Thailand forum

It's highly unlikely you'll go that in a day -- the road from Mae Sot to Umphang is 165km long and very mountainous -- it take a longtime and the songtheaws leave in the morning as far as I know.

From Pai to Mae Sot you can either take the route you're considering, or continue around via Mae Hong Son to Mae Sariang, Khun Yuam and so on down to Mae Sot - this is a BEAUTIFUL road -- overnight in Mae Sariang if you can - it's an interesting little blip of a town.

While the above takes longer than going via Chiang Mai, it doesn't matter too much as you'll need to overnight in Mae Sot anyway before heading onto Umphang.

Flights from Chiang Mai to Mae Sot - news to me... I think there is still occasional flights from Bangkok...

Well you could get a night bus from Bangkok to Mae Sot and then get the songtheaw in the morning up to Umphang. Perhaps there is a night bus from CHiang Mai, but I doubt it...

It's not that it is difficult to get to - just time consuming ;-)

If you're just planning two nights there, you're really only allowing yourself one full day there, which isn't very long at all -- are you sure you can't scrape a few more days out of your itinerary from somewhere else?

Ha - trip planning is never completed - it is always a work in progress!

I remember reading your trip plan earlier, what about if you changed the order a little -- something like:

Bangkok ->(fly) Trang -> Sukorn -> Khao Sok -> Khao Lak -> Bangkok -> Kanchanaburi -> Bangkok -> Umphang -> Pai -> Chiang Mai -> (fly) Bangkok.

While you can't do Bangkok to Umphang in a day, you certainly can do Pai to Bangkok in a day (bus to Chiang Mai, then fly -- or overnight bus/train)

There are few things you can do in Kanchanaburi that you can't do in Pai, so if it was my trip and I needed to knock off a couple of places, I'd skip Khao Sok (as you won't have enough time to enjoy the park) and Kanchanaburi (as you can go rafting, trekking etc etc in both Umphang and Pai, PLUS Kanchanaburi isn't on the road to anywhere else, so there a backtrack to Bangkok involved as well.)

I can't remember if I mentioned this before, but when it comes to short trips in Thailand Less is More -- if you've only got four days for islands, bite the bullet and pick one island rather than divide your time between two -- for starters that will give you more time to enjoy the island you settle on, but it will also save you time -- same goes for national parks, trekking and so on.

If your trip is looking too rushed and you're pulling your hair out trying to squeeze time for one more island out of it, then chances are it is too rushed -- save the rest for next year!

Hope that helps - feel free to come back with itinerary #234,982 for suggestions ;-)

And don't forget, chances are when you arrive in Bangkok, you'll say "Holy Cow I love Bangkok -- toss your well-planned itinerary in the bin -- and start from scratch -- that's what I did and it took me seven years to escape!"