where you were from? Something to look into perhaps!

We then hopped back onto our motorbikes and make the 70km trek back while dusk was approaching. I don't know why it still strikes me as odd to see fields of crops here! I think maybe it's because it's hard for me to grasp the concept that there could be some similarities between Thailand and home! Here are some fields of sugar cane in the middle of harvest.