We kayak the Khwae Noi River from Thong Pha Phum in the northwest to Kanchanaburi town in the southeast.
This will be my fourth kayak journey. The first took place on a commercial
tour in Alaska's Glacier National Park in 1994 with lots of beautiful ice,
mountains, and wildlife. In January 2022 I joined a small group led by Chris
Jedrzycki on a remote section of the Mae Nam Ping in northern Thailand,
https://www.arizonahandbook.com/KayakNamPing1.html. And just one year later
I headed out to sea among the Trang Islands of southern Thailand, again in a
small group organized by Chris,
https://www.arizonahandbook.com/KayakTrang1.html. Now I take to the
smooth-flowing waters of the Khwai Noi of Kanchanaburi Province in western
Thailand, once again led by Chris.I first heard of Chris from his
cycling stories posted on the Crazyguyonabike site
https://cgoab.com/Spoke2010 in which
he told of cycling challenging routes way off the beaten path, then I met up
with him in 2014 on my first ride to Kanchanaburi Province. He and his Thai wife
Areeya run Hidden Holiday House
www.hiddenholidayhouse.com/index.php/en/homehhh-en-gb a little guesthouse
beside the Tha Chin River near the town of Nakhon Chaisri, just a day's bicycle
ride west of Bangkok. Chris enjoys organizing kayak and cycling tours to which
he invites people who he knows.
The Trip
Chris had run this kayak
trip four years ago, so he knew of good places to stop for sights, food, and
accommodations. He and Areeya had reserved rooms for each night, so all we had
to do was paddle, eat, and sleep. Kayaks go about 4 kilometers per hour, to
which we got a river current bonus of 2-8 additional kilometers per hour. We
traveled at the end of the rainy season and did get rained on a few times, but
since we were already a bit wet from dripping paddles, a little more water
wouldn't matter. We didn't bother with raincoats, which would have been too hot.
The journey is about 240 kilometers, spread over seven days. Dramatic limestone
cliffs towered over many sections of river, and we detoured on foot to enter
cave underworlds. We saw and heard a great variety of birdlife, attracted to the
river by its fish and verdant vegetation. Chris set up a group chat on WhatsApp
to tell us about the day's schedule and for all of us to exchange thoughts and
photos. We enjoyed good cell phone coverage during the trip.
We kayak the Khwae
Noi River from Thong Pha Phum in the northwest to Kanchanaburi town in the
southeast.
The Group
Four of us had recently completed a pair of Chris's South Korea tours--Chris
(from Canada and now living in Thailand), Chow (a Malaysian Chinese), Mathilde
(from Holland), and myself (from U.S.A.). You can read about our South Korean
adventures at
https://www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/SeoulJeju2023. Areeya (from Thailand and
wife of Chris), David (from the U.K.), Hans and Lieneke (from Holland; Lieneke
is an older sister of Mathilde), and Iew (from Thailand) joined for a total
group of nine.
The Gear
I brought an OM System OM-5 camera, a smaller
and lighter version of the larger Olympus cameras I've been using in the past
but with the same image quality, weatherproofing, and most of the features. To
go with it I added a light-weight Olympus 12-45mm (24-90mm equivalent) F4.0
lens. A small waterproof bag shelters the camera, phone, and a few other small
items that I wished to keep handy. Clothes, toiletries, food, and everything
else went into a 30-liter dry bag strapped atop the middle of my kayak. Chris
provided the kayak, life jacket (I kept close by, but never wore), and paddle.
Hidden Holiday House Prelude
5 November Hidden Holiday House, Nakhon
Chaisri
On this Sunday I cycled west from Bangkok, a 47-kilometer ride. First
I pedaled along wide Rama 4 Road, through colorful Chinatown, past the royal Wat
Phra Kaew (Temple of the Emerald Buddha) and parklands of Sanam Luang to the
Chao Phraya River, where I took a ferry across the Chao Phraya River to
Thonburi. From here I followed relatively quiet roads on a route recommended by
Chris that has a long section beside a railway line followed by a pleasant ride
on the north bank of the canal Khlong Maha Sawat. (You can find a map of this
cycling route on the Hidden Holiday House website.) Thunderstorms boomed in the
afternoon but I managed to avoid heavy rain or strong winds. Areeya welcomed me
with a wonderful massaman curry and a side of vegetables.
Thailand has five egret species, which appear similar.
I think these are
little egrets (black bills) and intermediate egrets (yellow bills).
6 November
Hidden Holiday House, Nakhon Chaisri
After an omelet-over-rice breakfast, I
cycled southeast on a warm partly cloudy day to the university town of Salaya
for a visit to the Buddhist-inspired park Phutthamonthon, a lovely expanse of
greenery, lakes, lawns, and Buddhist buildings centered on a towering statue of
a walking Buddha. Afterward I met up with a friend for a pizza lunch at Pee
Neung Coffee House. For dinner I joined some of the other kayakers at a new
restaurant, Natthee Farm, across the road from Hidden Holiday House.
This Buddha image in Phutthamonthon stands 15.87-meters high.
7
November Hidden Holiday House, Nakhon Chaisri
Fueled by a tasty pancake, I
borrowed a kayak and began paddling upstream on the wide Tha Chin River just in
front of Hidden Holiday House. The current made for slow going, but I knew the
return journey would go quickly. Water hyacinth and other aquatic plants lined
the shores and drifted by in big chunks. In a couple kilometers on my left I
reached Woodland Museum, an amazingly large and fine collection of wood
carvings, and on the right trees packed with Asian openbill storks. Farther up
on the left I came to a giant statue of the Chinese god Caishing Ye (God of
Wealth) near Huai Phlu Market. The river current made the return journey almost
effortless. My arms felt tired, but I hoped these three hours on the river would
help when I began the week-long Khwai Noi trip two days from now. Areeya made a
super-tasty tom kha, a Thai coconut cream soup with mushrooms and vegetables for
dinner. A thunderstorm rolled through in the night.