Thailand Trail Monday 15th January Along the death railway to the Bridge on the River Kwai

 

Here we at Thornburi station. This is were you depart for Kanchanburi the destination where you can get out to see the Bridge on the River Kwai. It's a 3 hour journey that costs 100 bahts each (remember 40 odd to the pound). Quite a lot of Europeans make this journey with the Allies involvement of WW ll and the notoriety of the war crimes committed. 

We boarded the train at 7-45am after a 6am taxi from the hotel. The train was single 3rd class although some of the carriages had been 2nd, note the slightly padded seats and fans in the ceiling. The windows remain fully open throughout the journey. 

In the first few kilometers out of Bangkok we passed very closely to the oh so common shanty dwellings that seem to follow railway lines the world over. We next travelled through a largely agricultural landscape with lots of different arable crops and a good variety of livestock. In the picture below you can see the ubiquitous paddy fields.

Here we are looking at the infamous Bridge on the River Kwai. Not what you thought, I imagine. It is not a kind of bamboo Forth Bridge but a proper steel girder and concrete pier construction. The Japanese had an arrangement with Thailand to build the railway through Thailand as a supply line to support their troops who were invading British held Burma. The so called "death railway" was started in 1942 and despite terrible abuse of the slave labour, completed ahead of schedule. The bridge was bombed by the  Allies in 1944 so the taller, square sections are replacements from Japan. What you see in the next two pictures are original parts. Kanchanburi station is immediately before the bridge and arguably we should have got off here, but we wanted to cross the bridge on the train. So we stayed on the train naively thinking that it would stop once the bridge had been crossed. It didn't. 

Plan A was to get off and get a tuc-tuc back to the bridge but when we discovered that the next stop was over an hour up the line, we needed Plan B. It transpired that the train went on up the line for a further hour, then turned round and came back again. So we decided to get out at Krasae cave Station. This was one of the most difficult and dangerous points of the railway, but more of this later. 

Here we are now crossing the bridge and on our way into oblivion, The bridge at this point is original.  

The Allies bombed the bridge several times in 1944/45 and for a while it was out of commission. This is one of the spans to replace the bomb damaged sections. 

Now on the west side of the river. Thailand did decide to join the Axis powers during WW ll and told their ambassador in the USA to declare war. Fortunately for Thailand he refused to do so thereby saving the country from masses of debts for reparations and sanctions. What a hero.

We have been following the west side of the river and are now nearing our destination. Remember that I said this was one of the most difficult and dangerous parts to build. We are tight on a limestone cliff with the river vertiginously below us.

 The bend of the river not serves as the site for a holiday destination and the views are stunning. What would those workers of 1942/45 have thought?

Walking on the Death Railway. Now some serious thoughts about the scale and tragedy of what occurred here. Up to 250,000 local civilians and 60,000 prisoners of war worked as slaves on the line. About 90,000 civilians and 12,000 prisoners died of malnutrition, illnesses and maltreatment. It is calculated that one worker died for every wooden sleeper laid. After the war 111 Japanese officials were charged with war crimes and 32 executed. It is thought that there are still mass graves out here undiscovered. 

Here we are inside the Krasae cave where the prisoners were able to find brief respite to and now is home to another Buddha and all his presents. Although we never really intended to come to this place, we were so pleased that we did. By the time we had lunch and explored what was here, the train arrived chugging it's way back. 

Part of the museum of remembrance Kanchanburi is this WW ll steam engine which we passed on our way back to Bangkok. 

There is some serious development going on with this line from about 50 kms into Bangkok. Massive amounts of concrete poured into road bridges and new platforms but most of the work appears to have stopped some time ago. Buddha knows when this lot is going to be finished.