Kanchanaburi Thailand

The next destination that we will be heading to will be Kanchanaburi which is about 3 hours from Bangkok.  My husband and I visited here 7 years ago but didn't know what else there was to offer here as it was all arranged through a travel agent and we just followed our itinerary.  We visited the Bridge on the River Kwai and some war museums and a cemetery.  We found all of this to be fantastic, and it wasn't till we were about to leave to come home to Australia, when i found out that there was a tiger temple run by monks not far from where we were.  I can't believe we didn't know about it.  On this trip with our kids, Kanchanaburi was definitely on our list of places to go.
First we did some research on what we could do around here.  We changed our minds a few times, not sure what was the best option and then we finally made up our minds that we would visit Erawan Falls and an Elephant camp.  Now I have been planning this visit for awhile, trying to find a private driver with a mini van to get us where we want to go.  Its very hard to organize transport with 6 people.  I decided that the Tiger Temple was out.  I had read a lot of information and most people recommended to avoid it as the tigers were ill treated and the money paid to go there doesn't go back to the animals.  Now I really wanted to go to this but I watched a video on youtube recently where it shows the handlers being bossy with the tigers and they all had spray bottles which you would think were full of water, but every time they wanted the tigers to do something, they would spray it in their face.  I had read in one forum that they keep urine in these bottles.  Once I saw this video it was enough to upset me and I couldn't be apart of that.  My dilemma now it seems is the elephants.  One of the best memories of holidaying here 7 years ago was riding the elephants in Chiang Mai.  It was a real tourist show.  They had the elephants painting with their trunks and posing for pictures and doing tricks.  Now I was quite naive back then and wasn't aware that these animals were being mistreated  I just wanted to experience something different, so when I looked up the elephant riding in Kanachanaburi it seemed to be a lot better and you still went for a ride but you also feed them and get to take them into the river for a wash.  I also read that they are kept on long chains so they can wander out into the jungle at night.  Is this true?  I have just started reading some more reviews regarding this  and it is a mixed bag of feelings from a lot of people.
I will have to think more on this and let you know once we come back from our trip.  My children really want to ride elephants hmmm.
One thing I know we can do without feeling guilty is going to the Erawan waterfalls.  They have seven levels of falls and if the pictures are anything to go by, then it looks pretty amazing.  Again I look forward to reviewing all of this once we return in July.

This is my favourite picture from seven years ago.  I new it would be rude to take a picture of a monk so I got my husband to take a picture of me on the bridge on the River Kwai, and I have my shot.

Washing the Elephants in the River Kwai

Erawan Water falls