Thailand Mission and Cultural Trip 2014 - Journal 11

Today was Tiger Temple day! We were up at 5:45am and left promptly at 6:40. I like to leave early because of eventualities! And yes we had. We passed the Tiger Temple, because they had taken down the big entrance landmark and erecting a new one. We went miles beyond it, all the time I felt that we had passed it because everything looked new. Finally I stopped and asked; and yes we missed it. But

we got back there right on time, at 7:15. I need to remember, however, that we don’t need to wake up until 6:00am, and need not leave until 6:30am. It is only a 30 minutes’ drive.

It was a small group for the morning program – our group of 5 and another group from Norway of 5. Since the political problems the numbers have dropped. Hopefully it will pick back up, since it is quite calm and safe now. The advantage is that we got much more personal

attention. I was disappointed that we did not have any really baby tigers to bottle feed; but there were some 6-months old ones – but they don’t scream like the real babies! Then it was time for breakfast with the monks (we had earlier made presentations of the foods collected to them). My team each year has a hard time believing things I say until they experience it. I told them to head for the line within seconds when they announce breakfast. The staff gives the tourist 3 seconds to get in the line first. Then they descend upon the food, as if they hadn’t eaten

for days! It is something to behold and experience!

It is then time to walk the baby tigers, which have a mind of their own! Then we bathe some bigger tigers and fed them part of their daily ration of cooked chicken. Next we spent a bit of time exercising the teen-age tigers. That was fun. Then it was time to walk the big tigers down to the canyon, and to take photos with them. One of the great experiences is when they put us in the

cage and have the big tiger exercising with the trainers and caretakers in the big pond. Those tigers can jump up to 12 feet in the air! I got a few good photos of that event.

We were then free to be on our own to roam around the ground and see the other animals, like the lions, black bears, deer, water buffalo, etc. We then joined those who came for the afternoon program; and we got to take more awesome photo with the tigers, up close and personal!

Ended our time there in Kanchanaburi with dinner at the restaurant at which we usually eat (with the elephant in front). Great setting and great food!

I hope some of you who read this will want to join us one of these years if you have not at yet. I took over 500 pictures. Here is the link again: http://people.wallawalla.edu/~pedrito.maynard-reid/gallery2/main.php/v/pedrito-travels/PedritosTravels2014/Pedritos+ThailandTravel2014/