Nice Kitty...

There is an animal sanctuary here in Kanchanaburi which was originally started by a Monk to take care of an orphaned Tiger Cub. It would soon develop into a huge area with many more cubs plus a whole range of other animals which were in need.

Every afternoon, when the Tigers are out for their "excercise", people can come in to the excercise area and have their pictures taken with these felines.

When we saw we could do this, we jumped at the chance. When else were we going be get up close to real Tigers! And since I was born in the Year of the Tiger, how cool would that be to get a picture with them.

We arrived in the afternoon and followed a path leading into a large canyon. When we rounded a corner, you can see in the distance about 10 Tigers roaming around, along with people watching them and playing with them.

Now, not to give any false impressions, these cats were chained up to stakes in the ground so I guess if they did decide to charge, you'd get a head start before the beast pulls the chains out of the ground! :)

The area is quite set up for ushering people through a series of about 5 locations with good photo ops set up. A few Tigers would be lying on the ground, and some perched on top of a rock a meter in the air.

A quick spew about what was to happen came from one of the handlers.

"Leave your bags outside the area, there's less for them to grab onto, just in case"; great I thought

"We will have a handler escort you around, do NOT leave his/her side"; uh huh

"Give your camera to another handler for pictures"; ok.

Well, needless to say, Jenni went first! ;)

I watched from the side as she was led by hand to the first Tiger, some pictures taken, then to the second one, which seemed to be a bit pissed and just wouldn't sit still so they bypassed him. On to a few other ones and she was done being led out of the area.

Well, I was up next. Handing my camera over to one of the ladies another guy grabs my hand and leads me over to the first Tiger. Nice kitty I'm thinking as I size up the length of chain holding him to figure out how far I'll need to jump back if for whatever reason he turns and goes for me.

"Kneal down here and put your hand here".

As I reach down to rest my hand on the back hindquarters of the cat, the muscle twitches as my hand lands there. Phew...

Cool, I'm petting a Tiger.

A couple pics and we're off to the second grumpy one and again, he's not happy so we move on to the 3rd and 4th ones.
Most of them were too busy knawing at a bone or just sleeping so it was actually pretty safe to go through the motions. Not sure if there have ever been any injuries but I would think not.

Still, it was so amazing to be standing so close to one of these animals. There skin was so warm to the touch. Just one indication of the amount of power laying underneath there I guess.

Afterwards, the Tigers were to be lead back up into their cages and everyone, if they wanted, could have a picture taken with one of the Tigers as he headed back up. I was a bit more worried since the Tiger could easily knock down the handler holding their chains but what the heck. I gave my camera to someone, walked up behind the kitty and gave him one last pet. Jenni did the same but I guess he was a bit grumpy and they moved a bit faster and unfortunately, the shot was more of her chasing the cat instead of walking behind it.

All in all...very cool and well worth the 300 Baht each donation to help support the sanctuary.