Personally, I don't believe any of it. There really is an incredible inertia in the travel 'community' (which is not a communicty, it's new people every 3-6 months). These people mostly do the same things and go to the same places backpackers have been going to for 20 years. I can happily tell about a wonderful little jungle/mountain retreat in Om Koi district, and maybe one or two eager TT readers pick up on it and may visit the place in a year. Big deal. Same for almost every other off-the-beaten-path province; very few people go there. Om Koi is in LP by the way; like a half-column but it is in there with a brief description of what its like and where to stay. But the traveller 'community' just wants to go to Pai to hang out with other white people from back home and drink beer and eat muesli and listen to the same cool music they listen to when they go clubbing back home. Ha!
I think 'wanting to go somewhere unspoilt' is a VERY thin superficial intention, in the end everyone wants to go hang out with cool like-minded individuals and have a ball; just the absence of tour buses is about the only criterium as to if a place is spoilt or not it seems. But the tour industry is even more inert: you absolutely require an affordable hotel that can take a bus load of customers in order to take a group somewhere new.
Face it, unspoilt places are rediculously easy to find. In fact the majority of places in Thailand rarely sees a tourist. And to keep things like guesthouses or restaurants 'secret' is too rediculous for words. They're in the yellow pages and most likely have a web page. 'Secret hideaway'.. indeed.
Cheers,
Chanchao
#32 - Agreed.
As you say, in Thailand there are many places that are "unspoilt" and they're not even difficult to get to - That Phanom, Pak Chom, Sang Khom, Chiang Kham, Beung Kan, Bang Saphan, Phrao, Khong Chiam just off the top of my head, not only could all be described as "unspoilt", but they're also all easily reached by direct bus from Bangkok(excpet maybe Phrao)!
I believe they're all "in the book" yet find more than 2-3 farangs in any one of those towns and you're doing well... p'haps they're all off hiding in their paradises down south ;-)
IMO it doesn't matter if a place is in a book (or on a website). If the place appeals to a lot of people, then it will, over the years, develop and change into a different kind of spot - that's how it works. But luckily, there are lots of places here that don't appeal to everyone ... they're often the best.
I guess the big difference (imo) is when we're talking about Natural and scenic attractions, or Practical things such as guesthouses and restaraunts. Like somebody above said, guesthouses dont open with the intention of keeping a few select visitors. They want to expand and have the hordes. Same for restaraunts. So people whining about "their" guesthouse, etc is pretty silly. As someone above said, you can easily get off the beaten track even in Thailand. But really let's be honest here. What you will find it not very interesting nowadays. You'll just find pretty sleepy watered down versions of the same facilities that you get in other towns. I dont consider South East Asia (Indochina, more specifically) a place to find really unique spots anymore. You have to really get out into other regions like Central Asia and Latin America to find such places. Talking to locals, picking things up through them is the way to really do something different. Then it's perfectly within your rights to keep it secret because you put in the effort to find it yourself and dont have to go around telling others who are plain lazy. If there is any "sin" about the Lonely Planet circuit, it's that it can often breed lazy people who think there is no other option but the LP routes.
Can't understand how the guests staing there got so upset. Do they have a given right or some sort of ownership ? That is what they are claiming here. Sorry, but l have little time for elitism. Of cours on the other end of the scale are the timid little rabbits who when they travel miss half the fun and excitement because they never get their noses out of the LP guide books. They decide to go to a place based on te recommendations of the Bible of travel books. Somewhere in between, is what is needed.
Oh, my.
The petty tyrannies of middle-class convention. The snobbery. The what's-mine-is-mine-ism -- and the paranoia that what's-mine-is-mine-ism implies.
It's odd that people should travel so far only to recreate, down to the very last attitude and reflex, what they say they disdain about "home."
Chanchao has maybe hit the nail and whacked it solidly into the wood.
If a place is out of the way, off the main backpacker path and hard to get to, it will probably remain pretty quiet, even if listed in the bible. Why? Because, with a few exceptions, and despite the desire to travel and see the world, most backpackers and most tourists are lazy and in fact don't want to see the "real" Thailand or anywhere else unless it's easy to get to and full of like minded people, talking English, listening to their cool music and eating yoghurt.
Flame me - but I admit I did much of the same when I started traveling in South America, just occasionally feeling the urge to get away, and incredibly, with just a half days travel by bus, boat, train, or hitching a ride, finding places with no other tourists! After a few months, these were the places I wanted to be, with just the occasional stop at the (unavoidable) tourism centers such as Cuzco. I mean, after a week eating the local food, you do need a good bowl of yoghurt and muesli now and then!
Full praise to those who make the effort.
While #32 (& #37) has a valid point, one thing I do take issue with is radically altering access to otherwise remote places, esp. wilderness areas that suffer if reasonable volumes of people start occupying the place. Its one thing to reveal a place to others (inevitable), but another to literally destroy it with overdevelopment, pollution, etc. I like the idea that wilderness areas remain areas for those that make the effort.
I recall one guide book author (Hugh Swift's Pakistan) hinting of places that he obviously didn't want spoiled. To be fair that is a rather different guide book, more a travelog with trip and route info. I visited one of those places on my trip (in '92) and it was one of the highlights of my trip. I'd hate to imagine a sealed road and tour buses up there one day.
The problem I find is that when we privately recommend, ie a GH in BKK, or a place like Vang Vianne/ Non Khai in Laos. The next time we go it will be booked full, or as is the case with Vang Vianne, become an extension of the Kaosan Rd.
mm
Yes.. but how often do you really go back to the same place.. I mean with so many places in the World to visit. By the time you get back it will have changed no matter what, especially if it was a great place. Or even if you visit again years later then chances are that your own interests and requirements will have developed, making you go for a different style/price of place.
#38 makes a good point about over-development or inappropriate development of wilderness areas. That I do agree with but in the end it's the responsibility of the (local) government to channel development and/or require appropriate or sustainable development. That's of course totally not happening in Thailand (government regulation of just about anything) but I don't feel that travellers can do a lot to prevent that.
It's almost a paradox perhaps: Do you A: (advocate to) stay at places that are over-developed so that you won't affect the wilderness areas, or do you B: actively avoid over-developed places to show that there's no profit in hideous over-development.. Or does any of that make no difference one way or the other.. Interesting topic for the Responsible Travel branch.
Maybe travellers should stop going to Pai right now because it's inches away from becoming the next big government tourism project that will likely involve Pai's very own airport along with other Disneyland developments?
Going back to telling about cool guesthouses or not: Also keep in mind that it's a very fine balance for a place to remain 'cool'.. Like if you find a good place and tell nobody and nobody goes there then there's a good chance the place goes belly-up during the low season and you won't have a place to return to. Or you do tell people and word of mouth works great and theirs hordes of people going, which means the original vibe will be gone just the same. (But perhaps other places will have sprung up close to it).
Always in motion life is. I don't think it can be boxed and preserved no matter what you do. :-)
In the end though, my personal view is that if I stay somewhere and the owners/operators make it an awesome experience then they DESERVE my word of mouth advertising as a reward for running a great place and making my stay memorable. You'll be doing the operators as well as other travellers a favour by spreading the word. To keep quiet is both selfish and doomed to failure all at the same time.
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