10th-11th April 2012

 

Feeling slightly stiff from the trek yesterday, I thought it would be a perfect chance to do….nothing. In the last few days, I’ve been on the go non-stop and was feeling a little tired.

 

Sleeping in, I roused myself awake with the breakfast that’s provided and watched a film called Little Buddha. It was pretty hard going and I soon lost interest when I began to natter with some of the other hostel mates and had a bit of banter. Before I knew it, it was mid afternoon, and feeling the need to eat something other than Thai food, Ryan showed me place that had an amazing concept…The Salad Conception. You pick your own vegetables, add some toppings and wash down with a smoothie. It was pretty awesome.

 

It is always important to ring home to let your loved ones know that you are fine and it was good to chat to my parents particularly as they are thinking of going on another instalment on their holidays to Lanzarote. I told them what I’ve been up to (not adding in the rock climbing with no ropes) and told them my plans for the next week to their amusement.

 

Spending the night watching more films, I headed off for an early night. Why? Because I was pretty insanely excited what I was going to do the next day…

 

Cuddling Tigers.

 

Oh yes.

 

But first, in the morning, I got a haircut by a Thai ladyboy, as you do, and got a lovely head massage thrown in, Luke, Matt and I got a tuk tuk to the Tiger Kingdom.

 

Upon arrival, we had to decide which tigers to see As there was a choice between smallest, small, medium and big. I opted to go for smallest, small and big.

 

Now, these tigers have been reared around humans so they are used to our presence but they still can be vicious and you always must approach from the back. These tigers range from – few months to 2 years old as after that they get too vicious to handle around humans and thus sent to zoos. Despite my initial thoughts these tigers were not drugged up as they could certainly wake up really quickly. They naturally sleep a lot during the day so please do not be alarmed if you see any tigers sleeping. They are actually roaming around in the kingdom and certainly not chained up.

 

So as I walked in, it was tiger time and it was grrrrrrrrrrrreat! Enjoy the photos!

 

Smallest

 

 

Small

 

 

Big

 

Have you been to the tiger kingdom?