Finding Pang Sida’s Butterflies on the Road to Isan

This post is the first in a four-part series exploring the Angkor Empire Loop. We’re traveling through Thailand’s Isan region to uncover ancient temples that reflect the glory of Angkor Wat—minus the crowds. Follow along as we journey from the butterfly-filled forests of Pang Sida to Phanom Rung, the temple crowning an extinct volcano in Buriram.

I lived in Cambodia for two years. Every time I had visitors, we made the obligatory pilgrimage to Angkor Wat. As the largest religious building on earth, it is a marvel—I never grew tired of it. The busloads of tourists, however, were another story.

What I didn’t know then was that just 30 kilometers north of the Cambodian border, in Thailand’s Isan region, stand splendid temples built by the rulers of Angkor.  They tell of the magnificence and power of this long-departed empire.  Unlike the ruins of the ancient capital, these monuments are yours to explore in almost total peace.

We set out on a four-day ‘Angkor Empire Loop’ to see them for ourselves, a journey that began not with ancient stones, but with a cloud of butterflies in the forests of Pang Sida.

The drive from Bangkok to the ruins of Phanom Rung is over five hours, so we built in a few stops to break up the journey east.  We picked up Isobel directly from school around 8:00 that morning. She had just finished her first overnight away from home and hadn’t slept a wink the night before.  She was soundly asleep before we’d even left Bangkok.

By the time Isobel woke up, we were driving past a sign announcing our arrival at “The Butterfly City of the Eastern Forest.”  Not the catchiest tagline a tourism board has ever produced, but it communicated the essentials. From May to July, more than 400 species of butterflies fill the park.

They were everywhere: in the bushes, in the air, even the wooden pillars supporting the park headquarters’ roof were densely covered by a thick carpet of butterflies, which seemed to come to life as a thousand wings slowly opened and closed.

Throughout the park, rangers have dug out salt licks, where butterflies go to obtain essential minerals and nutrients unavailable in a diet of nectar alone.  This behavior, called “puddling,” brings together dozens of species and hundreds of individuals into shuddering Persian rugs, which scatter at the approach of children. 

To stand among a cloud of butterflies as they trace their mad paths around you is a great pleasure. Several of Thailand’s mountain forests, like Kaeng Krachan and Huai Kha Khaeng, also see gatherings of butterflies during the summer months, though I don’t think we’ve ever seen as many together as we did here.

Unfortunately, the best time to see Pang Sida’s butterflies coincides with one of the hottest periods on the Thai calendar.  In late May, the monsoon rains are only just arriving, and the humidity is stifling.  After around 90 minutes, with storm clouds forming on the horizon but the sun still blazing overhead, we turned back to the car.  

In these pre-monsoon months, the Pang Sida Waterfall around which the park is built essentially ceases to exist.  The park ranger told me not to bother walking down the short trail to see it, but out of stubbornness, I did anyway.  It was as dry as he promised, a black slab with barely a trickle of water dripping into a stagnant pool.

That dry riverbed wouldn’t stay that way for many more weeks. As we left Pang Sida, the skies opened and it seemed as though all the humidity in the air was pouring to earth in a soaking deluge.  The dry season was ending.

We took refuge from the downpour at Zaap Wa Zaan (แซ่บ ว่า ซั้น), located just outside Isan proper, but as good an introduction to the region’s cuisine as you could ask for.  After a short, but harrowing drive in blinding rain, it was a relief to step into this bright, modern restaurant.  These roadside stops, catering to drivers and far from any major towns, are something Thailand does particularly well.

I have a bad habit of going straight for the meat dishes, and this place very much encourages it.  The specialty is grilled chicken, a celebrated Isan style called Gai Yang Khao Suan Kwang that uses scrawnier (but more flavorful) free-range birds.  Here, it’s served with two sauces: the standard tamarind-chili jaew and a sweeter chicken sauce.  The grace note is deep-fried sticky rice, which defines the whole Zaap Wa Zaan experience.

Zaap Wa Zaan takes its slogan, “No Som Tam, No Life,” seriously, and offers a diverse array of the papaya salads that inevitably appear on our table if Kat orders.  We did our research, and the favorites were Tam Thai for its balanced sweet and sour profile, and the Tam Lao Sen Lek (Lao-style papaya salad with thin rice noodles).

Isan is Thailand’s least wealthy region, yet it enjoys one of the country’s richest cuisines.  It draws on the produce that’s available: fermented fish sauces replace coconut milk, Kor Moo Yang (grilled pork neck—one of my favorites) is paired with locally-grown shallots and garlic.  It’s a style of cooking which relies on little more than quality ingredients expertly prepared.  

The rain was still pouring down as we ran back to our car, but fortified by our Isan feast, we were now much better equipped to handle its roads.  We soon crossed the border into Buriram province, one of Isan’s core provinces, and continued northeast towards the volcano-top temple of Phanom Rung.   

Cross the border into Isan with us as we explore the frontier temples of the Angkor Empire.