Lonely Planet was wrong about Nakhon Pathom

Nakhon Pathom looked like such an interesting place to visit and as an obedient Lonely Planet reader I had to visit this little town. Mistake of a lifetime..

Unless you're backpacking in front of Nakhon Pathom Station you probably booked in one of the hotel which claim to be close to the town centre. Well, they aren't and the maps you find on the internet already gave you that impression because they seem to be drawn on a piece of paper but you do put your trust in these travel guides.

Our beautiful Jacuzzi in..

We stayed at a hotel which was supposed to be in the centre of Nakhon Pathom, close to the popular Phra Pathom Chedi which is the main touristic attraction here because it's the tallest chedi in the world and over a 120 meters.

Don't get me wrong the chedi is nice but not worth the tuk tuk ride over the highway speeding at a 120 km an hour into the ghetto of Nakhon Pathom because that's where we were going!

None of the tuk tuk drivers had ever heard of the Pharndevi Hotel where we had booked a room so they started arguing about who deserved the taxi ride because obviously it was a long a well paid job..One problem, the winning driver didn't know where the hotel was either so we left town without a clue.

Tuk tuk rides in Thailand are pleasent in general, this was probably the most freightening moment in my life! I said a 120 km/hour but I just remember running faster than all the mercedeses and bmw's on the highway while trying to hold on to this instabile vehicle.

Amazing Thai Flowers at..

Hoping to get to the hotel, we got lost..The tuk tuk driver entered some kind of Thai ghetto where people were setting their garbage on fire and dogs and kids without shoes were running over the street which didn't calm my nerves. In the meanwhile we phoned the hotel several time but with my thai and her english the situation got even more complex so we pulled over at a local supermarket or something where people do their groceries and let the girl at the counter talk to the hotel owner.

Off we went again! It was getting pretty dark so I started praying the tuk tuk driver was a honest and good man:) After all we drove into a forest to complete the horror setting and all of a sudden there it was: The Pharnevi hotel of Nakhon Pathom!

The river from our breakfast..

We thanked the driver, paid him his monthly salary and ordered him right away for the next day. The hotel, not considering the location, turned out to be beautiful and we felt so blessed!

We had our own cabin with spa and jacuzzi and the bedroom was lovely. The girl at the counter said she was very sorry for the bad communication and made us some tea. The next morning we had breakfast along the river and finally lost our travel stress with an amazing Thai massage.