Khao Lak before the tourists
Destination:
KhaoLak
Beautiful beaches close to tropical nature among very friendly people
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Before tourism came to Khao Lak the name Khao Lak was only known locally as the name of a mountain, the name of a National Park in various spellings and the name of the tiny village Ban Khao Lak to the south of Khao Lak - Lam Ru National Park.
When the first tourist bungalows were built as the Khao Lak Bungalows in 1987, the name Khao Lak became known for the first time to the tourism world. It was mentioned for the first time in four sentences in the Loose Thailand Burma Traveller Handbuch in the second edition published in 1988. |  |
A life of hardship in the last centuries
In the 19th and 20th century the small villages that belonged to tambon Khuk Khak were literally at the end of the world without traffic connection to the south towards Phuket.
The people lived a solitary life as fishermen, coconut farmers and laborers in tin mines.
Until the year 2000 there was no telephone connection to anywhere in the world. No clinic, no doctor and no taxi service was available. The young people had left the villages for better areas to earn a living. They left the old people and the small children behind which created a very unhealthy social structure in the villages.
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Change had to come
The Pu Yai Ban (Village Headman) of Ban Bang Niang, Khun Pipat Na Ranong, recognized that his village would die if there were no better opportunities for the young people to earn a living.
In 1996 he decided to buy useless land at the beach, to cut it in one rai pieces (1600 sq.m.) and to sell the plots to foreigners, because he was convinced that they would love this area and bring their friends here to spend their holidays. When Thai land speculators from Koh Samui showed up, he sent them away: "They will never get my land."
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