[Above: A picture of bats pouring out of Chao Ram cave near Sukhothai]
Entry #19: July 8, 2011
Today started late, and is ending fairly late too, I woke up too late to get breakfast so opted to just throw my swimming suit on and lounge by the pool. Unfortunately I think I was a little too ambitious in this endeavor as I swam and lounged outside for too long and ended up with a nice deep sunburn. The sun here in Sukhothai is very intense especially when the skies are clear. With any luck I will avoid getting terribly sick from the sunburn, and tomorrow I am already planning on just taking it easy by reading, and relaxing rather then take any serious excursions out during the day.
The real adventure today though was not the mundane experience of swimming or failing at getting a tan, I decided I would catch a ride to go see Chao Ram cave via the suggestion of a friend. Unfortunately I did not know how far away the cave actually was, it was something like 50 Kilometers which especially because of the condition of some of the roads and the fact we had to go up into the mountains it took a little under an hour each way to get there and back. The experience was well worth the travel. I had an expectation in my mind that I would see a huge cavernous opening in the mountain where a huge explosion of bats would just emerge all at once from. However the experience was much different and intense in a far different way. After about 30 minutes of waiting for the sun to set a bit more we saw the first small groups of bats emerging. Shortly within a couple minutes a constant stream of bats pulsed and surged over my head. The best way I can describe what I saw was like a never ending ribbon made of bats that just sashayed back and forth overhead. Honestly it was a really unique experience, and what was most surprising was the sound that they made, there wasn't any squeaking rather just the flutter of thousands of wings directly over head which sounded something akin to waves washing up on the beach or the pitter-patter of rainfall. The experience lasted for just under an hour when the thriving column of bats started to become spur-attic again like how it began. I left the mountain with a big smile on my face, I have to say if you want to see a unique experience and get away from tourists this is a must see. There was a total of 4 people there tonight, myself, my driver and a couple which drove themselves up to the mountain to take in the sight of the bats leaving for the night. If you can manage to find an inexpensive ride, the experience is free and the view along the way is amazing. Green fields of rice, followed by acres of green forested trees, a small lake nestled in the mountains and the rocky but lushly covered mountains themselves.
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