TrongpaiExpat
August 11th, 2008, 15:21
The 10 day trip began with a short BKK to Udon Thani via Nok Air. The BF and I arrived in the evening, picked up a rental car from Budget and spent the night at the Charonensri Grand Royal Hotel. A fancy name for an aging tourist class hotel, next to a shopping center that has seen better days. Most of the money on this hotel was spent on the lobby. Call and you get a better rate than any of the web booking sites. Most of the guests I noticed were paunchy middle and past middle aged white guys in tow with Thai ladies, one looked 8 months pregnant. If you stay here be sure not to get a room in the front, there's a disco across the street that goes to 2 am. I need to find better lodging in Udon.
Loei Province is bordered on the North by the Mekong and is west of Udon Thani. It's mostly mountainous and untouched by mass tourism and has numerous National Parks and forest reserves. We used The Phu Pha Nam Resort in Dan Sai as our base to explore the Province. The resort had a few other guests but most were just there on an overnight. A resort of this quality would cost 3x as much if it was in or near Chiang Mai. We booked via Sawatdee.com and got a better rate than calling. Food excellent, room with a view and everything was very nice, I highly recommend this place.
There's not many places to eat at night in or around Dan Sai. Most of the restaurants double as local whore house/karaoke joints. You get to choose a lady or a lady boy to sit with you and 'sing a song' but just eating and not taking a "host" is OK too. I was told the off fee is only 100B.
We visited Nam Tok Chat Trakan, Phu Hin Rongkla and my favorite, Phu Rua National parks. If it was not for park rangers and some park grounds and road workers, we would have been all alone most days, these parks don't get many visitors. It has to be because of their remote locations rather than lack of beauty. There are well marked trails ranging from 200M to 4KM, none are level, a few strenuous and some slippery. The reward at the end of the trail was either a water fall or some cliff overlooking the landscape. All these parks are high altitude and covered in a constant mist of fog. For Aug the temperature were quite low, windy and comfortable. It rains off and on always in this season. It's one place in Thailand that sees below 0c in the winter.
We did not suffer any injuries but given the uneven and steep paths it was on my mind that falling was a possibility. We took the precaution of entering the ranger station phone numbers should a rescue be necessary though if we fell off some of the narrow cliff foot paths, survival seemed unlikely. Slow, easy and careful was the order of the day.
Leaving Dan Sai we drove back to Loei and picked up route 201, a road that follows the winding path of the Mekong all the way to Nong Khai. Small Mekong towns dot the area, only one I noticed had some guest houses, Sangkhom. It's the long way scenic route to Nong Khai and it took all day. It's a paved narrow road in decent shape contrasted by what I could see of a similar dirt road on the Lao side. Homes simple and then every now and then there's some huge mansion type house in the mix. Plenty of river front land is available and uninhabited.
In Nong Khai we stayed at the Tip Hotel. Clean, basic and just a place to sleep for the night. I prefer the Pantwee, but the BF likes Tip next to Tesco. Be sure to get a room as far from the disco as possible.
For our next stop we stayed at the BF family house. Most of the family were on jobs else where in Thailand and we had the house to ourself, more or less, given the communal nature of life in a rural Nong Khai village. It's in the NE section of the Province near a town called SoPhisai. We went to the far eastern area of the province, the Wua Wildlife Sanctuary, Bung Khia and the nearly impossible to find Chet Si Waterfall. This waterfall is very popular with the locals and for some reason about 1/3 of the visitors were lady-boys in groups with other lady boys and some gay and stright(er) looking boys. The path to this waterfall is very treacherous, slippery and steep. It was fun to watch them fall and slide on the slippery rocks swimming Thai style with all your clothes on.
We spent one day at the mountain Wat Phu Tok in Beung Kan. It's accessed via a network of winding wooden stair-cases built on and around giant sandstone outcrops, caves and ascends to the top slowly with great views. If you can do a stair master in the gym for about an hour or two with some resting you can make the climb. Best no to go with young people who leave you a few hundred steps behind taking it slow and easy. The effort was worth the view at the top.
www.agoda.com/asia/thailand/udonthani/charoensri_grand_royal_hotel.html (http://www.agoda.com/asia/thailand/udonthani/charoensri_grand_royal_hotel.html)
www.sawadee.com/hotel/TH_isan_phuphanam.html (http://www.sawadee.com/hotel/TH_isan_phuphanam.html)
Loei Province is bordered on the North by the Mekong and is west of Udon Thani. It's mostly mountainous and untouched by mass tourism and has numerous National Parks and forest reserves. We used The Phu Pha Nam Resort in Dan Sai as our base to explore the Province. The resort had a few other guests but most were just there on an overnight. A resort of this quality would cost 3x as much if it was in or near Chiang Mai. We booked via Sawatdee.com and got a better rate than calling. Food excellent, room with a view and everything was very nice, I highly recommend this place.
There's not many places to eat at night in or around Dan Sai. Most of the restaurants double as local whore house/karaoke joints. You get to choose a lady or a lady boy to sit with you and 'sing a song' but just eating and not taking a "host" is OK too. I was told the off fee is only 100B.
We visited Nam Tok Chat Trakan, Phu Hin Rongkla and my favorite, Phu Rua National parks. If it was not for park rangers and some park grounds and road workers, we would have been all alone most days, these parks don't get many visitors. It has to be because of their remote locations rather than lack of beauty. There are well marked trails ranging from 200M to 4KM, none are level, a few strenuous and some slippery. The reward at the end of the trail was either a water fall or some cliff overlooking the landscape. All these parks are high altitude and covered in a constant mist of fog. For Aug the temperature were quite low, windy and comfortable. It rains off and on always in this season. It's one place in Thailand that sees below 0c in the winter.
We did not suffer any injuries but given the uneven and steep paths it was on my mind that falling was a possibility. We took the precaution of entering the ranger station phone numbers should a rescue be necessary though if we fell off some of the narrow cliff foot paths, survival seemed unlikely. Slow, easy and careful was the order of the day.
Leaving Dan Sai we drove back to Loei and picked up route 201, a road that follows the winding path of the Mekong all the way to Nong Khai. Small Mekong towns dot the area, only one I noticed had some guest houses, Sangkhom. It's the long way scenic route to Nong Khai and it took all day. It's a paved narrow road in decent shape contrasted by what I could see of a similar dirt road on the Lao side. Homes simple and then every now and then there's some huge mansion type house in the mix. Plenty of river front land is available and uninhabited.
In Nong Khai we stayed at the Tip Hotel. Clean, basic and just a place to sleep for the night. I prefer the Pantwee, but the BF likes Tip next to Tesco. Be sure to get a room as far from the disco as possible.
For our next stop we stayed at the BF family house. Most of the family were on jobs else where in Thailand and we had the house to ourself, more or less, given the communal nature of life in a rural Nong Khai village. It's in the NE section of the Province near a town called SoPhisai. We went to the far eastern area of the province, the Wua Wildlife Sanctuary, Bung Khia and the nearly impossible to find Chet Si Waterfall. This waterfall is very popular with the locals and for some reason about 1/3 of the visitors were lady-boys in groups with other lady boys and some gay and stright(er) looking boys. The path to this waterfall is very treacherous, slippery and steep. It was fun to watch them fall and slide on the slippery rocks swimming Thai style with all your clothes on.
We spent one day at the mountain Wat Phu Tok in Beung Kan. It's accessed via a network of winding wooden stair-cases built on and around giant sandstone outcrops, caves and ascends to the top slowly with great views. If you can do a stair master in the gym for about an hour or two with some resting you can make the climb. Best no to go with young people who leave you a few hundred steps behind taking it slow and easy. The effort was worth the view at the top.
www.agoda.com/asia/thailand/udonthani/charoensri_grand_royal_hotel.html (http://www.agoda.com/asia/thailand/udonthani/charoensri_grand_royal_hotel.html)
www.sawadee.com/hotel/TH_isan_phuphanam.html (http://www.sawadee.com/hotel/TH_isan_phuphanam.html)