Listening Earth Blog

I thought I was recording a tropical waterfall, but no, it was just the sweat pouring off me. We have never been so uncomfortably hot and sticky. And it was only 5.30 am.

This is Khao Sok National Park, an ancient and extensive rainforest on the Thai peninsular. Despite our expectations, it has not been as rewarding for sounds and images as we’d hoped. A part of this park’s reputation comes from it being relatively heavily visited. A backpacker ghetto has become well established on the kilometer of road entrance to the park, and the main trails are heavily walked by westerners and their Thai guides, all sweating as profusely as we. The first few kilometers of trail are through degraded regrowth forest, and once into the mature jungle, the trail follows a tortuous riverside path, with the noise of rushing water ever-present. Few birds are heard calling, or seen, and the incessant buzz of insects almost drowns out the river. This makes for an unrewarding soundscape, and the sweat just doesn’t seem worth it. After two days we have re-assessed our plans, and decided to head for the coast.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Between Mae Wong National Park and here, we have been in two other parks, which by contrast, have been wonderful. Firstly Khao Yai National Park, a visit to which was a last minute decision. It is a very popular destination for Thais, especially on weekends, and its proximity to Bangkok led to us concluding it could be affected by noise pollution such as flight paths. But we are so glad we went.

We hired a car to get there and around the park, and our driver’s total lack of English allowed us to practice our Thai, with some comical results; he loved me pointing to a pile of roadside elephant droppings with the words ‘kee chang’; apparently ‘kee’ has many meanings beside just ’shit’… We were concerned that our driver would be comfortable sleeping in the car, but with his air conditioning, dashboard DVD player and satellite TV reception, we concluded we were the ones ’slumming it’ in a noisily-fanned bungalow.

Each morning we would set out around 4am, and walk a track through majestic, picturesque rainforest. In the dark, we proceeded cautiously, as the area was frequented by elephants, evidenced by the kee. We had also just seen a King Cobra for the first time, fortunately from the car as it hot-slithered its way off the bitumen and into the forest with its hood fanned out. They are one huge snake! – we were respectfully impressed.

But the real delight of the forest was Gibbons. Everywhere. Troops of them calling at dawn and later in the morning, and occasionally glimpsed crashing and swinging through the treetops. Their agility is extraordinary. We had one memorable morning watching a group on the other side of the valley, moving acrobatically around the crowns of massive trees. What a sight. And what sounds, these guys really sing!

The other joy of Khao Yai was the campground. Not for the amenities particularly, but because of the fruit trees, or specifically the birds that would frequent them. They made bird photography a matter of hanging around under a tree with the lens poised, and I got some lovely pictures of such tropical wonders such as hornbills, barbets, flowerpeckers, sharmas, and a very rare flycatcher. These few trees must be famous throughout Thailand, as they were also constantly attended by a mixed gaggle of nature photographers. It felt very odd for me to be stalking these birds with a group of other photographers, many of whom were Thais, and often hefting huge 500mm lenses and industrial-strength tripods.

Next stop has been Kaeng Krachan National Park, which we’d heard was a birding hotspot with over 400 species to be seen at the lower of two campgrounds in the park (Ban Kraeng). Well, 400 species there may be, but after our first morning of recording, I was wondering if they were all on holidays like the Thais. The campground was packed with visitors for the weekend, but the birdsong was almost non-existent. There was a brief, scattered dawn chorus, then the insects started and there was almost nothing else to be heard. Thunder rolled around the hills in the afternoon.

We decided to go up to the top campsite at 1500 metres, despite the advice that birds were much less frequently seen up there. Just before we left Ban Kraeng, the heavens opened, and we were drenched with our first real downpour of the approaching monsoon season. By the time we piled into a ute for the ascent, the rain had stopped, but the hair-raising dirt track up the mountain had been made additionally treacherous by the rain. We slithered and revved our way up switchbacks and deeply rutted climbs through banks of cloud and fog.

But it was worth it. The final campsite was perched among the gods, with views out over mountain ranges in all directions. Each morning, the valleys filled with mist, and we looked out over a sea of fog. Calls of gibbons and birds floated up from the lower valleys, and mixed with the hill birdsong. It was surprisingly rich, with much more birdsong than we’d anticipated; great hornbills, scimitar babblers, spiderhunters, plus both dusky langurs and gibbons cavorting around the treetops at close range. Of all the places we visited in Thailand, this was the place to see these wonderful primates.

With the wisdom of hindsight, and our disappointment of Khao Sok, we wish we’d been able to spend longer at these locations. But for the moment this is put aside, as its now off to the beaches!

Read on to part 4

Tags: meditation music, National Parks, natural sounds, nature CD, nature download, nature music, nature sounds, sounds of nature, Thailand