Maha Sarakham for Digital Nomads

Maha Sarakham is a little known province in the centre of Isaan. The city of the same name is a couple of hours on a bus from Khon Kaen, and is very seldom visited by foreigners.

My motivation for coming here was primarily that one of my Thai teachers lives here. And having never met another foreigner who's been here, I was actually surprised by how nice it is.

If you're a digital nomad looking to go to a lesser-visited town, what can you expect if you come here?

You want to know the interesting thing about this clock tower? The clock's wrong. And it goes bong every hour, but as it's ten minutes fast, it happens at ten to the hour instead.

Getting to Maha Sarakham from Khon Kaen

I came to Maha Sarakham from Khon Kaen. I can speak and read Thai, and even so I didn't find it entirely straightforward either at the Khon Kaen end or at the Maha Sarakham end.

In Khon Kaen bus station 3, you're looking for a bus company called 'Pink Bus'. They're located in terminal 3, which is away from other bus companies and past the minivans and a couple of restaurants, which is why I didn't find it easy to locate. I had to ask at two different information counters, the first of which didn't even know where they were.

You'll find their ticket office here, but beware there's no English signage and the staff don't speak English. There are roughly five buses per day that travel to Maha Sarakham, but the times of these seem to vary, and they only had the departure times for the day I travelled scribbled down on a piece of paper behind the counter.

I'd been aiming for a 10am bus that I thought existed, but thankfully the next one was only at 10:30am. Worth calling them first if you have the means of doing so. A ticket to Maha Sarakham cost 70 baht.

The reviews on that Google Maps link describe the staff as being very rude. They aren't overly talkative I'll admit, but I found them to be fine. They might be less patient if you try speaking to them in English.

The bus trip was perfectly comfortable for a 70 baht ticket. It took a little under two hours to get to Maha Sarakham, but worth noting that Maha Sarakham wasn't the final destination, and the bus didn't actually pull into the Maha Sarakham bus terminal, as I was expecting it to. Nor was there any announcement from the conductor or driver that we were in Maha Sarakham. Instead the bus pulled-up outside this 7-11, about 100m away from the bus terminal. And as people started getting off, I panicked and got off too, which was the right move.

Had I not been paranoidly following along on Google Maps I could have easily missed this, so make sure you're paying attention. Even though your ticket gives your destination as Maha Sarakham bus terminal, the bus doesn't actually make it there.

What was my impression of Maha Sarakham?

Honestly, I was surprised at how nice it was. Often if a town doesn't really get any visitors, it's for a good reason. So I came here expecting it to be kind of... shit.

It's not at all. It's really well developed, but still peaceful and with a lot of trees lining the streets. I really loved it.

Who is Maha Sarakham suitable for?

The Sermthai Complex in the north west of town is the only big shopping mall in Maha Sarakham - kind of equivalent to Central in a lot of other towns/cities.

That is where the only branch of Starbucks is located, the only branch of Boots, the big branch of Lotus's etc. And it was the only place where I saw any other foreigners during my stay. Everywhere else in town I saw nothing but Thai people, so if you need to be around foreigners and you need the amenities offered in touristy places, Maha Sarakham is not the place for you.

If you're comfortable with that, then it's a lovely, peaceful, and consequently unexciting place to be.

If you want to go somewhere quite leafy, with some good coffee shops where things move slowly, then come here. If you want fast-moving excitement and convenience, look elsewhere.

How affordable is Maha Sarakham?

It's comparable to other towns and cities in Isaan, meaning it's very good value and cheaper than other parts of Thailand. My room was a little under 1,100 baht per night, but I could have got somewhere much cheaper.

How is the Internet in Maha Sarakham?

In my hotel I got 32mbps download speed and 21mbps upload speed on the one speed test I did. That's more than enough for video calling. I had no reliability issues.

Is Maha Sarakham safe?

Very. I encountered no kind of threatening or unruly behaviour, apart from a mentally retarded guy who ran across a busy road to try and hug me, the street dogs are all really passive, the cars drive at reasonable speeds, and by Thai standards the roads and pavements are in very good condition for when you're walking around.

The biggest risk is that because there's a lot of trees, there are a lot of birds in those trees who might shit on you.

Is it easy to get by with English in Maha Sarakham?

No. The staff at my hotel spoke good English, but beyond this I didn't speak any English during my stay. I used Thai everywhere.

Being sociable in Maha Sarakham

Knowing someone in Maha Sarakham was the only reason that I had any kind of social life here. The time we went to a bar it was a local Thai place - meaning that there isn't actually a bar for lonely people to sit at, it's just tables that you sit at to socialise with friends.

I'm unaware of any foreigner-aimed bars in town, or any bars at all where you can actually sit at the bar and chat to people, although it's a university town, so perhaps I didn't look hard enough.

I highly doubt there are any English-language events in town for meeting new people.

This photo was at Bus Station Cafe, which is a really fun, bus station themed bar (no really). Perhaps not great if you're alone, but it's a lot of fun if you have any friends.

Where to run in Maha Sarakham

The obvious place to run in Maha Sarakham is the Khae Loeng Chan lake - when I came here that was what I was thinking. One lap is apparently 10km, but I never ended up going there.

It's deceptively far from the city centre if you go on foot, so the two runs I did in Maha Sarakham ended up being at the Health Park - a small city centre park with a path going around the outside, and some workout equipment.

The path has markings indicating that one lap is 506m. My GPS told me it's closer to 450m, but regardless, it's a small park so you're going to be going around it a lot. However it's perfectly nice, there's a public toilet, and even when running in the daytime, it gets a fair bit of shade from the trees.

According to Google Maps it's open until 9pm, but on the one occasion I was here late, the guy running it locked all the gates and fucked off before it was even 8pm, with dozens of people still inside exercising. That's no issue, because in one corner of the park the only barrier to get in is some plant pots that you can easily walk between, so why they bother to lock the gates at all I'm not sure.

There isn't much traffic in Maha Sarakham and some roads have wide pavements, so I'd say that running along the roads, paricularly those that run along the canal, are perfectly viable too, although I didn't see anyone running outside of Health Park.

Health Park is small, but it's a perfectly pleasant place to come for a run, and the trees mean that you get some shade, even running in the middle of the day.

Where to get vegan food in Maha Sarakham

All I found for vegan food here was a small number of 'jay' restaurants.

One reason that I stayed where I did is that there's one such restaurant right outside my hotel. But with it being closed when I first arrived in Maha Sarakham, I ended up ordering from 'Im Bun' on Grab (named as Enjoy my food on Google Maps). I liked it so much that apart from when I made food myself, it was pretty much the only place I ate in Maha Sarakham.

On my wanderings I also found one more 'jay' restaurant here. The restaurant itself isn't labelled on Google Maps, but that's the location.

One of my Grab orders from Im Bun - this is dumplings for 59 baht, a fried Isaan vegetarian sausage also for 59 baht, and a vegetarian spicy pork salad (made very spicy) for 139 baht.

Where I stayed

TJ 4711 Residence

576/2 Nakornsawan Road

The cardinal sin that a hotel can make, is to tell you that they have a kettle in the room, and then not give you one. I almost left Maha Sarakham when I checked-in here and there wasn't a kettle, but thankfully when I stormed back downstairs to complain, they had one lying around that they gave me to take up to my room. But still, I suffered a great trauma.

Once I got over that, this was a decent hotel.

I'd paid extra to be in a corner room, and that was a smart move. It meant I had windows on two sides of the room letting in lots of daylight, and the one next to the bed faced east, so I got to wake up with the sun streaming-in every morning.

The only downside was that I was only on the fourth floor (of nine), so people in the adjacent building could see into my room. I sleep with the curtains open no matter what, but it would have been nice if I was high enough that no one could see in while I did.

I would say that the cleanliness standards here were questionable, although I've had worse, and as you expect in this part of the world, the room definitely wasn't completely void of ants. They were noticeable as I arrived, so one of the first things I did was go down to the Mini Big C, right downstairs, and get some ziplock bags to keep my food in.

Other than that, I liked this place. The room was spacious and pretty comfortable. More than enough floor space to workout. The Internet was fast enough for all I needed it for, and it didn't suffer from any reliability issues. And the hotel was located walking distance from everything I needed.

As well as the Mini Big C right downstairs, there are a couple of coffee shops (Amazon and Inthanin) about five minutes walk away, as well as a Launderette. Health Park is about a 15 minute walk, as is Bus Terminal 1. It takes about an hour to walk up to Sermthai Complex.

I might look around and see what else is available if I ever come back to Maha Sarakham, but I certainly wouldn't shy away from staying here again.

My room here was very spacious. More than enough floor space for a workout.

Summary of Maha Sarakham

Do I want to come back again?

It's unlikely I would have come to Maha Sarakham in the first place if I didn't know someone here. Now that I have been, I'd certainly come back again.

It falls into the category of being a very pleasant, unexciting place. And you don't ever really get excited to return somewhere unexciting, but I would gladly make it part of my itinerary again if I wanted somewhere relaxing to go for a week or two.