Today we spent touring surrounding areas. We began at the floating market where we were poled around by an older man up and down quiet and not so quiet canals. At times larger long boats, motorized, whipped by and semi swamped our small craft. Vendors in their own small boats sold a variety of items, from fruit and vegetables, to waffles, to tourist trinkets like hats. Prices were high and no one in our boat, us and a Vietnamese couple, bought anything.
After a very long and hot one and a half hour drive, we arrived at a riverside cafe for our lunch of rice, curry sparsely sprinkled with bits of chicken, and pineapple for dessert. As the river was the River Kwai, it seemed special regardless. After eating it was another half hour to a large military cemetary to honour those who had died here building the Thai to Burma railroad. Very moving to read the inscriptions of the poor men who were mainly in their 20s and buried so far from Britain, India. A beautifully kept cemetary and a good reminder that while we all think of the Alec Guiness and David Niven movie, parts of it were based on fact and these graves represent that.
The actual bridge on the River Kwai was destroyed by the Allies and a newer one has been rebuilt on the site. It is in actual use today; a train crossed it just after we got off it!
Our final stop, another 2 hours away, was the largest pagoda in Thailand. We could not climb to the very top due to renovations, but enjoyed a walk around to see many small buddhas set in alcoves in the walls, and another reclining buddha inside. Traffic back into Bangkok was not too bad in our direction, horrific going out of town at 6 pm. A cold beer was the first thing on our minds as we got out of the van.
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