Re: Winter 2015 | Page 63

Elephants We then travelled south to Kanchanaburi home to the death bridge or the bridge over the River Kwai. This was our tour guide’s home town so that evening he took us out to the 10baht bar. As the name suggests everything was 10baht which is the equivalent to 20p. Needless to say we all had sore heads the next morning. We didn’t mind too much as we were off to see the elephants. This was the thing I was looking forward to the most and it didn’t disappoint. Half-way through the ride our handler slipped down the trunk and gestured for us to sit behind the elephants head. This was an amazing experience, despite the feeling that I was going to fall off at any moment. After our ride it was time for the elephants to get their own back. We took them down into the river to bathe. You might imagine this was a lovely experience however the elephants took the opportunity to relieve themselves and we were desperately trying to stay on their backs to avoid the mucky water! Afterwards we then spent a few nights at a homestay which we found out was more of a B&B than staying in an actual Thai home. Apparently it is called a homestay for tax reasons. We had a lovely room with futon mattresses, a flat screen TV and two showers. That evening we travelled down the river 61