Khao Sok

After our lightning quick trip up to Khao Sok we arrived earlier than we could check in so wandered down the street for some lunch. Khao Sok is a one-street town that seems to exist purely for the tourism, with almost every shop being either a restaurant, accommodation, mini mart, massage place or a combination of any of them. It’s pretty quiet during the day with most people out on tours in the national park, but comes to life at night.

We had a quiet afternoon once we were able to check in, and got to planning our few days here, which we thought might include elephants, a trip to the huge man-made lake in the jungle and some tubing on the river.

As we’re all a bit sick (again!!) we booked the elephants first for the next day. We went out to a sanctuary about 30 minutes drive away where we first met and fed our elephants (2 ladies – one in her 20’s and one in her 50’s). They demolished our baskets of bananas then we took them for a walk down to the river for a quick bath.

They were extremely placid and friendly so we were able to pat them and give them a hug (on their trunk). We then walked them back while they helped themselves to a snack from the jungle, then prepared some more food for them (a mixture of mashed banana and a mix of protein/vitamins to make some balls. We then fed them those as well.

All up it was a couple of hours and a really nice time with the elephants as they did their thing.

Back at Khao Sok we went out to dinner down the street. With so many eateries there was no issue with making sure we didn’t visit the same place twice!

The next day we had an early start with a 7:30 pick up to drive out to the national park and the huge man-made lake. It was about an hour to drive out to the lake where we met up with the rest of our tour group (about 15 of us all up).

We jumped on to a longboat for the trip across the lake which took about 50 minutes. It’s quite a spectacular place with the sheer cliffs that once were all just the jungle valley before it was filled with water. Once on the other side we walked through a bit of the jungle and saw some monkeys and a tapir. We also very nearly saw an elephant – he/she was a bit elusive, according to another tour guide we missed them by around 15 minutes.

After our jungle walk we got on some bamboo rafts which were surprisingly stable. We had a quick 15 minute trip over to a cave to view the stalagmites and stalactites within the cave. Then we did all that in reverse and got back on the longboat to go to our lunch stop – which was floating on the lake.

Lunch was delicious, with massaman curry, whole grilled fish and stir fry veg. We then went for a quick kayak on the lake followed by a swim, before getting on the longboat to go home again.

It was a great day out in what is a spectacular place. They do have a few huts over the water, so perhaps next time we’ll go and spend a night on the lake as well.

For our last full day in Khao Sok we thought we’d go tubing down the river but the water level was too low. So instead we walked up to the closest entrance to the national park (at the end of the street), then walked 3km into the jungle to go swimming in a swimming hole there. The water was crystal clear and a perfect temperature so we spent a fair bit of time playing around in there.

We did encounter some monkeys on the way including an angry one, but managed to get out of it unscathed with Jim growling back at it louder than it was growling at us!

We had a couple of cocktails at dinner and then on our hotel balcony to mark our final night in Khao Sok. We’re all quite sick now which is extremely frustrating. On and off at least one of us has been sick during this trip. Not sure if it is some local flu that we’re not immunised for with the Australian flu shot, or from the air conditioning or something else, but it has knocked us around a fair bit.

Now we’re waiting for our bus down to Surat Thani, which is about 1.5 hours down the road. I had booked a car via Grab to take us, but accidently booked it for 9pm instead of 9am! So here we are waiting for the bus, which thankfully goes as regularly as it needs to.

We’ve got the rest of today and tomorrow there before we fly back to Bangkok, but only for a night there before we try and get on a train to go out to the Bridge on the River Kwai. You can’t book the train, so we’ll see how that goes!