Anantara Golden Triangle

Press Reviews

AWARDS

Nominated for World Savers Awards 2010, Conde Nast Traveler (US)
Top 15 Resorts Asia, Travel + Leisure's World's Best Awards 2010

REVIEWS

Conde Nast Traveler (US), September 2010
Ride an elephant at the Anantara Golden Triangle, which supports a community of mahouts, or trainers, and their families."

Conde Nast Traveler (US), February 2010
"A large room with local-textile accents and views of the jungle and an infinity pool. Fine meals and a day-trip to the hotel's elephant camp were memory makers."

The Telegraph, July 2009
"At dawn, John drives me, a Californian couple and an Irish volunteer, up to the bamboo forest. We walk up a rough red track and come upon four elephants and their mahouts. My first thought is: "God, they're enormous." The second: "How will I ever get on?" I am assigned to Jenny. Her pilot, Pong, commands her to drop down. She's still huge. Another mahout, Saeng, tells me to put my foot on his knee, and I scramble up Jenny's massive shoulder. Move forward, Pong urges, until I am perching on her bristly neck, thighs splayed, shins wedged behind her ears. The position is more strenuous than dynamic Pilates; the view, down the precipice of Jenny's face, is terrifying.

And now we are trampling down a steep, muddy track, Jenny yanking bamboo from the root with her trunk. I feel I could fall off at any moment, but Karen, the Irish volunteer, says nobody ever does. This is only semi-reassuring. When we get back to the camp 15 minutes later, my legs are trembling...

Feeling more synchronised, we trot around the camp, and then it is bath time. Bousi wades into the pond until she is completely submerged and I almost am, too. The only hope of staying on is to grab her ears. She goes under for a minute at a time and the funniest thing is not knowing where her trunk has got to – until it rears up like a geyser and sprays me in the face."

The Independent, January 2009
""Pai, pai!" – the Thai for "go" – I yell at several tons of stubborn pachyderm. It's not working, so I try something more south-east London than south-east Asia: "Move, ya great big lump." Nothing happens. The main reason is that Lawann, 26, female and elephant, is eating sugar cane and has no wish to be interrupted.

The five-star Anantara Golden Triangle Resort in Thailand's northernmost reaches is an unlikely place for a ground-breaking mahout training camp, but then learning to "drive" an elephant is an unlikely holiday activity. Of course many tourists will have ridden one, but have they fed one, washed one, or climbed up its trunk on to its head?

"After the elephants finish their breakfast we'll be heading through the forest up there on the ridge," says John Roberts, the tall blond Englishman in charge of the Anantara's elephant camp. "Then we head towards the Mekong River where we'll see the Golden Triangle."

The Anantara is about 3km north of the Golden Triangle – the point where the Mekong joins Burma, Laos and Thailand. With a sultry morning mist enveloping us, we head off. High up on Lawann's neck, with only the occasional bamboo leaf providing temptation, I begin to make good ground. Finally we come to a clearing where the Mekong unfurls majestically. "That's Burma there," says John, "and those thick forests and hills are in Laos." I also notice a long line of tourist buses decanting their camera-wielding hordes.

For a few moments we watch the light playing over the huge river, before heading back, Lawann no doubt thinking of feeding time. OK, she's tricky to handle, but I wouldn't swap her for all the air-con buses in China."

Scotland on Sunday, 16 May 2008
"Heavy morning mist lingers over the mighty Mekong river and spills on to the lush jungle foothills of Thailand and Laos. I am at the confluence of the great Ruak and Mae Nam Khong (Mekong) rivers, home to the Anantara Resort and Elephant Camp in northern Thailand's Golden Triangle.

My day begins in luxury at this exclusive rural hideaway overlooking the rugged hillsides, but I pull on my old clothes. I have no intention of visiting the spa or the infinity pool: it's my first day's training as a mahout, or elephant driver. John Roberts, the resort's director of elephants, who hails from deepest Devon, loves his job so much that, when he's not hanging out with his four-tonne friends, he is writing about them on his daily blog...

After several attempts I manage to clamber on to Plume's back and we set off slowly towards the top of a nearby hill. Spectacular views of Laos and Burma stretch for miles in front of me and the Mekong flows like a silvery ribbon below... When we arrive at a lake, Plume strolls straight in and disappears into the depths of the murky brown water, while my head just sticks out above the surface, the only evidence of our presence."

Travel + Leisure
"The property rests on the banks of the mighty Mekong River at the meeting point of Thailand, Myanmar, and Laos. The Zen-luxe retreat, near the Thai town of Chiang Saen, unabashedly makes the most of its location. Each of the 90 rooms includes a balcony with a canopied daybed for prime tri-cultural vistas. The Anantara's spa has five treatment rooms, equipped with both Thai massage platforms and private outdoor decks. The Mekong plays host to scenic river rides on long-tail boats, and the resort's nearby elephant camp, affiliated with Thailand's Elephant Conservation Center, offersriding courses. There's also a Thai cooking school, along with two restaurants and a bar.To help support the Doi Tung produce co-op, run by 27 area villages and tribes, the hotel carries its fair-trade nuts and coffee beans to sell to guests."

Guest Reviews

Reviews are only from people who have stayed there and booked through i-escape.

• “Room was great but the bathroom was disappointing.
  Staff are extremely attentive, courteous and friendly.
  The breakfast was excellent but Thai food at dinner disappointing. All non-inclusive food and drinks very expensive exploiting the fact that eating out was quite difficult given the hotels situation. Overall it was well worth it just for the elephants!We would recommend it.”
  Liz, United Kingdom (11.08.09)