Hua Hin & the Upper Gulf

Who doesn't want to see herds of wild elephants roaming through the forest or enjoying an evening bath? At Kuiburi National Park's hôoay léuk unit, up near the border with Myanmar and about 65km from Pranburi, it's almost guaranteed. Wildlife-watching drives in the back of pickup trucks go through the forest and reclaimed farm fields where elephants live. They're used to seeing vehicles, so they pay them little mind, making this almost like an African safari experience.

Towering limestone outcrops form a rocky, jigsaw-puzzle landscape at Khao Sam Roi Yot National Park (Three Hundred Mountain Peaks), located about 30km from Pranburi. Most visitors are here to see Tham Phraya Nakhon, one of the most spectacular and, for Thais, famous caves in Thailand. This revered cave shelters the Khuha Kharuehat Pavilion, a royal săh·lah built for Rama V in 1890, which is usually bathed in streams of morning light from around 10.30am.

An easy escape from Bangkok, Phetchaburi (เพชรบุรี) should be on every cultural traveller’s itinerary. It has temples, palaces and cave shrines, but best of all, Phetburi, as it's usually called, remains an untouched and largely untouristed provincial town, complete with riverside markets and old teak shophouses. It's a great place for random wandering and makes a convenient stop on your way to the beach.

Phetchaburi is a visible timeline of kingdoms that have migrated across Southeast Asia. During the 11th century, the Khmer empire settled in, although their control was relatively short-lived. As Khmer power diminished, Phetchaburi became a strategic royal fort during the Thai-based Sukhothai and Ayuthaya kingdoms, and in the 17th century, it flourished as a trading post between Myanmar (Burma) and Ayuthaya. Though the great temples of the former capital were destroyed, the town is often referred to as a ‘Living Ayuthaya’ because the smaller but similar ones live on.

A sleepy seaside town, Prachuap Khiri Khan (ประจวบคีรีขันธ์) is a delightfully relaxed place; the antithesis of Hua Hin. The broad bay is a tropical turquoise punctuated by bobbing fishing boats and overlooked by honeycombed limestone mountains – scenery that you usually have to travel to the southern Andaman to find.

In recent years, foreigners have discovered Prachuap's charms and some Bangkokians drive past Hua Hin for their weekends away. But their numbers are still very small compared to better-known destinations, leaving plenty of room on the beaches, at the hilltop temples and in the many excellent seafood restaurants.

Thailand’s largest national park is surprisingly close to civilisation but shelters an intense tangle of wilderness that sees relatively few tourists. It's primarily great for butterflies and birds. Occupying an overlapping biozone for birds as the southernmost spot for northern species and the northernmost spot for southern species, it's home to over 400 bird species. The park, except for Pa La-U Waterfall, a popular day trip from Hua Hin, closes from August to October.

Thailand’s original beach resort is no palm-fringed castaway island and arguably is the better for it. Instead, Hua Hin (หัวหิน) is a refreshing mix of city and sea with lively markets, good golf courses and water parks, excellent accommodation and an ambience that just keeps getting more hip and cosmopolitan. In fact, many visitors never even step foot on the sand.

By the mid-1920s Hua Hin was a full-fledged resort town for the Bangkok-based nobility – even Kings Rama VI and VII built summer palaces here. There’s still a lot of money swirling around Hua Hin, but it remains a good budget destination: seafood is plentiful and cheap, there’s convenient public transport and it takes a lot less time and effort to get here from Bangkok than to the southern islands.

While calling Ban Krut (บ้านกรูด) and Bang Saphan Yai (บางสะพานใหญ่) beaches idyllic is a bit of a stretch, they're no slouches in the beauty department. Around 65km and 90km south of Prachuap Khiri Khan, most people don't come here for the scenery, they come because so few others choose to come. There are no high-rises, no late-night bars and no speeding traffic to distract you from a serious regimen of reading, swimming, eating and biking. Ban Krut is getting busier as a getaway for Thai families, but it is still a much more laid-back alternative to Hua Hin. Meanwhile, on Bang Saphan Yai, you'll often be all on your lonesome as you sit or stroll between the coconut trees and the crystalline blue sea that laps the long sandy coastline. There's a November to March high season, though all in all it's a wonderfully meagre one.