Lanna Resort

I went to this place with a large group that rented the grounds for an afternoon group function. We did not stay there so I can’t comment on the rooms although they look like rustic bungalows raised above the ground. The location is remote even though it’s only 20 miles or so from Chiang Mai. The grounds are beautiful and set in a river valley. They have a nice pool and hiking paths. The food they laid out for our group was very good. Would I stay at this place? No, because I would get bored very quickly. But if you are looking for a place where you can check out from civilization, this is your place. It would be excellent as a yoga retreat or a place to practice meditation. Good for monks!

On arrival, this place is breathtaking. So beautiful. The photos are accurate, the grounds are stunning, the cabins are cute. We were so optimistic but it wasn't long till we started to realise we were in for a terrible 2 days and nights. 1. The reception staff don't speak English. 2. They offer no activities, no affiliation tours or trips. No flyers in the lobby. No support to get guests to local attractions like the nearby waterfalls. When asked if they can help us call a car, a local taxi... any kind of vehicle to get us out of the hotel, they just said "No. You use Grab". There is absolutely nothing to do at this hotel. It is in the middle of literal nowhere and it is many kilometres to the nearest town. There are no city taxis out there. No buses. 3. They only care about Chinese tour groups. We learned this on our first night at dinner. We arrived to an empty dining room but every table was set with food and coconuts. We asked for a table and they looked both surprised and annoyed. They snarkily unmade a table for us to sit at and then we realised what was happening.... 40-50 Chinese guests arrived at the same time, being shouted at by their guide. They were on a package with food all-inclusive, so the menu was set. Us being there, ordering food from the menu, was an inconvenience to the staff. 4. No wifi in the rooms at all. Wifi in the restaurant barely worked. 5. No phones in the rooms to call reception. 6. The shower heads are 3 feet off the bottom of the tub. One must sit, cross-legged in the bathtub to get their head wet. 7. The staff quarters are located next to guest rooms. One night, the whole staff decided to have an extremely loud drunken party. They screamed at each other and drank Sangsom. When asked to be quiet, they came out of their rooms, stood in the middle of the road and mocked us. They then drove back and forth past our room on motorcycles yelling. 8. They told us there was a breakfast buffet till 10 am (we paid for inclusive breakfast). We arrived at 8:50 am to find it finished and mostly packed up other than the coffee station. After confused angry grumbling, they decided we could order "A la carte" and kept saying "A la carte". So we looked at menus and chose a breakfast each. Then they came with 2 bowls of rice gruel with mystery meat on top. I told them we didn't want that, we wanted to order "a la carte" and they grumped around, mad faces, talking about us loudly in Thai (I speak some Thai) and whining. Finally, they snarkily decided we could have an omelette and an American breakfast. It was foul. Cold hot dogs, cold processed meat slices, uncooked eggs and mayonnaise. We decided not to eat. Asked them to refill the empty drip filter coffee jug, the horrendous waitress, poured Nescafe granules into the jug and topped it up with warm water, gave it a swirl and plonked it down in front of us! Wow. They had packed up the buffet after the tour group had eaten and left because we didn't matter to them. 9. We asked for the bicycles that were supposedly included in the room. It took them 30 minutes of yelling into walkie-talkies before a guard came with 2 bikes. They were rusty, flat-tired bits of junk. One had a broken seat, metal bits poking out. Unrideable. We gave up and walked 5 km to town. 10. We live in Thailand, our electronics are Thai. But we could not use them because the rooms only had the 2-prong outlets instead of 3-prong outlets. We walked back to reception to ask for an adaptor and they just said "no". We had to walk around the restaurant and saw an extension cord with 3 holes and pointed and said "that, we need that" and they said "NO" and finally a random Thai guest came over and told them to give us the cord. 11. There is no "Do not disturb" sign, so people came into our room when we did not want them to. 12. The coffee shop on the grounds said it was open till 10 pm, was closed every time we tried to visit. Even at 5 pm. 13. There is no shop to buy water, snacks or anything at on the hotel grounds or anywhere in the surrounding area. 14. At 8 am, you aren't allowed to sleep in because that is when they bring out the lawnmowers and motorised leaf blowers to use outside your windows. Guys with noisy machines on their backs seriously blowing leaves around your cabin... (see photo). They also get out there with those thick brooms and sweep the road outside the room. Just no rest allowed here. ........ By 7 am after our 2nd night in that place, we called our own Grab car (the hotel can't arrange airport transfers) to get us out of there as soon as possible. We sat at the airport for 5 hours to avoid being in that awful hotel for a second longer. I am so glad that we spent time in Chiang Mai city before we went to Lanna Resort. Chiang Mai is gorgeous and full of really friendly, good people. This hotel is the exception. Just horrible people, no management, no service, bad attitude. Horrific.

Check-in at night, meet very unfriendly front desk, notice that the place is so run down already; start from front desk/places are not clean, no phone inside room/house (guest only contact with front desk with our own phone), etc. But since we already booked it so we have give a try and to stay at least 1 night. The place is old wooden house - feel so creepy, the wooden floor also thin and got cracking sound, the room is very cold with no heater. The prove thing that this place still operate are wake-up with the noisy voice from Chinese tourists shouting and spit saliva all over the places. And another prove is the restaurant which I think this is the plus side as the restaurant staff is friendly at least make the taste of food which is just okay become much better than service from front desk. The next morning we want to meet front desk to check out and cancel the remaining 4 nights. But we had to wait for few hours since after breakfast until 11 am due to morning front desk informed us that we had to discuss with the night front desk who we met at night instead. We feel that we got cheating as we paid the full amount for 5 nights (5000 baht/night) since we want to cancel out check out the next day we lose 20,000 baht. This is a lot of money for us but if got to stay longer I would end up got sick instead. Not recommended places to stay at all unless you want to have creepy experience like in the movie.