Kanchanaburi, Hua Hin & the West

People have lived in the western valleys since prehistoric times; Ban Kao in Kanchanaburi is a Neolithic burial site, and Khu Bua in Ratchaburi was a town of the Mon Dvaravati culture. Later the Khmer built the walled temple town of Mueang Sing on the Khwae Noi. For Ayutthaya, the west was a frontier: the Three Pagodas Pass at the head of Kanchanaburi was the route by which Burmese armies invaded, and the province was fortified to watch it.

The coast rose with the Chakri kings. King Mongkut built the hilltop palace of Phra Nakhon Khiri at Phetchaburi, finished in 1860, and after the railway reached the south in the early 20th century Hua Hin became the court's seaside retreat; King Prajadhipok built the Klai Kangwon palace there in the 1920s and was staying in Hua Hin when the revolution of 1932 ended absolute monarchy. King Vajiravudh built the teak Mrigadayavan palace on the beach at Cha-am.

The Second World War left the region's best-known history. On 8 December 1941 Japanese forces landed along the Gulf coast, meeting brief Thai resistance at Prachuap Khiri Khan, and in 1942–43 Japan built the Thailand–Burma Railway through Kanchanaburi using Allied prisoners of war and far larger numbers of Asian labourers; many tens of thousands died of disease, hunger and abuse. The river where the main bridge stood was renamed Khwae Yai in the 1960s, after the 1957 film had made it famous. Since the war, dams on the Khwae rivers and royal residence at Hua Hin have shaped the region.

The west mixes central Thai culture with the peoples of the Myanmar border. Kanchanaburi has Mon and other border communities, most visibly at Sangkhla Buri, where a Mon village faces the Thai town across a reservoir and Mon dress, food and Buddhist festivals are part of daily life. Ratchaburi and Phetchaburi have Thai Song Dam or Lao Song people, descendants of Tai Dam deportees from Laos, known for their black clothing.

Phetchaburi is a town of craftsmen and cooks: its temples preserve Ayutthaya-era murals and stucco, notably at Wat Yai Suwannaram, and it was named a UNESCO Creative City of Gastronomy in 2021 for its sweets and palm-sugar cooking. Ratchaburi is known for its "dragon jars", ong mangkon.

Hua Hin has a more genteel identity shaped by the court: golf courses, seafront villas of Bangkok families, and a strong attachment to the monarchy, since Klai Kangwon was King Bhumibol's main summer residence. Hua Hin also holds a jazz festival, usually in June.

The region's towns are small. Hua Hin has roughly 60,000 to 90,000 people and many seasonal residents; Kanchanaburi, Ratchaburi and Phetchaburi are market and administrative towns of a few tens of thousands each, and Prachuap Khiri Khan is a quiet provincial capital.

The economy combines tourism with farming and fishing. Ratchaburi farms the river plain in its east; Phetchaburi produces salt and palm sugar and Prachuap coconuts, and the Gulf ports land squid and fish. Kanchanaburi's dams generate hydroelectric power and its forests and reservoirs draw weekend visitors from the capital. The province of Prachuap narrows to Thailand's slimmest point, only about 11 kilometres between the sea and the Myanmar border.

Days follow the heat and the sea: early markets, fishing boats landing catches in the morning, and evening night markets in Hua Hin and Cha-am. Current issues include coastal erosion at Cha-am and migration across the Myanmar border.

Phetchaburi is the region's kitchen. Its sweets are famous across the country: khanom mo kaeng, a baked custard of egg, coconut and palm sugar; and treats made from the sugar palm, whose sap is boiled into nam tan puek, the cake palm sugar that sweetens local cooking.

The coast from Cha-am to Prachuap is a seafood strip: grilled squid and prawns, crab, pla kapong, sea bass steamed with lime and chilli. Hua Hin's night market and the seafront restaurants on stilts serve the day's catch. Prachuap's coconuts are sold at the roadside.

Inland, Kanchanaburi's riverside restaurants serve freshwater fish from the Khwae rivers and forest vegetables and bamboo shoots, and the Mon villages of Sangkhla Buri offer khanom jeen with Mon-style curries. Drinks run to fresh coconut water, sugar-palm juice and, on the river rafts, cold beer.

Kanchanaburi town is built around the Death Railway's memory: the bridge over the River Kwai, the Kanchanaburi War Cemetery with thousands of Allied graves, and the Thailand–Burma Railway Centre museum. The line north runs along the Khwae Noi to Nam Tok, passing over the curving Wang Pho viaduct, and beyond it Hellfire Pass keeps a cutting and memorial trail. Erawan National Park has its seven-tiered falls, Sai Yok its riverside waterfalls, and Sangkhla Buri its long wooden Mon bridge.

Ratchaburi has the Damnoen Saduak floating market, busiest in the early morning, and limestone caves in its western hills. Phetchaburi offers Phra Nakhon Khiri on its hill, the cave temple of Khao Luang, the palace of Phra Ram Ratchaniwet and Kaeng Krachan National Park, part of a UNESCO-listed forest complex, while Cha-am has its beach and the Mrigadayavan palace.

Hua Hin has its railway station's royal waiting room, Klai Kangwon, the long beach running to Khao Takiap, and the night market. South along the Prachuap coast lie Khao Sam Roi Yot National Park, with Phraya Nakhon cave and its pavilion, the fishing town of Prachuap Khiri Khan on the bay of Ao Manao, and quieter beaches towards Bang Saphan.