Khao sok

From Ko Lanta we had an horrendous journey to Khao sok national park packed in a minivan with non-existent air-con. But it was so beautiful and tranquil that a shower in the fantastic jungle hut soon washed it all away. We treated ourselves to that old Thai classic - french fries (yummie potatoes Mmmmmm) and the lovely lady who served our drinks turned out to be a man. Interesting. From the cafe terrace we watched the monkeys across the river playing in the cave and were deafened by frogs and ciccadas, which we originally thought was an alarm in one of the huts as it was so ear-piercingly loud.
We went back to our hut and were confronted with the biggest insects I have ever seen that appeared to have become our new roomies. One was a cockroach about the size of a small child and I'm pretty certain had a beard though Ben said it was meerly a beetle in disguise. Ben did the manly thing and rid our bedroom of another huge beast and said the only thing he was concerned about was crushing the things antennae, although there was definitely fear in his eyes.
The next day we chickened out of the overnight trekking, which would'v involved a good few hours walking each day, and took an elephant ride instead. We were at the front of the pack and we came literally face to many-eyed-face with a huge jungle spider. We kept quiet about it and enjoyed looking back at our everso slightly annoying American companions freaking out at the sight of it dangling across their path. We could've sworn we heard it chuckle. On the way back to base we stopped off at a waterfall and were more taken with another, (or was it the same?), giant spider than the water. These things were big, had fearfully scary pointy legs sporting what looked like yellow knee-pads and moved in such a slow, deliberate way that you almost knew they were thinking, "You may be scared of us now but imagine how you feel when you wake up and find we've taken over the World and eaten all your furniture. Mwah-Ha-Ha!"



We ventured off into the national park in the afternoon and followed a well trodden path with plenty of pit-stops to look at lizards and... more mega-spiders, as well as a friendly monitor lizard who gracefully posed for a photo before disappearing into the undergrowth looking for a mega-spider to eat.
It was great being in the jungle and a brilliant stopping off point before our next beach stop on the other side of the peninsular to meet up with the family Boase.