Day 169 Jan 20 2015 Khao Sok Thailand

On the way to the raft houses 

the raft houses on Cheow Lan Lake

swimming through the Nam Ta Lu Cave

a cool formation

Day 169  Jan 20 2015  Khao Sok Thailand

We went on a tour to Cheow Lan Lake in the Khao Sok national park.  We were picked up at our hotel by van at 8:30 and given a 1 hour ride to the lake.  Once at the lake we were loaded onto long tail boats and shuttled up the lake for 1  hour.  The scenery around the lake is gorgeous with large limestone cliffs and hills.   We stopped at the raft houses on the lake where we had 1 hour to swim and use the kayaks.  One of the options for tours included an overnight stay at the raft houses.   When I saw the raft houses I was glad that we did not opt for that tour as the walkways were definitely not safe for little kids like Isabel.  After the swimming we were fed a lunch of fish and chicken.  Once lunch was done we were loaded back into the long tail boats for a 5 minute ride to the start of the walking trail to the Nam Ta Lu Cave.  We walked 2.5 km to the cave mouth then 800 meters through the cave.  The passage through the cave was very cool, requiring us to walk down a small water fall and wade (swim for Isabel and David) through water that was at my eye level.  Once out of the cave we walked 1.5 km back to the boats and were taken back to the pier were we got into the van and were driven back to our hotel.  At the hotel we watched a documentary on the tsunami that hit the area in 2004.  On the walk from the restaurant to the hotel I came within 2 inches of stepping on a large black scorpion.  That could have been a bad ending to a very good day.