Trip Report: Khao Yai National Park

The boyfriend and I set off from Bangkok after renting a car from Highway Rental on Rama 4 and Sathorn. I had used them several time before and they had always been good with new clean cars. They must have had a change of management. The car was functional but not new or clean. They also took forever with the paper work and had to verify and double check everything. Next time I will use Avis or Budget.

We drove north connecting with highway 2 in the direction of Saraburi. The highway is good and well marked. It took about 3 and a half hours to reach Pak Chong, the northern entrance area for Khao Yai. Jomtiemgayguide had provided an excellent web resource for National Park Hotels and Resorts and I went ahead and booked at the Bonanza Ranch. The web site said they would send a confirmation within 3 to 24 hours. I got no response. The web site provides phone numbers to the hotels so we called and booked by phone at a rate 400B less per day than then this web page. Still it's an excellent resource listing all the hotels near all the National Parks. I guess it's always best to check several web sites for prices, compare and then call and see if they will book at a better rate, in this case they did.

The Bonanza was easy to find. Good signs on highway 2 for all the hotels. The Bonanza is quite a distance from the main road, down a very narrow but paved soi. The ground and the exterior are very nice. We looked at several rooms and decided on the Deluxe lake front for 2,000TB breakfast included. The place must have over 60 rooms and bungalows but was almost empty of guests. Low season and not a weekend they said. The room was OK, clean and comfortable but for a new place with such a nice exterior, somehow the interior looked a little tattered and old. The bathrooms were all very small with old looking fixtures. The top of the shower stall was too low for your average sized farang.

The design is American Western Ponderosa. There was even a map of the Ponderosa ranch in the lobby. None of the staff had a clue what the name meant or knew Paw, Adam, Hoss or Little Joe. The Pool was very nice. They are set up for a buffet breakfast but they don't set it out unless there are 30 or more guests. We essentially had the place to ourselves, they gave us a decent cooked to order breakfast even though there was no one named Hop Sing cooking. There is a golf course and horse back riding available. The entrance to Khao Yai is a 15 min drive away most of which is getting out to the main road down a very narrow road to Bonanza. There is an excellent restaurant across from the hotel. The place is dead quiet at night.

We spent a day and a half in Khao National park. The park was also sparse on visitors. A few on private tours in mini vans and some self drivers. This park is not on the big tour bus circuit. If your not big on hiking on trails you can also just drive through the park and see a great deal. There are two major waterfalls on paved foot trails with steps and bridges. Haew Suwat is the easier walk. Three other nearby falls are nice but not on paved walkways. Deeper in the park is Haew Narok Falls, the walk starts out easy then you climb and climb stairs and then down then across the top and to see the waterfall you have to go down a lot of stairs. To get back you have to climb back those same stairs. I would say you have be in moderate decent shape for Haew Narok and average shape for Haew Suwat.

If you saw the movie the Beach, Haew Suwat is the one where Leonardio DiCaprio jumps to get to the Beach and the park was used for many scenes. At Haew Narok there was a film crew shooting a commercial for some cell phone company.

If you go off the paved paths you need to either duct tape to your pants to your shoes or wear these plastic shin guards or you will have a problem with leaches. There is also some heavy gage shin guards aka snake guards. There are a few poisonous snakes but unless you rolling over logs and rocks your not likely coming in contact with anything dangerous. The guide books say you should not venture on the trails without am experienced Thai guide. I spoke to the guy at the Welcome Center and he said that's not really necessary if you stay on the paths and don't go in that far. We went in a few km and just got out the same way we went in. The macaques apparently did not see the sign about a 500B fine for feeding the wildlife, someone has been feeding them, they followed us and begged for food. We saw deers and lots of gibbons but no wild elephants, there are 200 wild in the park.

I could have spent days in the park but the BF was saturated after a day. We then left the Bonanza and drove out on highway 2 in the direction of Khorat and picked up highway 24 to Buriram Province. The major site in Buriram is Phanom Rung. I had seen the same Angkor style buildings at Angkor Wat but this is better preserved. In Cambodia you have to contend with all the beggars. Phanon Rung is very quiet, pleasant and well maintained. If your not into historic sites, the trip up the hill is worth it just for the view of the Buuriram Provence below.

On the way back to Bangkok we stayed in the city of Khorat. In the mood for comfort we headed for the Royal Princess. It's a big hotel but they only had a deluxe suit available. Most of the floors were closed for the low season they told us. 4000B was more than I wanted to spend but the room was very nice, standard rooms go at 1,600. It was rush hour in Khorat, I was dead tired and went ahead and splurged for the suit.

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