Visit To Udon

[Simbo]

Just got back from a trip to Udon Thani, visiting NongKai for a day. We stayed two nights in the karin Hotel. The standard was very high and at 400b a night inc breakfast, it would take some beating.

In the evening, walking around the town we found sufficient western bar/restaurants to keep any tourist happy with there stay.

I was wondering if there is a large ex-pat community there/ Obviously, We only saw very little of the place, so maybe there is much more to the town for farangs.

How do the prices, houses, land, etc? Are there any lads on the forum living in or near Udon. Getting sick of the bar scene and looking for a new resting place.

Any info gratefully received.

[Martin]

I go up to Udon often for shopping. We live half way between Udon and Khon Kaen. We prefer Udon. It is more homely, the traffic is better managed, and the police are a friendly bunch, unlike Khon Kaen. (Though I am generalising from only a few small straws in the wind about the police.)

I will always be grateful to Steve's Bar and Restaurant. When I first came here I had no Internet and no satellite tv, and Steve's great shelves of books, that he lets you take away on free loan, were a Godsend to me.

So much so that, whenever visitors ask if there is anything I would like them to bring, I still say "Please go in a charity shop in some posh place like Woburn Sands and buy a load of paperbacks at 3 for a quid, or whatever. I will reimburse you when you get them here. And I will pass them into Steve's collection when I have read the ones that happen to interest me".

For lunch, if we are in KK, we go to the buffet at the Sofitel or the Kosa. Western visitors think they are so good and so cheap. But in Udon, the Royal Grand Charoensi Hotel alongside the Charoensi Shopping Mall (not the older Charoensi Hotel, two blocks away) does the same sort of buffet even better, and cheaper. I cannot, for the life of me, see how they can put on such a great spread for 160 baht.

Interestingly, Udon is smaller than KK but it has a much better shopping mall, with a Robinson's and a Tops supermarket, which KK hasn't got.

Also Air Asia flies twice a day to UTH and only once a day to KKC.

Can't comment on nightlife. KK probably has more, because it has more and bigger units of the Higher Education Industry.

[stroll]

I've stayed in udon on visa runs before, so don't have much info other than I like it, too.

If you feel like mixing with the young student crowd, the many steetside eateries along the lake are great fun. Mostly candlelit, since they didn't have electricity (last time I was there).

Very friendly and miles away, literally and metaphorically, from the farang scene in Thailand's tourist spots!

I should specify, most of them are juice bars, and you sit on mats and cushions on the floor, in the street. I know, it sounds less and less attractive to some, but you can get a decent meal and a bottle of beer as well, and there is no traffic. Ilike it because it is so different.