Our second excursion was a two day trip to Khao Sok national park. After a couple of hours driving to the dam at the end of Cheow Lan lake, we got into a long tail boat and whizzed right to the other end of the lake where we were staying in floating raft houses. This presumably stops them having to hack down the oldest primary rainforest in the world to create accommodation - though the lake is surrounded by cliffs, so maybe there isn't much flat land for building on. We kayaked around the lake a bit, saw virtually no wildlife, went out in the long tail boat after dark to search for more wildlife, and spotted a bat and an owl. Feeling a bit cheated by the lack of wildlife, we were pleased the next day to hear gibbons and see a hornbill, but that wasn't enough to stop us thinking that maybe jungles don't harbour that much life after all!
All packed up and ready to go, we realised our fishing mad guide was missing. I went to look for him, and found him lurking under his floating raft house with a scuba mask and a harpoon. Thinking it wise not to surprise him, I decided to leave him to it! He failed to catch his giant catfish, which was probably good, as I'm not sure what he'd have done with it if he had. Pleased with the tiny two tiddlers he did catch, he got us back onto the long tail and we stormed back in painful driving rain to the dam. Soaked and cold, they drove us back to the bungalows with the air conditioning on full blast, making the warm humid air welcome on arrival.
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