Thailand - Haadson resort - part 2

In the middle of the day, when it was hot, we returned to our villa. And I took my position on the shady terrace again. Again I met some new birds, like this Black-naped oriole (Oriolus chinensis), that looks very bright yellow in flight.

The Water monitor came by again, maybe not the same one as the day before. None of the ones that we saw here were really big, maybe a good meter long.

And then I got really excited again - there was a Greater racquet-tailed drongo (Dicrurus paradiseus) on a tree across the pond. What a sight! Look at those long feathers in the tail, it looks like a bird of paradise!

This package made of leaves was constructed by ants, I guess there is a nest inside it. It is sealed really well from all sides, it is a great way to keep the nest dry in the rain.

In the evening we tried another restaurant and the food was really good, so it became our favourite restaurant here. Tomaz started the dinner off with fresh young coconut of course. 

Since we were on the West coast, there was a beautiful sunset over the sea every evening.

Next day there was a new opportunity to do some bird watching. And we saw the Greater racquet-tailed drongo (Dicrurus paradiseus) again, this time even a bit closer. 

Two Common tailorbirds (Orthotomus sutorius) came to browse through the small bushes around our terrace. They were really fast and I could either photograph their behind with the funny raised tail...

...or their face when they were checking me out and assessing if I am a threat. They are seriously cute.

We also saw the White-throated kingfisher (Halcyon smyrnensis) again.

With all the pretty birds and animals I almost forgot to take photos of plants, that were no less pretty - this is the Beach morning glory (Ipomoea pes-caprae).

I had to make a photo of these two Lineated barbets (Psilopogon lineatus) having a snack on the palm tree across the pond. It looks like they were looking back at me.

And this was surely the highlight of the day - while I was sitting very still and quiet on our terrace, the Northern treeshrew (Tupaia belangeri) came running by, as if it didn't even notice me. My first thought was - I've seen this animal before! In Surin islands, one evening we saw it as we were approaching our bungalow, but it ran away very quickly.

I was in dilemma wether this is a Common treeshrew (Tupaia glis) or Northern treeshrew, they are very similar, but the distribution of Northern one is more in the North Thailand, and Common one in the South Thailand and Malesia. But the Northern treeshrew has more prominent white eye ring, so I am tipping on this one.

Here is our beach again, with the chairs and umbrellas where we sat often, usually in the morning, when there was still shade there, and sometimes in the evening, when we came for an evening swim after the dinner.

On the sand I found a Lemon Migrant (Catopsilia pomona).

And we met this guy several times, with his unusual fishing net.

From the morning swim in the sea we usually went to the pool, there was a great shade there and not a lot of people, but plenty of birds. This Black-naped oriole (Oriolus chinensis) was eating the red berries...

...but every now and again checked me out.

This is probably one of the White-eyes, it might be a Hume's White-eye (Zosterops auriventer), I am not sure.

And this is the male Asian koel (Eudynamys scolopaceus) with its red eyes. These guys are really loud and I read somewhere that they are the most annoying Asian birds. I don't think so, to me all the sounds were very new and interesting.

Then we returned to our villa and from our terrace I saw the Common Sandpiper (Actitis hypoleucos) walking by.

Also the Eurasian hoopoe (Upupa epops) flew to the nearby tree, unfortunately it was partially hidden by the branch.

While I was focused so much on the birds, I almost missed the fish in the pond - besides these, that I unfortunately couldn't identify, there were even bigger, darker and more elongated ones, that came to the surface very rarely for only a short moment.

On our last day we visited our favourite restaurant once more, this is our nice waitress on the photo with us. 

On the beach we found a skeleton of a coral, that looks like a bouquet of flowers.

Next morning we finished packing and went for a breakfast. Even from our table I could see and hear plenty of birds, and I had to take a photo of the Olive-backed sunbird (Cinnyris jugularis)...

...and the Yellow-vented Bulbul (Pycnonotus goiavier).

At 9 in the morning we were picked up by our private cab that took us to the Phuket airport. This was the last pretty sight before our flight home - the orchids around the airport smoking area.

The flight was long and the space very limited, but after 15 hours we finally landed in Slovenija. And after another hour and a half we were home.

It was a really a great holiday, that provided me with tons of material for many posts. We were really lucky with the resorts that we booked, Baan Krating was beautiful, with great views and surroundings and all the complimentary drinks and fruits. The three days on Surin islands were spectacular, with all the fishes, corals, and also monkeys and flying lemurs. And even the accommodation and food were pretty good there. And the Haadson resort was such a nice surprise - we were planing to mostly chill and be lazy on the beach and at the pool for the last couple of the days of our holiday, and never did I expect that there were so many birds and animals in the resort's tropical garden and that it would be such a joy to observe and photograph them.

 

All the underwater photos were taken with my trusty 7-year old Olympus TG6. Almost all the above-water photos were taken with my phone, new iPhone 17 pro. I am very happy with it, with my old one I would probably be able to make only a few photos of birds, only when birds were very close. Of course a phone can't compare to a good DSLR camera with a tele lens, but if you take a look at the second post about Similan islands, there is a photo of two Pacific reef egrets there and on the previous photo the egrets are also already there on the rock and you might see them as two small black dots and if you compare both photos, the phone really did a great job. And there is another big plus - after taking a photo with the phone, it suggests the name of the animal or plant on the photo, if it is distinct enough. As you can imagine, this made the identification of especially birds, for which I don't have so many books, much easier. Finally a really good use of AI.

We might have not been so very lucky with the food this time, but we still had some great meals. But still it seems that two years ago in Koh Lanta and Koh Lipe the food was better, I remember a great seafood curry served in a young coconut in our Koh Lanta  Coco Cape Lanta resort, or best ever pad thai from the street vendor "Pad Thai on Fire" in Ban Sala Dan village. Or the best green curry in restaurant in Serendipity resort in Koh Lipe, where the waiter, when I asked him how spicy the green curry was, said, as spicy as it is supposed to be and if I don't like spicy, can I please choose another dish. We went there twice. But it is only fair that I mention some of the really good food we had this time - the delicious shrimps in fried red curry paste in Bang Niang market, or red curry in Golden Elephant in Nang Thong village, which was Thai-spicy and great (we also tried Thai-spicy green papaya salad and it was quite brutal, the waiter came by couple of times to ask us if we were ok!). Also the first dinner in Surin islands was fantastic, the fried fish, vegetables, prawn fritters etc. And we also had couple of really good dishes in Bangsak kitchen near Haadson resort. For the next time when we visit Thailand we just need to remember to ask for Thai-spicy food, so they put enough curry paste in the dish, less curry paste doesn't just mean less spicy but also less flavour. But we might want to order the green papaya salad medium-spicy, which only means couple of chillies less and will not hurt the flavour.

 

Thailand - Haadson resort - part 1

We arrived at the Haadson resort in the evening. It was getting dark, but we could still see the beautiful sunset over the sea in the West. We were taken to our villa, that was some 200m away from the reception and the beach, in the lush tropical forest with several ponds. While I was a tiny bit disappointed for not having a sea-view, the surroundings were really beautiful and villa great.

Our villa is the fourth from the right. 

We were quite tired and after unpacking we decided to make it an early night and we even skipped the dinner.

Next morning we took a better look at everything around us and in the bright sunshine it looked even better than the evening before. We were very pleased with very spacious and pretty villa with giant bed and huge bath with the tub. Already on the way to the breakfast we met this Common Myna (Acridotheres tristis) and I was already forgetting the lack of sea view.

There were also several Bamboo Orchids (Arundina graminifolia) around the pool area.

The restaurant did have a sea view and the selection of food was very good. After a big breakfast we came back to the villa and started planning what we want to do and where we want to go later that day. We went to sit on our big terrace, also to see if there were any mosquitoes. Immediately I heard lots of birds singing and chirping and it was like a concert. And soon I started noticing birds in the trees around the terrace and I decided to have my phone at the ready for shooting photos.

This was a first big surprise, the Common flameback (Dinopium javanense). It was sitting in a tree across the pond, but its unbelievable pattern on the head and belly and the brown back with reddish spot in the middle were visible very well. 

Next cute bird that came into sight was the Common kingfisher (Alcedo atthis). And I was ecstatic! I think at that moment it was clear that we are not going anywhere for some time, until I get bored of the birds or until my phone runs out of battery.

Across the pond there were some palm trees with the red berries that seemed to be very popular with many birds. Also with this unusual Lineated barbet (Psilopogon lineatus), that I saw for the first time.

The Spotted dove or Eastern spotted dove (Spilopelia chinensis) came to sit quite close to our terrace, obviously it was less shy than other birds.

Next highlight was the sighting of the White-throated kingfisher (Halcyon smyrnensis) with pretty blue back.

Here it is from the front and it's clear where its name comes from. It has a really prominent beak!

While photographing I was really quiet and didn't move much and birds started coming closer and closer. The Oriental magpie-robin (Copsychus saularis) came to rest only two meters away from me on our terrace floor.

I spent good portion of the day on the terrace watching the birds, I only made a break for coffee and some cookies. In the afternoon we finally went to the beach for a swimm and then to the pool, since there was no shade on the beach any more.

At the pool there was another surprise for us - this Southeast Asian striped squirrel (Tamiops barbei) was sitting on the railing just long enough for a good photo. These creatures are so very fast, I saw them many times in following days, and it was almost impossible to take a decent photo of them. But it was fun watching them speeding up and down the trees and over the roofs of villas.

In the early evening we walked to the nearest village to see where the shops and the restaurants and money exchanges were. On our way we saw the Ditch Jewel (Brachythemis contaminata) on the beach.

This was our beach, it looked endless, it went for miles in each direction.

Next to the road we also found the Common tree frog (Polypedates leucomystax). 

On our way back we saw this June Beetle (Lepidiota sp) on the sidewalk near our resort. The nice waitress explained to us that these beetles are often eaten in Thailand.

Then we tried one of the nearby restaurants and although the food was quite good, it was again not spicy and was very mild in flavour. 

In the evening I was browsing through my photos that I made that day and was totally happy to see and photograph so many birds and animals. And there were no mosquitoes during the day at all, only a few in the evening. We were really lucky to have ended up in place with so many animals, without even knowing it when I was booking the hotel.

Nex morning after breakfast we went to the beach while it was still shade there, then we moved to the pool, that was shaded all of the day. It was very pretty and we were alone there.

And what do you know - across the pool there were few palm trees with red berries, and also plenty of birds. I spotted this red-eyed female Asian koel (Eudynamys scolopaceus) there.

Here is the proof that the berries were very popular with birds - also this Streak-eared bulbul (Pycnonotus conradi) was munching on them.

The Lineated barbet (Psilopogon lineatus) also came by, in flight it looked very bright green and pretty.

Among other animals there were four dogs living in the resort, this is the Blacknose, shy and always hungry dog with pink ribbon around its neck. We became sort of friends. We also met another younger dog, I think its name was TikTok, that came to sleep on a day bed on our terrace one night. All dogs were very well behaved.

In the pond we saw a Water monitor (Varanus salvator) several times. We already saw one very big one near Baan Krating resort, on the stairs to the beach and it was quite close, unfortunately we didn't have our phones with us to make a photo.

Another beauty that we saw from our terrace was this Chestnut-headed bee-eater (Merops leschenaulti).

In late afternoon we walked in direction South to find another restaurant for the dinner. On the way we saw this unusual way of fishing.

The dinner was good, but not great. After the meal Tomaz found himself a hammock.

Before returning to our villa we stopped at the pool to wash our hands, and found the Banded bullfrog (Kaloula pulchra) in the sink.

Next morning, right after the breakfast, I was sitting on our terrace again. And the Common flameback (Dinopium javanense) came by again, it sat on the same tree across the pond as the previous time. Unfortunately I didn't see it flying, but I've seen some spectacular photos of it in flight in internet, it looks like a prehistoric Pterodactyl.

The Streak-eared bulbul (Pycnonotus conradi) came closer this time, to our side of the pond.

Obviously I must have been really still and quiet, as the Chestnut-headed bee-eater (Merops leschenaulti) also came really close.

Then we went to the beach and for a swim in the sea and saw the very familiar Brahminy kite (Haliastur indus) above us.

To be continued...