Hidden places

This series covers places where not many tourists show up. Discover the gems, that lie off the beaten tourist track!
Only attractions where, during my entire visit, I haven’t come across more than five other international tourists make it into this category. I don’t count local tourists.

Experience Thailand off the beaten path in Don Hoi Lot,

which lies at the mouth of the Mae Klong river into the gulf of Thailand. With the time the river transported a lot of sand to that place forming a sandbank. These sandbanks have become the home of the razor clam shell.

Don Hoi Lot has become a place, where the locals like to relax at weekends and enjoy a seafood pick-nick. Some of them also go hunting shells on the sandbank. It is possible to take a boat to access the sandbank a few hundred meters out. The best time in year to do that is from March to May, because then the water levels are low. It is also possible to see fossil shells on the sand banks at the coast at that time of the year.

If you walk around on the place you will note a small mangrove forest on one end and seafood stalls on the other end. The range of seafoods on offer is amazing and I have seen a horseshoe crab for the first time in my life. In South East Asia it’s considered a delicacy to eat its eggs.

Because of the beauty of the place – my guess – there is also a shrine here devoted to the Thai prince Abhakara Kiartivongse, who served in the Royal Thai navy and contributed in making it better and more modern. For that he is respected in the Thai population and people come to honour him in that shrine.

The horseshoe crab

Pictures of the sandbank and the fossil shells

The mangrove forest

Pictures of the shrine

If you see this colour ribbons, it means, it is holy and should not be touched.

How to get there

I recommend you to go during a weekend to visit Don Hoi Lot, the floating markets of the area and the Samut Songkhram train market. We rented a tuktuk for a little more than half a day to visit Tha Kha floating market, Don Hoi Lot and the Samut Songkhram train market.

To get to Amphawa or Samut Songkhram, where you could stay overnight, use the minivan service from the Bangkok BTS station Victory Monument. Take the exit no. 2 and proceed to the place full of minivans. Just tell a ticket vendor “Amphawa” or “Samut Songkhram” and he will guide you to the right ticket booth (writing only in Thai). You will reach either one in about 1.5 hours.

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