Queen Saovabha Memorial Institute and Snake Farm

Did you know that Thailand is home to 180 varieties og snakes, and that 56 of them are venomous? I certainly did not. One of the things that's allways kept me from visiting Australia is the thought of haveing venomous snakes and spiders in every corner that I pass.

So after I booked my trip to Bangkok, I learned about this attraction and when I hit the line "to teach the public about the venomous snakes of Thailand" I allmost freaked out.

But even though snakes has allways scared the shit out of me, I'm also very attracted to them - so both to satisfy my couriosity and to get more knowledge I decided to visit Queen Saovabha Memorial Institute and Snake Farm.

The main mission of QSMI is to produce antivenoms that are effective for treatment of snakebites in the region. Another mission is to educate people about the snakes, as in how to react if you encounter one, what's the best first aid and whats truth and myth about the snakes in general.

To suit the later purpose QSMI has a large exhibit of snake teraries where you can come and watch the snakes, and at the same time read about them, on the first floor you'll also find a big exhibit on the eveolution of snakes, their phsyiology, and the chemical structure and effects of the diffrent types of venom.

In adition to this there are two shows every day, the first one shows how the venom is extracted from the snakes and the second one i educateing you in which snakes are venomous, which are not, which can be found in Thailand and how do they behave. At the end of the show you'll be given the chance to hold a phyton...a thing I never thought I'd do - but I did it anyway...and I do feel today that I have a much diffrent relationship to the creatures after spending the entire day at the institute.

The admission is 200 THB which allows you to come and go as many times as you want the entire day, this means that if you come early and finish before the second show you can come back and watch the show with no aditional cost.