Tiger Temple Thailand

There aren’t many places in the world where you can touch a fully-grown tiger, but the monks at Thailand’s Tiger Temple allow you to get up close and personal with their domesticated brood of big cats

Just a couple of hours’ drive outside Bangkok in the Kanchanaburi province, not far from the world famous Bridge Over The River Kwai, lies the Tiger Temple of Thailand, formally known as Wat Pa Luangta Bua Yannasampanno. Since 1999, the monks here have taken care of tigers which have been rescued from poachers in the nearby Thai-Burmese border jungle – and to date they have 17 fully grown tigers and tiger cubs living within the temple grounds. Every afternoon, the tigers are let out of their cages and taken down to a quarry which has a natural pool for them to bathe and play in. Visitors can walk down into the quarry and see the tigers from only a few feet away – there’s a single rope between you and them. Most of the tigers simply sit stretched out in the sun – they are nocturnal creatures so they laze around during the day. Some of the younger tigers are pretty frisky however – on both occasions I’ve been to the temple, they’ve been busy playing in the pond – “playing” in this case meaning “whacking each other in the face with their paws”. (See the photo gallery to see what I mean).

It’s just as well most of the tigers prefer to stay stationary – if they start moving around, things can become a little tense on the other side of the rope. Some of these tigers are huge, and to be in such close proximity to them is both awe-inspiring and a little scary. Their beauty is mesmerising though. I was surprised at just how long I was content to simply sit and stare at them, take some photos, and then stare at them again. The first time we went there it was during the rainy season and it we saw the tigers in torrential rain – but it didn’t matter at all.

Tiger Temple photos [click for bigger images]:

Touching A Tiger
Presiding over the tigers is the Abbot Phra Acharn Phoosit Khantidharo and a bunch of blue-shirted volunteers. The volunteers are mainly Thai but there’s also a couple of westerners too, who keep grab hold of the tigers’ collars if they start moving towards the boundary rope. They behave with well-deserved respect to the tigers, and they also take visitors in one by one to have their photo taken with a tiger. I have to confess I didn’t do this – I get a bit funny about petting wild animals. However, both my parents and my girlfriend did do it and it was an anxious few moments for me while I watched them being led in and out of the tigers’ area. There’s a reason that the collective noun is an ambush of tigers, y’know… They were all quite visibly moved by the experience. The Abott will sometimes intervene and get the tiger to rest its head in the lap of the visitor waiting for their photo to be taken – an unforgettable experience I’d imagine.

The temple has big plans for extending their sanctuary, with the ultimate aim of providing an area where the tigers can live naturally pretty much all the time, rather than having to be locked up in cages. A booklet explaining these ambitious plans is provided on entry. While the tigers are the stars of the temple, there are numerous other animals also wandering the grounds, such as boar and goats, and the monks care for these creatures as well.

Controversy
The tiger temple has been the subject of controversy on the Lonely Planet Thorn Tree message boards, with accusations that the tigers are drugged and that the temple itself is a rip-off. Most of the criticism seems shrill and uninformed to my mind, but read the board and decide for yourself.

UPDATE June 2008: There has been a lot of controversy about the Tiger Temple culminating in a critical report from Care For The Wild International, accusing the temple of mistreating the tigers and illegal tiger trafficking. National Geographic provides a good summary and overview here. You definitely want to weigh up these accusations before you decide to visit the temple.

Further links
On balance, there’s a great Untamed Travel Magazine article from 2001 about the Tiger Temple, a general overview in Wikipedia, and the excellent official Tiger Temple site (English version), which has stacks of amazing photos and information, including biographies of each of the tigers. There’s also the newly launched Walking With Tigers website, which describes working as a volunteer with the tigers (and how to volunteer yourself). Thai-Blogs also has a great eye-witness account of visiting the Tiger Temple with some excellent photos. You can book hotels in Kanchanaburi online as well. Most hotels are near the Bridge Over The River Kwai and about 30 kilometres from the Tiger Temple, which is quite remote. TripAdvisor has info on other attractions in Kanchanaburi Province, near to the Tiger Temple.

Vital work
Given that Thailand is a developing country where the concerns of nature gets short shrift much of the time, the temple is doing vital work in looking after these tigers who would be dead otherwise. Poachers still operate with impunity in the Thai-Burmese jungle. It’s extremely expensive feeding and looking after the animals, especially for a Buddhist monastery which relies wholly on donations and tourist income. Originally the temple asked visitors to donate whatever they wished, but so few donated they now charge a fixed admission price of 300B.

Some say that the monks are only interested in the tigers for the money they generate, which is frankly insulting to the monks themselves. The harsh reality is that the monks could make a lot of money and save themselves a lot of trouble by simply selling the tigers rather than continuing to look after them. It would be easy enough to make them disappear. Hopefully the temple will continue to grow as the monks have envisioned it so that they can continue to look after the tigers, take in more creatures and provide a safe home where the animals are not caged away. And for the tourists, they continue to get the chance to touch a tiger but also to understand a bit more about Thailand’s monks and the importance of their temples and Buddhist teaching.

Getting there

There are several interesting places to stay, like the Floating Jungle Rafts on the river, which gets rave reviews, and the Hin Tok Camp at Hellfire Pass.

You can browse a complete list of Kanchanaburi hotels available to book online. There’s a useful map showing the location of Kanchanaburi hotels on Agoda.com.

It’s pretty simple to get to the Tiger Temple – see the Lonely Planet thread above. Plenty of places on Khao San Rd can give you options of how to get to the temple. We did it by talking to a very friendly and helpful travel agent on the first floor at Hua Lumphong railway station (the main terminus in BKK) who booked a day trip for us combining the Bridge Over The River Kwai and the Tiger Temple. Remember to organise your day so you get to the temple after 1.30pm – that’s when the tigers are taken out of their cages. With these sorts of tours, you can simply pitch up and book it for the next day – no advance booking required.

Alternatively you spend a few days out in Kanchanaburi Province away from the big city and enjoy the other attractions the countryside has to offer.

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