Thursday, Nov 3 - Phuket - The nature excursion that wasn't

We had an early wake-up and a long drive north to Khao Sok for a rain forest walk and a canoe ride down a river.  At a bathroom stop along the way we had some great views of a beach.  

After a two+ hour drive we stopped at a memorial for the 2004 tsunami that killed a couple of thousand people in Thailand. The memorial was a patrol boat that had been swept 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) inland.  They braced the boat, put up a sign and a couple of vendors set up stalls in the area showing pictures of the tsunami and its aftermath and selling souvenir trinkets. That was the extent of the memorial.

The views of the rain forests were pretty awesome.  The country is very beautiful and lush. 

Then it was another 40 minute drive (we are now at three hours) to our excursion location.  Except that there was a mix-up with our excursion.  The one hour rainforest walk we had booked didn’t exist.  It is a three hour walk and only occurs in the early morning because of the heat.  We had specifically said we did not want to do the elephant encounter which involved riding and feeding the elephants, so we were apparently booked on an elephant observation – observing but not riding.   So the rest of the group went off to ride and feed big elephants and we were talked into going to see a 2 month old baby elephant (and Momma) at the Khaosok Discovery Center to fill some time.  The baby was awfully cute and kept trying to squeeze through the fence.

We then headed to lunch and spent 2 hours there while waiting for the rest of the group to finish their encounter and then have lunch.

The afternoon worked out much better with an hour plus canoe ride down a river.  We got sprinkled on a bit, saw some monkeys, and generally just relaxed.

Then it was the drive back to the hotel...during which we saw several elephants along the road heading home from their day's work.

The drive back to town was endless because about half way there the skies opened and the heavens rained down in buckets and barrels.  On the way some of the roads were flooded with cars half way up to their axles in water.  When we reached town we saw many people wading ankle deep, and deeper, through the streets.  

The rains slowed us down so the total time from departure to return was 12 hours…all for the chance to spend 15 minutes with a baby elephant and take an hour+ canoe ride. 

Needless to say we didn’t rate the day as one of our favorites.