23 February 2026

Thailand – 1-Day Bird Tour

ByDoug SmithonMarch 27, 2026

On the last day of our big Bangkok – Laos Trip was this this birding tour in Thailand outside the city. It gets it’s own post because the list of birds is long and it’s not in Laos, nor Bangkok. It was a squeeze doing it, but was definitly worth it. We had a late and delayed flight from Luang Prabang, Laos to DMK, Airport hotel, 4AM pickup, 2h drive, 12h birding, 2h drive back to DMK Airport hotel, dinner, 4AM wakeup, 5AM 1h bus from DMK to BKK, check in, relax, for a minute, then an 8h, 12h, and 2h flight to get home. Anyway, here is the day:

For my birthday my true love gave to me, many bird sightings! We were picked up at 4AM at the airport hotel, and driven for 2 hours to Khao Yai National Park, where we met up with a professional birding guide(Ruangyot Hongsaeng) and his driver provider by Tontan Travel. The next 12 hour was about 50 different species of birds. Luckily he had a great quality scope by Swarovski Optik, the best wildlife scope money can buy, because the birds were beautiful and we had many sightings. There is no play by play of this experience but you can check out the photos. This day was a long layover on our way home from Laos.

We visited many habitats from the town first off where we saw the owl, hornbill, hoopoe, roller right off the bat around a municipal building. Light was low still so photos were not great. We headed off into the park from here with many stops as we made our way up in into the hills where we had many more stops and birds. The list below.

I typed as fast as I could to record all the birds I could. I didn’t use eBird as I figured I would miss half of them. Between the Thai accent and the speed of the tour we figured I’d miss a fair bit. I generally take photos and do ID’s after and record eBird after the fact from the photos. We had so many little stops, and I have no clue where they are or what they are called, eBird was not going to work well for me. There is a report I did after but locations are inaccurate.

A 2 hour drive back to the hotel for dinner and sleep before our flights home, as this was the last day of the trip. We have to get up at 430AM to catch a 5AM bus to the other Bangkok airport.

The trip home was mostly uneventful, except for the part we’re walking through the airport trying to find our connection, and a lounge, and I see somebody walking in the opposite direction, I’m looking at him, he’s looking at me. I know who it is, but this makes no sense. He should be at home, at the studio I work at, working! I did this trip during a show, so why would my coworkers be on vacation too? So after about 6 seconds of denial, he says, “Doug?”, and I say “Paul…What are you doing here?”…What are the fucking chances of that? He should be at work! We’re full on working a show, nobody goes on vacation during a show! Apparently lots of now. Lol He was on a honeymoon, diving for 5 weeks in Asia and was on his way home with his wife, the same time we were. We all had the same flight itinerary all the way home from Bangkok to Halifax. Not only that, we were sat very close to each other on the long flight since we both splurged for Premium Economy. Crazy.

Adventures Everywhere

Thailand – 1-Day Bird Tour

Birds Seen Today