Trip report to Thailand Dec 2007

Getting there

We got a flight from Norwich to Schiphol, Amsterdam and then a flight onward to Bangkok, as usual the cost of flying during the school holidays led to a premium price , although we saved a bit by booking 9 months in advance. We booked through Opodo on-line with China airlines for Ł800 per return ticket.

Getting around

We hired a Toyota Corolla though Avis this came to around Ł400 for the two weeks this included a full Crash damage waiver. There are three or four car hire companies all based within the airport on the ground floor - it would have been very easy to have hired the car on arrival we booked ours in advance on-line, beware as they did try to hit us with some extras on insurance that we had already requested from the on-line price. In hindsight I would book the car hire on arrival then yopu could play the companies off against each other on price and probably get a better deal.
Driving a car in Thailand is not so bad outside of Bangkok and New Years day! Do not try a return journey to or around Bangkok on New years day we were stuck in a 5 hour traffic jam from hell! The rest of the time was fine as the Thai's drive on the lefthandside, so this does make it easier for Brit's. Be aware that they pay no attention to lane discipline, basically many of them treat 2-3 lane highways as a racetrack, undertaking is common place and the nutcases in the big pick-ups will veer from one side of the road to the other whilst navigating past any vehicle doing less than 120 KMH!! If you just stick at around 100 KPH & use your mirrors before changing lanes you should be fine.

Maps

You will need a map; we bought one from a bookstore prior to leaving, a Michelin 751 National, this was okay for navigating from one big town to another big town but was of little use for small areas and finding National Parks, many of the small roads were omitted from the map. If you are self-driving I would advise finding something with more detail.

Temperature & Climate

The weather was hot & humid in the south, but hot and more pleasant in Khao Yai & Kaeng Krachan. You will want sun cream and lots of water! Birding under the canopy of the forest was much cooler and the density of the forest in these areas meant that you needed less precaution and water. Although very dry in the forest, the damp valleys clearly held a reasonable number of mosquito's as witnessed by the number of bites on our legs by the evenings.

Useful Email addresses & web addresses

Ao Nang nr Krabi - www.laithai-reaort.com
Kraeng Krachan & Khao Yai - http://www.thaiforestbooking.com/
Khao Yai - http://www.sawadee.com/hotel/isan/juldis/
Samut Sakhon - www.centralplacehotel.com or sales@central placehotel.com
Samut Sakhon Mr. T (the Spoonbilled Sandpiper man!) - teespoonbill@yahoo.com
Nang - bird guide for forest at KK & KY - nang@thailandyourway.com

Money & currency

Just take plastic cards, there are plenty of ATM machines in Thailand - the majority worked okay. Be aware that not all the petrol stations take Visa cards, the main ones like Esso & shell did, look for the Visa sign on entry, those that didn't did appear to take American express cards.

Overview of the trip

Overall we had a great trip recording over 200 species of birds. Birding in the forest was difficult at times, don't go expecting to see all the target species as you would be very fortunate to nail them all unless you just targeted these species and nothing else for 2 weeks.

Dates & Sites visited plus Accommodation details
(For details of the birds seen at each site - use the systematic list)

20/12 Fly from Norwich 9.50 to Schiphol, Amsterdam onward to Bangkok

21/12 Arrived Bangkok 0710am collected car from Airport and drove to Khao Yai, Juldis Resort arriving at around 1PM. Having got only 2 hours sleep on the plane we grabbed an hour in the room and then birded around gardens and surrounding forest for 3 hours, before meeting up with Oscar Campbell. The Juldhis resort was very comfortable; nice clean rooms, with hot shower, flush wc, swimming pool and good gardens backing on to secondary forest ideal for birding around. The steakhouse restaurant ( opposite the hotel) whilst looking very nice was not so great, none of the food arived together and 2 meals arrived lukewarm. We found food at the less aesthetic looking restaurants nearby cheaper, hotter and better value for money!
Overnight at Khao Yai Juldis Resort

22/12 After having had just 3 hours sleep in the past 36 hours we decided to have a breakfast at around 7.30am, we collected Oscar at 0800 and headed off to the reserve of Khao Yai. We paid at the main entrance gate and then birded mainly from the roadside by stopping several times and walking up and down the road.This was fairly productive resulting a good number of expected forest species. We had lunch at the Reserve centre, and then went to the waterfalls at Haew Pratun - made famous in 'The Beach' film. It was very busy around these areas with many Thai holidaymakers.
Overnight at Khao Yai Juldis Resort

23/12 Again we met up again with Oscar, but this time we had hired a guide - Nang. She arrived at 6am and we went straight up to the area around the Radar station to look for Siamese Fireback & Silver Pheasant. Despite plenty of time and effort we failed to locate them, we did however amass a good number of other birds. Nang then took us off into the forest, under the canopy on several trails and we continued to get to grips with some great birds. She also took us to the infamous campsite for Coral-billed Ground Cuckoo. Unfortunately the camp was solid with Thai campers partying - we did have great views of Blue-bearded Bee-eater here, plus Orange-breasted Trogan the next day. In the afternoon we worked hard for 3-4 hours.
Overnight at Khao Yai Juldis Resort

24/12 Jules arrived last night and today the four of us, Jacky, Chris, Oscar & Jules were collected by Nang at 0545 in her pick-up with a driver. This ensured we were up at the Radar station very early - however it unfortunately did not guarantee us any Pheasants!! The rest of the day was a similar run as yesterday.
Overnight at Khao Yai Juldis Resort

25/12 We left for Khao Yai after breakfast and reached Samut Sahkon, Khok Kham salt pans just after lunch. We managed to locate Mr T and we spent 4 hours searching, scanning through 100's of waders for Spoon-billed Sandpiper. After amassing a great number of waders we had failed to locate probably the number one target species of the trip. There was going to be no big Xmas present today! We decided to abandon the journey to KK, sacrificing a day there for another shot at the Spooner in the morning. Mr T seemed fairly confident that the next morning we stood a good chance. We, by some small miracle, located a very nice hotel in Samut Sakhon - www.centralplacehotel.com or sales@central placehotel.com. If you make it to this Hotel try and ask for Nicky - she speaks good english (few of the other staff do) - she took good care of us!
Overnight at Central Place Hotel

26/12 We took a quick and early breakfast and arrived at the salt pans just after 7am. As we arrived Mr T gave us the "thumbs up" -we all piled out the quickly but very quietly, a few seconds later we took quick turns looking through Mr T's scope at the wader of all waders! For the next hour we watched, digiscoped and photographed the Spoon-billed Sandpiper. As you will see from the systematic list we also amasses a good range of other waders, although we did not see Asiatic Dowitcher or Nordmaans Greenshank - better come later in March if you wish to maximise your chances of seeing these species. We left Oscar after midday - they were heading up North to Doi Inthanon, whilst we headed off east to the National Park of Kraeng Krachan. It tokk around 5 hours to reach KK, and we settled in at the pre-booked bungalow overlooking the lake in front of the dam. The bunglaows are more like wooden chalets on stilts, in a wonderful setting - very clean inside with dormitory style beds, hot shower, flush toilet and fridge. They are about 20 minutes drive from the park gates, and make sure you know the way to the Park entrance as we discovered it is not particularly well sign- posted.
Overnight at Kraeng Krachan Bungalow

27/12 We spent the day walking up the road from the KK park entrance gate. We basically did 3-4 stops as far as the campsite. After the campsite the road detiorates and if you wish to go all the way to the Dam, or birdwatch much beyond here you will need a 4 wheel drive as there are boulder strewn streams to cross. Birding was good and exciting, you could easily stay here for 4-5 days. The campsite looked a nice spot, and you would have the added benefit of being in the Park dusk til dawn, although you would need to bring your own provisions.
Overnight at Kraeng Krachan Bungalow

28/12 Leave KK late morning drive to Krabi aand stayed at Ao Nang Lai Thai resort. This was a crazy long drive of 12 hours and we would probably have opted for an internal flight if we had realised. Especially as our return journey turned into a nightmare 16 hour drive! We booked into the Lai Thai resort pre-booked accommo. This is a nice place - we got a double bed chalet, with hot shower, fridge, very clean. All accommo in Krabi and surrounding area is expensive compared with the other areas we stayed.
Overnight at Lai Thai resort

29/12 We had a lie in this morning and then headed off down to the harbour at Krabi and hired a long boatman to take us out round the mangroves, we had 4 hours and managed to see a good delection of species, although we failed to see Mangrove Pitta.
Overnight at Lai Thai resort

30/12 Today we took one of the tourist boats out to the offshore islands of Ko Phi Phi and Ko Phi Phi Lee, we had some wonderful snorkelling and also manged to see a flock of 50 Frigatebirds, we sorted out several definite Lesser's but are still studying photographs to see if we are bale to add either Christmas Island or Great, be warned you need good views!
Overnight at Lai Thai resort

31/12 Up at 0500 and off to Khao Nor Chui Cui or KNC as it is known! This is the renowned Gurney's Pitta site. Alow 1.5hrs travel time from Krabi. It took 5 hours and 3 walks up and down U-trail but we did eventually see a feamle Gurney's Pitta. The bird was in the muddy valley - well noted by all previous trip reports. We did see several more new species at this site, but it would be fair to say that birding on U trail was tough!! Overnight at Lai Thai resort. One word of warning despite having pre-paid for our accommodation at this resort we were charged extra due to bank handling charges at the Thai end. The American owner did show us his bank statementto verify that he wasn't making the extra money, although I paid what was only an extra Ł16, it is worth checking this before making a booking, I would recommend trying to do everything via credit card if possible rather than bank transfer.

1/1/08 Today we set off for Petchaburi area, we knew it would be a long drive, but we hadn't reckoned on every Thai tourist heading back towards Bangkok.We had an horrific journey, the traffic for the last 100KM was nose to tail 3-4 lanes of traffic moving at 10-15 kmh. We eventually reached Samut Sakhon and the Central Place Hotel where we had stopped before, we decided on this as it was so late when we had reached Petchaburri and we had no idea of where we were stopping.
Overnight at Central Place Hotel

2/1/08 Today we had a leisurely day around the Saltpans photographing the Kingfishers, Egrets and waders, before returning for a late lunch.
Overnight at Central Place Hotel

3/1/08 We spent the morning in Bangkok around the Grand Palace and visited several other temples, before gathering our gear and getting the flight home to the UK.

30/12 KrabiLa Thai resort

31/12 KrabiLa Thai resort

1/1 Leave Krabi & drive to Bangkok are