Before going to the gulf of Thailand, I wanted to pay a visit to the Khao Sok National Park, as I heard only good things about in various internet forums and François (the Belgium guy I met on Phi Phi) also had been there and liked it a lot. Apparently Francois also talked to Chris about it, as he decided to come along. Francois even gave the both of us a card from the place he stayed at, as he hardly recommended it.

Chris is as lazy as me, so we both slept very long and then walked to the bus station to take the last possible bus to the national park. It was a local bus, so it wasn’t very expensive. I guess 140 Baht for a 3h ride is ok. The view out of the ride was quiet nice, as the street followed the coast line for about half of the way… Then after about 3h the bus stopped in the middle of nowhere at a small intersection and the driver yelled “Khao Sok”, so we got out of the bus and collected our backpacks. There were two guys with pick ups waiting for us, holding up signs of their resort and trying to get us to stay there (as always). Without even reading the signs, Chris went to the first guy and showed him the card Francois gave us and said to him, that we wanted to go there. They guy looked at the card, laughed and said: “That’s me, that’s me”. Chris looked at the guys sign and surprisingly it was really him. We hopped onto the back of his pickup and he drove us over a few dirt roads to his small resort located far off the beaten track. he bungalows were very nice, and quiet cheap; we couldn’t complain.

To our surprise we met Collin (the Scottish guy we met on Phi Phi) on the porch of the resort restaurant. I guess Francois also gave him a card. Unfortunately it was his last night, as he was leaving the next day. We had a nice chat and some good food and then everybody went to bed early, as Collin had to get up early and Chris and I were just tired from the bus ride.

The next day Chris and I decided to do some trekking in the national park and visit a few waterfalls. We ordered some Pad Thai noodles for takeaway as lunch and then Tawee (the owner of the resort) drove us to the entrance of the national park. We paid the 200 Baht entrance fee and then started walking along a trek that had 7 waterfalls in various distances. Along the way we saw some monkeys, but I already have so many pictures of monkey, so I didn’t take any this time. When we arrived at the first “waterfall”, it was very disappointing. We knew that it was dry season and didn’t expect too much water, but even in raining season this “waterfall” would have been disappointing, as there was no falling involved at all!

We went back to the trek and started walking to the next waterfall. On the way we saw a sign that said “swimming”. We decided to skip the waterfalls, as they were probably as impressive as the first one and go swimming instead. After a short walk we came to small spot, were the current of the river wasn’t very strong and the water about 50 cm deep. Good enough for a swim and after all the sweating in the jungle really refreshing.

Afterwards we had our lunch and then slowly walked back to the entrance of the park. The whole trip took us about 3h. Back at the park entrance we stocked up on mosquito repellant and then called Tawee to pick us up again. While waiting for him we went into a travel agency and asked for the price of one of the lake tours. The guy asked where we were staying and when we said at the “Green Mountain View” he said: “Oh, then you have to book directly with Tawee as he is my friend”. So much for comparing prices…  A few minutes later Tawee arrived and brought us back home.

Back home we discussed our plan with Tawee to do a 2 day / 1 night tour on the lake. He showed us some pictures from other guests that did the tour and told us a bit more about it. The price would be 2500 Baht, which is quiet a lot of money for me (for 2 days). I tried to negotiate a better price but he said it was fixed and there was nothing he could do about it. But he offered us, that we could keep the bungalow while we were away and didn’t have to pay for the night. Better than nothing, so we booked the trip. A bit later, while Chris and I were having dinner, a new couple arrived and joined us for dinner. Petra from Switzerland and Tony, her German boyfriend. As they heard of our plans to do the tour next stay, they decided to come along. Tawee also sat down with us and brought a bottle of rice whiskey and 5 glasses. Francois warned us, that Tawee really likes his rice whiskey… We had a good night before everybody went to bed to get some sleep.

On the next morning Tawee drove us to the pickup point, were another pickup car was waiting for us. We hopped in and the driver started picking up a few other people along the road, that were also doing the tour. We ended up being 9 people. Before we head on the main road, we saw Tawee again at the side of the road. The driver stopped and Tawee handed him 200 Baht. We found out later, what for… Then we drove for quiet a while, as the lake was about 60km away. The national park is the second biggest in Thailand with about 750 km². The lake itself takes up 165 km², so it’s really big!

When we arrived at the lake, we changed the car for a long tail boat. The lake was just beautiful! Everybody took tons of pictures along the ride. I really enjoy these long tail boat rides through the beautiful nature…

The first point on the agenda was to walk through the jungle up to some kind of viewpoint. So after a good 45 minutes ride we arrived in a small bay, where we had our lunch, before we started walking. By now you can probably guess what we had for dinner, right?! Yep, it was rice & chicken…

The trek through the jungle was about 1h, but compared to the treks I did in Malaysia, this one was very easy. But that’s no reason not to sweat. When I walk in the jungle, I’m always soaking wet…

At the end of the trek we had to climb over some really sharp rocks. I don’t want to know how you look like, when you trip here… but the view we got at the viewpoint was really amazing. As I said before, the lake is just beautiful! Wonderful peace of earth!

After we enjoyed the amazing view for a while, we walked back to the boat and head off to our sleeping location for the night: floating bamboo bungalows! How cool is that!?

Of cause the bungalows were very basic, but the feeling of living right on the water is just great. Especially in the morning, when you just have to make 2 steps from your bed and you’re in the water.

The water was really, really warm (too warm) but we spend a few hours having fun with jumping in the water and just relaxing sitting in the front of the bungalow with the feet in the water and having a Chang. Most of the other people that came on the tour were “idiots”, except for one guy: Lars, also from Germany. So he, Chris, Petra, Tony and I hang out most of the time together until they served dinner. Not like the cheap lunch they gave us, dinner was really good! Different kind of meals and plenty to eat. How it should be for the price we paid.

After dinner we had some more time to relax, before we went on a night safari with the boat. We didn’t see much except for an owl and a few glowing eyes in the jungle. The really amazing thing however was the sky. As there was no light source around for miles, the view of the stars was just astonishing! I think I really have to learn all the different figures of the stars (like the big wagon etc.), as I’ll probably never see them as clearly as here…

After the night safari we found out what the 200 Baht, that Tawee gave to the guides, were for. One of the guides handed us a bottle of whiskey, that Tawee asked them to buy for us. What a great guy! So you can imagine, what we did the rest of the evening…but we didn’t stay up too long, as the guide was going to wake us up at 7 am for the morning safari.

At 6:55 I could hear the guide outside knocking and yelling “Good morning…good morning”. I crouched out of the bed and stumbled into the water to wake up. Most of the other guys were doing the same. There’s just nothing better than a morning swim in a lake… Breakfast was supposed to be after the morning safari, so we hopped into the long tail boat and the driver brought us to various locations. We couldn’t see anything, but we could hear the monkeys (Gibbons) make a lot of noises; it almost sounded like they were singing. Very interesting…

After about an hour we drove back to the floating raft houses. The scenery was stunning, as there was a lot of fog around the mountains, which gave them a magical look…

Shortly before we reached the raft houses, we could hear the gibbons again. After a while of searching, we finally found 3 of them in the trees jumping around. They were too far away to get a good picture and it was really nice to watch them jumping from tree to tree while singing the “monkey song”…

After we had breakfast, we head off for a cave tour. First we had to take the long tail boat and then we had a good 1h walk ahead of us, but this one was very easy, as the trek was flat… The tour got really interesting, when Petra told us, that several people died in the cave a few years bag. It started to rain after they went in and they drowned in one of the smaller caves. Only one girl survived…Of cause they don’t tell you that stuff when you book the tour, but the sky looked good so we went in.

The first thing we saw, when we went into the cave, was tons of spiders in various sizes. You can spot them very easily, as their eyes reflect the light and then look like they glow in the dark. The small ones are pretty afraid and run away when you walk towards them, but the big ones just sit there and do nothing…

The cave didn’t really impress me, as it was pretty boring compared to the cave on Koh Lanta. The only fun thing was, when we had to rope down a small 3m passage and then swim 10m through neck deep cold water. Unfortunately I don’t have any pictures of that, as I gave my camera to the guide to put it into his waterproof bag.

On the way back to the long tail boat we walked into “some” butterflies. In the middle of the jungle on a small creek there were sitting at least a hundred butterflies in all kind of colors. When I walked through them, they started to fly all around me. Pretty cool experience…

After we had another good lunch at the raft houses they brought everybody home to their resort. We had a nice relaxed afternoon at Petra’s and Tony’s porch and then went to get something to eat. Tawee probably thought that we should have some kind of goodbye party, as it was everybody’s last night, so he sponsored a few bottles of rice whiskey and we had a really good time.

While Petra and Tony left to some island on the west coast on the next day, Chris and I bought a ticket from Tawee to get to Koh Samui. Apparently he had a friend, that was involved somewhere along the trip (2 minibuses, 1 ferry), so we got a pretty good price.

While the Khao Sok Nation Park is not the travel plans of most travelers, it’s definitely worth a visit, especially if you stay in the “Green Mountain View Resort” with Tawee!

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