Kanchanaburi and the Death Railway

Kanchanaburi is a beautiful town, 100km from Bangkok, nestled in the mountains and built up around a river. But is isn't famed for its beauty. The river is the River Kwai and the town has a rather famous bridge crossing it. The railway here links Bangkok to Burma - or it did. The last 4 km of track was destroyed by the allies cutting off the Japanese supply route through Burma. During WW2 captured POW's and 90,000 locals were worked to death by the Japanese in order to create the railway. The majority of people visit the area to visit the war memorials and the beautifully maintained war cemeteries.

I myself visited a couple of museums and travelled further north, to the now legendary Hellfire Pass. This is the location of Konyu Cutting the most difficult stretch of the railway and the one were the conditions were the most appalling and brutal. 69 men were beaten to death in the twelve weeks it took to construct, whilst hundreds more died of diseases and malnutrition. When you see the place for yourself, you simply cannot imagine how on earth the men were able to dig this out by hand, whilst being starved, beaten and forced to work 18 hour days. The irony being that this place is stunningly beautiful. In the 1980's a group of surviving Australian POW's raised the money to re-excavate overgrown portions of the cutting and build the museum to honour their fallen comrades. It is still maintained by donations only.

Luckily though, there is far more to Kanchanaburi than war, suffering and death. My accommodation for one was great - it was a raft room built on stilts in the river. Whenever a boat went past, the room swayed slightly. I loved it. I took a trip to Erawan waterfalls. It is a hike through the countryside with 7 levels which have waterfalls. You can swim in the falls - but there is a catch! Fish live in the water. And these are the type of fish that like to nibble your feet for fun. These are the fish on which those fish spa's are based. Only in the wild, the fish are bigger and so is their bite. I managed ok with the little fish (size of a large fat sausage finger) with minimal squealing but when the big fish arrived (size of my forearm fingertip to elbow), I could not take it. Those buggers bite! But my favourite experience has to be my cooking class with On. Not only does she run vegetarian cookery classes but she spoke brilliant english, so I did not have to put up with any pesky nuts in my food! I learnt how to make Tom Yum soup (which On then made into 3 different dishes) Massaman Curry and a Thai Issan salad. I was then expected to eat it all. I forced 2 soups and the hot spicy salad down but then I was stuffed. No way could I stay for desert let alone the curry. On gave me doggie bags instead. Still it was over 24 hours till I ate next! 30 hours after creating it, I managed to eat my curry. Turns out time makes left overs even spicier! By mouth was on fire - but it tasted good. I visited On a couple of days later (when my stomach could cope again) and we made Mango sticky rice. A scrumptious desert which knocks the socks off rice pudding. It was not the only desert I had in Kanchanaburi. As I was walking down the road, a local man was buying icecream from a passing vendor. It looked good so I went to buy some. The chap was having none of it and insisted on buying me a large tub of ice-cream. The people here are that friendly. Later that same day a lady rushed over to give me a bottle of water because I had taken off my shoes (the correct custom) before going to sit in a sheltered waiting area. I am going to miss Kanchanaburi!