Phu Lan Ka national park, home to some spectacular rocks and about 50 kilometres from Tat Ton. We had a magazine and prints from web pages that provided a map to the park headquarters and, in spite of my navigational skills, we found the park entrance and headed inside.
We followed the road in the park which took us up a hill to a lookout. No sign of spectacular rocks so down the hill and we asked the first man we met where they could be found. “oh, they are not here, you have to leave the park and go somewhere else”, he said. Typical response, we thought, if they don’t know the answer to your question they send you away somewhere else. How we laughed, mocked and dismissed his answer (although not to his face of course).
So we climbed the hill again for a closer look at the viewpoint area. There were some signs to rocks on the left and a viewpoint on the right, but none of the signs seemed to point to where we wanted to go, and all were a minimum of 350 metres away, so we went down the hill again and found someone who seemed more confident of the location of the rocks. “Go to the top of the hill and go right” he said in a confident voice. So back to the top of the hill.
The path to the right said “Lookout - 1750 metres.” The path to the left indicated 4 groups of stones from 350 metres away and further. He must of meant left, we decided so we went left and after struggling through undergrowth we came to an unimpressive rock. Wrong place. Back to the lookout and not keen to trek nearly 2 kilometres to the right only to discover that there were no rocks, we went back down the hill and into the park office to check.
Two young ladies in the office, who confirmed that the first guy had been right; the rocks were more than 50 kilometres away in another part of the park……
Had the magazine indicated that the rocks were nowhere near the main park entrance? No. Had all the info downloaded from the Tourist Authority of Thailand indicated that the rocks were nowhere near the main park entrance? No. Had there been any signs indicating a route to the rocks? No. Were we pissed off? Yes. Were we going to give up? No.
Clearly we weren’t going to find these rocks on our own. So Nik did his charm thing and suggested that one of the girls should get into the truck with two scruffy looking men she had never met and come on a journey with us to a remote hillside. Astonishingly she agreed, although when she asked where we had come from an we said “Pattaya”, there was an increase in reluctance, Pattaya has a bad reputation with the Thais as well as the rest of the world.
To cut a long journey short, we ended up driving all the way back to the entrance to the previous park and then taking a turning left (no signs). Then many more kilometres, followed by several kilometres up a very rough track (4 wheel drive required), until finally we arrived.
And it was worth it. Nothing like Stonehenge, but some very weird rocks standing on a remote hillside.
Click on this one and choose original size if you want to see it in more detail:
The sky was cloudy, the sun was high, the light was not of the best; but at least we had found it, thanks to Khun Noi, a very kind office lady from the park.
Of course we had to re-do the journey all the way back to the park office. We dropped off Khun Noi and tried to give her some baht for her kindness which she was most unwilling to accept. Then we had to re-do the journey again back to Chaiyaphum for a late lunch, some four hours and a couple of hundred kilometres after we had first set out on our hunt for the rocks. We know where they are now; we will sell you directions if you want to visit.
Our final visit was to be to a small temple which every map book, guide book and web page told us was on route 202. And of course it wasn’t. It was down a little side road that we used to get back to our road home having given up looking for it. Not much to see, but at least we found it, and at last the sun had come out.
And that was it. All that remained was five hours back home with Nik scything his way through the traffic in a commendable manner.
2 days, 1,300 kilometers, 6,000 baht of fuel, 4 national parks, cooler air, nicer people and hundreds of photographs. Now we are planning our next trip.
Comments 🔗
2008-07-14| Billy saysMy God, Thailand is just sex, sex sex; even the rocks are something that would not look out of place in Pat Pong … more flowers please ..
2008-07-15| Spike saysDon’t wish for what you don’t really want.
2008-07-15| Jock saysNot quite the 12 apostles but looks like you had a great time. You’ll be setting up your own tour company next !!