Thailand, Part 3

At the bridge.

Next day, and I will get to this bridge.  In fact it is only a mile or so from the hotel, and proves to be impressive enough as seventy year old railway bridges go.  There's certainly a sense of history here as I walk across the span, the outer parts of which are the original whereas the centre was replaced after being damaged by American bombing.  Time to take a look at the station here then, my plan is to get a train at 1.30pm which will take me to Nam Tok, the furthest the line gets from Bangkok.  Unfortunately it seems I've screwed up, the next train doesn't go at 1.30pm at all, but rather 4.30pm.  Oops.  I get a coffee, have a wander around the 'JEATH War Museum' - no, not a misprint, it stands for Japan, England, Australia, Thailand, Holland apparently.  Interesting collection of WWII artifacts, plus rather gruesomely numerous bones of those who died building the railway.  Generally there isn't much to do though so I head back into town and grab a few beers while waiting for the train.

Sun setting, still on the train.

It is, of course, an hour late, and then takes its time to rattle along the track towards Nam Tok.  We are getting into the hills now and the route starts to take in steep inclines and sharp bends, the decrepit seeming diesel engine struggling much as I imagine the steam trains did back in the day.  At least nobody is dropping bombs on us.  By the time we arrive though we are even further behind schedule, and I am here nearly five hours later than I'd expected.  Not really ideal when my hotel is something like ten miles away... I had planned to walk it, and as I don't see any taxis and while numerous people are about - hell, there is some sort of party happening - English doesn't seem to be spoken, I hoist up my pack and set off.

I should be able to get there before midnight or so, and at least it isn't too hot at this time.  But, before long it turns out the route I planned is less of a country lane and more of a dual carriageway, not much traffic but what cars there are tend to flash lights at me, I suspect I'm not doing a very normal thing here.  Lightning from distant storms flashes around me, at one point I pass through fires on either side of the road, it is certainly atmospheric.  But in the end I only get a few miles before reaching an immigration post.  They are mainly looking for people coming the other way, from the direction of Myanmar, but they're still not keen on me walking along the road and so call up the hotel and ask them to send a taxi - I'm not really complaining.  My hotel turns out to be more of a resort and is certainly nice, my room is more of detached bungalow overlooking the river.  Bit of a shame both the bar and restaurant are shut at this time though, so not much for it but an early night.

Home Phutoey Resort - nice, pity about the bar opening times.

Photos to go with this post can be found here.