Four-year wait delivers perfect photos of Thailand’s ‘Eye of Heaven’
A postal worker with camera spent four years to snap the perfect shot of a natural wonder that can be seen for only five minutes a day two months of the year on the Thai side of a mountain on the border with Cambodia in Sa Kaeo province.
What local resident’s call the “Eye of Heaven” occurs shortly after sunrise when a beam of light shines directly into a cave in Kok Ma Muong Mountain in the province’s Khlong Hat district.
Yossaphat Leoithao, who describes himself as an amateur photographer, said he heard about the astonishingly rare phenomena while delivering a package to a resident of Kai Theun, the area around the mountain several years ago.
Locals residents told him that the “Eye of the Heaven” grants immortality to those who manage to bathe in the sunbeam as it shines into the cave, he said in a Facebook post on Thursday.
The startling phenomenon lasts only five minutes per day and can be observed only in May and June shortly after 5am, when the sun makes its first appearance from the Cambodia side of the border.
Yossaphat said he spent four years trying to take the perfect photos of the sunbeam entering the cave. The window of opportunity was narrow. The cave entrance disappears when the sunbeam rises above it by 6am.
He finally captured the perfect photos of “Eye of the Heaven” on the morning of May 16, after waiting patiently for the Sun to rise from 5am.
Some local residents believe “The Eye of Heaven” has the potential to become the vibrant province’s latest tourist attraction.
Support from the tourism and other government officials will help, they say.
Yossaphat’s patience and determination – and what he calls amateur photography – may have already have accomplished this goal.
