A bike trip to the western part of Thailand led us first to its famed river crossing, the "River Kwai Bridge", which actually crosses the Maenam Kwae and is a mispronounciation in itself. The bridge on display here hasn't much to do with the one built by prisoners of war in WW II, but was built in the 50's near the original site. It takes however all the glory and appreciation and is visited by millions each year. The bridge can be crossed on foot and so we had a much welcomed break from the long ride on our bike here.
The walk across is free of charge and the area between the rails has been modified to accomodate pedestrians. Be aware, the rails are still in use!
Lovely Elephant Babies await visitors on the western part, the so-called "Burmese side". Burma is still over 100 km from here, but the "Burmese giftshops" there sell the illusion to the plenty of Chinese and Japanese tourists. Melona enjoyed playing with the elephants, the merchandise from the giftshops there didn't tickle our fancy at all.
After a short cruise, we reached marker number 21 on the 323 roadin the afternoon, we were near the known turnoff for the Tigertemple here, we had to watch out for an unpaved road to the right.
And soon we also found the sign at the proper turnoff there, the signage was, however, visible only for eastbound traffic on this road number 323.
A narrow gravel road led us northbound further into the mountaineous area north of here.
And then we arrived at this sactuary for wild animals. Melona was immediately occupied by a tame deer and she enjoyed playing with it and feeding it. A brick wall encases the foundatons territory here. The animal saw the bananas an went nuts for them. Melona had to sacrifice all.
But we didn't come here to meet other mammals then tigercats, we came as journalists and requested an interview with the abbot by email beforehand. It was Melonas first trip as a journalist, many more did follow since. She is a naturally talented photographer and videographer, much more of her works is shown elsewhere on this site.
Like any task given to her, she tried her best and succeeded well. We had an interview with the abbot scheduled for 16:00 hours and still time to see the tigers, so we ventured into the compound and walked further inside, we both were given "Journalist" tags to identify us to the staff inside the huge compound.
And after entering it, we saw with our own eyes, what we came here for. The groups of tigers playing or napping on a variety of boulders and rocks. Some were even taking a bath, completely unleashed or unchained!
It was quite breathtaking, to see these majestic and powerful cats play and interact in this natural environment for them.
Some were way bigger than us and would have had us for a snack if the animals were hungry and have their natural aggressiveness. Somehow, this peaceful temple must spread its aura to them, Melona was the first one to touch the beast right near her, she stroke it gently and was surprised by its warmth and softness of the fur. She could feel him breathing when she touched his flank gently, very low and deep growls by the cat signalled clearly, that it liked the soft strokes very well. An unforgettable moment for her!
A youngster was sitting on a nearby boulder, carefully watching every move she made, some light breeze in the canyon made the hot temperatures bearable for beasts and people in here.
The Temples tigers were difficult to count, because some were roaming and some napping, but they had over 20 in the canyon at this time. It didn't seem crowded here and few wardens were on stand-by in case a cat reacts aggressive towards a visitor, but that never happened. The big cats did not always nap, some eyed their territory silently, occcasional growls from the bathing tigers filled the canyon with a noise that made us realise, we're dealing with the world's most powerful cat here!
Melona took a few closeup pictures of the prettiest ones, some of them would make nice postcard-motives, don't you agree?
Look at how big the fronr leg of this Tiger is, they are all muscle and claws plus teeth when they are out there, fighting their daily fight to survive.
He caressed the tigers as if they were pet cats, they seemed to like it as well. Some big tiger even put his head in his lap for a while.
Later on, a friendly monk came to Frank and he was introduced as the famous Luang Por or abbot of this temple. Luang Por Mabtabuha Sampanno himself answered liberally all of Franks questions and even posed for me to take a picture. He assured us that any kinds of drugs are not a part of the felines diets and that their non-aggressive behavior here is the special spirit Buddha did give his temple.
Controversial reports have surfaced, I can not witness any of the mistreatments as discussed there. Charging high fees for posing with the cats to take photos now may be excused by the high feeding costs of these. monks have the absolute authority here and all warden staff are volunteers or locals, none showed any aggressive behavior during our time there. People complain about a 300 baht entrance fee, but fork over 400 Baht to see a waterfall a bit further down the road. I consider the tigertemple a nice opportunity to interact with the animals, one may like it or not, we will return here one day.
