Anantara Golden Triangle Excursions
 

Based on all of the recommendations in the Forum, we will be staying at the Anantara Golden Triangle Resort for 4 days in December. We have received a list of tours/excursions offered by the hotel. Wondering if anyone has actually taken any of them (besides the elephant camp experience). There is a day trip to Laos, day trip to Myanmar and a hill tribe village hike (Doi Sa Ngo) which all look interesting. So does the long tail boat trip. How to decide? Any input would be appreciated!

My recommendation is to get a car and driver and do the things you want to do.

I recommend against the day trips to Laos and Burma... both are trips to border towns that will give you no real feel for the country.

The boat ride on the river is very pleasant, and a trip to Doi Tung is well worth your time. Both can be easily arranged with a driver (and for much less than the hotel excursions).

When we were there, we got a recommendation for a driver (from the hotel staff) and did all the things we wanted to do on our own.

I'd recommend taking a full day to do things away from the Anantara, and spend the rest of your time there, interacting with the elephants, enjoying the gorgeous scenery, the pool and the spa. Oh, do venture the short walk to the Opium Museum. It's very well done.

In addition to getting to just inauthentic border towns, in Burma you will have to pay (if memory serves me correctly) something like $50 USD to enter. We decided that we did not want to give the government that amount of money just to get a stamp saying we'd gone to Burma. A boat ride, though, is very pleasant (even in the rain that we had) and we claim that we got close enough to the Burmese shore that we were in Burma without paying the fee :$. Doi Tung is beautiful and the history of the Princess Mother is heartwarming. She reminded me of my beloved grandmother ((L)). And the gardens are beautiful (if a bit steep to get down to). Enjoy!

Sounds like great advice, although this Laotian trip sounded intriguing and not a border town:

"Cross the border into Laos and step into another world. Travel to a village through the hills, fields and forests of rural Laos, then on to a working lowland Lao village and try their local food. Next, with four-wheel drive and guide cross the open country to the 12th century lost ruins of Buddha statues and pagodas (chedis). Cruise back to the crossing point for two hours on the Mekong and drive back to the hotel for cocktails. This is a unique trip."

Not the silly stop 10 minute to the Lao island for souvenirs or going to Myanmar for the market.

I had heard that they were going to offer a longer excursion into Laos, but I don't know of anyone who has done it.

We did:
- the opium museum (brilliant - relates the history of the whole world to drugs)
- the cooking school (includes visit to non-tourist market - highly recommended)
- night market in Chiang Rai on our own
- a "three-country tour" with Toi - fabulous guide provided by hotel(not the standard tour, but one we put together):
1/2 day in Burma (not just the border market), rented a vehicle -visited two villages plus a monestary where our boys interacted with 6-year old monks. My husband was on a mission for a certain gong which he found in Burma, and I bought a phenomenal pair of dangling sapphire earrings on the Thai side. Then took a longboat to visit to the Lao tourist island (we were the only people there at the time). True, the island was not the "real" Laos, but I bought some cool fabrics (which look even better when you get them home) while my husband and kids played cards, ate noodles (and, to my horror, drank tiger penis whiskey) with the vendors.

Not sure if I would do the Burma part now with the current political situation. The Lao island was not nearly as tacky as we expected, and the boys liked the trip up the Mehkong. I ended up returning the following day in the Anantara boat because I had left my sunglasses there - Bought some silk table runners like the ones at the Anantara.

We did speak to people who had been on the inagural trip into Laos that you mentioned. They raved about the experience and their photos were incredible. They attended a festival and had a lot of interaction with the locals.

I really wanted to go on the hike, but the concierge told me it was "too cold". Later ran into other guests who had gone and they said it was perfect hiking weather.

Crosscheck: thanks for the detailed response! Care to share the itinerary of your custom tour? Also, did you have to reserve any of the tours before your arrival or did you handle everything when you got there? Thanks in advance!!

Crosscheck sure had a better experience at the Lao island than we did. We wanted to do the boat trip on the river and our boatman asked whether we wanted to stop. We opted to stop as I wanted to see if they had any local weavings. I'd bought lots in LP. I was surprised at just how low quality the goods were. The weavings were very poor quality and about the other other things they had (other than the animal parts wine/whisky) were low-quality baby and toddler clothing that was already falling apart.

That said, crosscheck has been there more recently than I have, so perhaps it's improved.

When we were at the Anantara in June, the only tour that we did through the hotel was to take a boat ride on the Mekong. The boatman wanted to stop for the obligatory "setting foot in Laos" and after taking a quick look around at the poor quality of crafts and the various jars of moonshine with critters pickled inside, we opted to get back in the boat and just continue our cruise. An hour or two in a longboat on the river is a nice diversion and although it is more expensive than hiring a boat in Chang Saen, it was very convenient to just walk down to the Anantara's own dock and we felt worth the slight "splurge"
I will second or third the recommendation to tour the Opium Museum which is just across the street from the hotel. It is really fascinating and you really need a solid 2-3 hours. Great during afternoon rains. The concierge at the hotel does have tickets.
If you enjoy biking, I would suggest taking out the bikes they have at the hotel and biking to Sop Ruak or Chang Saen on your own -- very easy rides along the Mekong. There is a good market in Chang Saen and lots of side walk stalls of food.

If you are a little more adventurous, the Anantara also has good maps for longer bike rides up into the hills

Hope this helps.

jrlaw10,
We only arranged the elephant activities in advance. What I described was our custom tour - Villages in Burma, Thai border area, Lao island.

I think the Anantara trip into the remote interior of Laos would be fascinating. Please report back if you decide to do it.

Kathie,
The fabrics were inferior to what one would find in LP. But one vendor did have a small selection of higher-quality ones.

P.S. I am still sorry we didn't get to Luang Prabang on that trip - and I'm still craving a taste of the real Laos. My husband is about to go to Korea, Japan, Singapore & Hong Kong - I'm thinking of meeting him in HK and sneaking off to LP for a long weekend.

Just sent my final list of excursions to the Anantara just to find out that the day trip to Laos has been canceled due to "transportation problems in Laos".
Back to the drawing board!!!

quite honestly you have not really missed much....those border towns are very dreary and full of junk