Ponnatee Resort

Right on the lake, very tranquil, traditional, very comfortable. 15 minutes walk from the town. Many of the rooms have balcony's overlooking the lake. Spacious, plenty of car parking space. Much quieter at night than neighbouring guest houses.

We were at Sangkhla Buri in the first week of June this year. It was a 350 km drive from Bangkok with a stopover at Kanchanaburi on the way. Our friends had booked us into the Ponnatee Resort just a mile outside the main town. Sangkhla Buri is a beautiful place with lovely hills and valleys, the views are beautiful and local people wonderful. The main attractions of the town are the old wooden bridge, the Mon temple & village and boating on the lake. You can drive down to the 'Three Pagoda Thai Myanmar border' on a day trip from there. The resort was almost all wooden and started with a parking lot and dining area on the road level and went down almost to the lake side. This meant a climb down or up of 100 or so steps and this was a killer for us with our rooms being located on the lowest level with superb lake side views. Our room was quite comfortable with good air conditioning, the wooden beds were quite good and the room also had a dressing table and a table with couple of chairs. However the bath seems to have been recently renovated with unfinished walls and no door. There are rooms on various levels going down and many of them are quite nice with their own balconies. The reception area is vast and there is a lovely veranda on which guests can enjoy the lake view while lounging around with a drink and book. The owner / manager is not very cheerful and the staff who are all locals are friendly but not so trained. Breakfast is very simple with nothing much to talk about. On weekdays it is self service, however on weekends when the hotel is quite full with local tourists there is more variety on offer. There is no active restaurant or kitchen that I could see and apart from breakfast food is not available at the hotel. A major plus for this resort would be the free wifi that they provide, I found it to be very fast and efficient. On the whole the Ponnatee Resort was just about satisfactory and at Thai Bhat Eleven Hundred per night including breakfast, not the best accommodation available. I would not stay there if planning to visit Sangkhla Buri again.

Bed like concrete. Children serving breakfast? Only water (no juice) and a fried egg or toast cooked on a camp cooking stove, cup of tea with coffeemate. No english spoken except reception who had limited English and she was not always there. Dinner at night, better to go up the street...first night kitchen had no one to cook. Second night only a menu in Thai and no one to translate.Room service if you asked, bins not emptied on 3 day stay. Shower, toilet - in one room flooded. Walked through water to the toilet.15 mins brisk walk to town. The 'resort' even by Thailand countryside standards is very lacking in everything. No maintenance in the past 14 years when we stayed for a night with Thai speaking friends. The view of the lake is great from your small balcony and that is probably the only plus. If going 'up town' to eat try the pink cafe....wonderful food and great value for money. Also, coffee shop 100m down past Ponnatee on left side (grey house) also good food and coffee.