*Happy New Year peeps!*
*OOT*
Started new career recently and the I am still trying to get used to the new working culture and environment. No more flexi-hour for me and everything has to start anew. Wish myself all the best!
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Continued from the previous entry, I would like to share more on my trip to Kanchanaburi. Again, this is a place full of historical events, and apart of the famous Death Railway, Kanchanaburi has much more to offer.
The next day after the Kanchanaburi carnival, I woke up at 7 a.m. and headed to the Erawan National Park. Riding motorcycle for 70 km in the morning along the mountain road was not a joke. It was so cold, and furthermore I was not wearing any jacket! The good part was that riding bike with the thick forest on both sides of the road, made me really feeling good with the chilling fresh air. After riding the bike for approximately an hour, I reached the entrance of the national park. Not much crowd yet at this hour, great!
When I was there in the year 2011, the entrance fee was 200THB for foreigners and the fees of motorbike was 20THB. Based on the Erawan National Park homepage, it seems that the entrance fee has been increased to 300THB for foreigners. Nevertheless, it is still a good attraction to pay a visit, if you are into jungle trekking & wildlife observation.
The major attraction of the national park is the Erawan waterfall, which is a 7-tiered waterfall and spans over 1.5 km, flowing emerald water along each tier.
In order to finish all the 7 tiers of waterfall, jungle trekking is required. Walking along the trail, we would be able to reach the first tier of waterfall, named Lai Kuen Rung, after walking for only 20 meters. As I was early that day, not much visitors on the site and I was able to take my first long exposure waterfall shot. Totally satisfied with the result!
Next, I proceeded for another 150 meters to reach Wang Macha, the second tier of the waterfall. Again, long exposure waterfall shot! There are multiple ponds for this tier, and there were a lot of fish!
No more food beyond this tier, but anyway, I was not there for picnic so it did not bother me much. Walking for another 50 meters, I reached the third tier of waterfall, Pha Nam Tok.
The trek gets trickier upon this point, and visitors have to be more concentrate on the trek instead of the phone. Signal is weak here anyway, so stop all the social media and just enjoy the surrounding! Trekking for 300 meters, I came to the forth tier, Oke Nang Phee Sue. At this tier, we could only take picture from far, and the pond was a little too far to get into.
Coming to the fifth tier of waterfall after trekking for another 600 meters from Oke Nang Phee Sue, I had my first tragedy on my camera! My tripod failed when I was trying to take long exposure waterfall shot at this tier, Bue Mai Long. As I set my tripod in the swallow pond to have better angle of the waterfall, the tripod failed and my camera dropped into the pond! At the speed of light I grabbed my camera away from soaking in the pond, but still, half of the camera was in the water, O.M.G!
Luckily after wiping the camera, it was still able to work fine and then captured the shot below. Phew!
After a scare at Bue Mai Long, I slowly walked 300 meters to the next tier which is Dong Pruk Sa. The tier of waterfall was barely seen with thick vegetation covering it to be viewed from the trail. No picture for this tier.
In order to reach the final tier, there was some tricky steps where visitors have to use both hands and legs to climb the cliffs before reaching the 7th tier. Erawan waterfall was named after the three-headed white elephant of Hindu mythology, and this tier was said to resemble the elephant's head. Which part of the waterfall resembles elephant's head? I am not sure.
Finally by the time I came down, the crowd already built up and the picnic sites were full of visitors! Some were sitting on the picnic mats enjoying food they brought while some of them playing in the ponds. The whole trekking process took me around 4 hours and I proceeded to another attraction of Kanchanaburi, which is the Hellfire Pass Memorial Museum.
While I was on the way to the memorial museum, I came across the Thathungna Dam (Chong Sadao) and I decided to stop over to take a photo of it. Thathungna Dam consists of a hydro power plant, which is owned by the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand (EGAT).
Hellfire Pass Memorial Musuem is situated 42 km North West of Erawan National Park, and it is built right next to the railway cutting on the Death Railway. The museum is divided into indoor and outdoor area, as the documentaries and drawings are contained in the indoor, while the unfinished railway is at outdoor. Visitors may get the audio touring headset to understand more on the site of the museum, especially the spots at the outdoor compound.
The scale model of the Death Railway construction during the World War II.
The illustration showing how bad was the conditions of POW camp.
The statue of POWs carrying logs to build to Death Railway.
Coming to the outdoor area, the first thing we would be able to see was the great scenery of mountains in Kanchanaburi.
The Hellfire Pass railway cutting was the first thing visitors would come across at the outdoor area. The cutting was done on the large rock, during the time where there was no proper construction tool. The process of railway cutting costed so many lives of POWs, as well as the laborers from Malaya.
In the end of the day, the railway was not completed. What was left behind, was the partially completed railway in the woods, along with the sorrow memories of WWII.
Finally, one more part to go on the unusual tourist spots of Kanchanaburi. Stay tuned!
