RFI Thailand
Hi all,
Long-time reader, first-time poster. I’ve finally taken long service leave and am in the process of trying planning a large mammal-themed trip throughout Southeast Asia. I’m planning to spend 3–4 weeks in Thailand and have been reading trip reports to start planning. If anyone has any recommendations for parks or guides, I’d be really grateful for the advice.
I’m also considering staying on an extra month or so in Cambodia or Laos and would rather not overlap on species, making sure I concentrate on endemics and key species when I’m in certain areas. Again any recommendations or advice would be much appreciated!
I’m very excited!
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4 Comments
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Murray T
Hi David, a little bit different is Khao Sok NP a couple of hours drive north of Phuket. It’s based around a lake made by a dam. Stay in huts on pontoons and take a long tail or kayak to various parts of the national park. A good place to see gibbons, elephant and gaur (as well as great hornbills etc). There’s plenty of small stuff as well but wildlife guides were a bit light on and you had go off at night on your own (there’s no roads – only by boat).
Good luck!
Murray -
Flemming058
Hi David,
I have been to Vietnam and Cambodia in 2023 and the mammalwatching was quite frankly a bit of a disappointment. The country is getting rapidly destroyed and we were told by employees from the WWF that the country has lost 80% of its forests in the last 15 years. The only place that I could really recommend is the village of Chi Phat in the Cardamom mountains. This place is not to far from Thailand. Here on a semi-remote location, the NGO Wildlife Alliance has an wildlife release station in the jungle. (https://www.wildlifealliance.org/wildlife-release-koh-kong/).
During our stay in Chi Phat and koh-kong, we saw Pileated gibbons, Pangolins, Germain’s langur and Slow loris in the wild on the arranged jungle tours and evening walks. They also have some semi-habituated free-roaming animals around the release station, such as long-tailed macaque, sambar and apparently porcupines that we never saw. We heard a wild Sun bear on one of our hikes, but our guide was really scared so made us move away as quickly as possible. There are some elephants in the region and they also made claims that a clouded leopard is predating on the released wildlife around the camp.
Be aware that poaching is a thing in the region (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia), and that most animals run for their lives the moment that they see you. It is the same in Vietnam, but there they have these unique Doucs species that you don’t really have in Cambodia anymore. -
Asanoth
There are two distinct wildlife zones in Thailand: Indochinese in the centre-north and Sunda in the south (my terminology). I think in three weeks, you can see a lot of variety in Thailand only. Say you would do one week in the north and Bangkok parks, one week Krachan and Khao Yai, and one week south, be it Khao Luang (I had terrible weather there, so I did not see anything), Khao Sok area or the famous Hala Bala, if you are brave (I wish I were able to visit). With one more week, you could visit the east for a few different monkey species. Wildlife in the south is similar to Malaysia, so you might also combine with that. I have a topic here regarding whether to go to Malaysia or Thailand, where you can find some tips on different species:
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/tips-for-thailand-or-malaysia-in-january/But in three weeks, I would stick to Thailand, unless I was more interested in Sunda species.
Thailand also has loads of non-wildlife things to do.In Vietnam, you would get some unique species, especially primates but for many you need to look quite hard, and Vietnam deserves its own trip.
I really liked Laos, but I do not think it is worth leaving Thailand to look for wildlife in Laos.
I did not like Cambodia, except for Angkor. It would be an overstatement to say it was my dream to visit the Cardamons, but I really wanted to go for a long time, and I was very, very dissapointed. I did not go to Chi Phat though, but to O Saom (Osoam). See my report here:
https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowTopic-g293939-i9162-k14263461-Cardamons_and_Botum_Sakor_on_budget-Cambodia.html
People on TA generally claim, that Cambodia sells off their nature for Chinese development and the term “national park” has quite broad limits of interpretation there. It might be different in the north east, I think the reserve there is called Kheo Seima, or something like that, but it is also very expensive to visit on SEA standards.Mind, that I visited all these countries except for my 2nd time in Thailand for general travel, not visiting purposely for wildlife.
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JanEbr
There is really a lot of reports from Thailand and it’s worth it to go through a selection of them – on the country page with links, you often see what part if Thailand it is for, so you can avoid reading 20 reports frok Kaeng Krachan …
That having said: consider Kaeng Krachan! The place has a kind of magic that’s difficult to explain. I have been in Thailand three times, twice of that in Kaeng Krachan and I still feel like coming back for more.