Rotchana's Retreat Hotel on Mekong That Phanom

Rojana’s Retreat on Mekong Hotel is a most wonderful place to stay, with dramatic views of the Mekong River. The owner is always available, helpful and gives the very best service you could want. The cottages are clean, very well-maintained and they sit and a wonderful well-maintained tropical flower garden setting. I really love the area. It’s peaceful, with genuine local culture and great views of the fisherman and sunrise over the Mekong River. Also fascinating is the nearby, highly revered Buddhist Chedi in That Phanom and the colorful Monday and Thursday morning Lao markets. I highly recommend this resort.

Apart from the scenic views of the Mekong, what is there to like about this “retreat”? The sign at the reception quotes “short-time” rates. The cottage is so dark that you can’t type on your computer after 6 pm. The dusty bathroom is home sweet home for mozzies; even orthodox Buddhists like us can’t resist killing dozens and counting. The home-cooked Thai food is reasonably priced but few dishes on the menu are available. The breakfast choices are meagre: khai kratha (Vietnamese fried egg served in a pan) or kway chap yuan (Vietnamese noodle with meatball and moo yor sausage cheaply made from flour instead of meat). With dingy rooms, isolated location and nothing to do in the immediate vicinity, we can’t imagine a better spot for extramarital affairs. Well, some may retort “mind your own business”. But at Rojana, bungalows are built so close to one another that everything is literally in-your-face. At 2 pm, a 50ish local male seeking hourly rental inspected the bungalows next to ours. (We speak Thai so understood perfectly what he was after.) Worse, the rooms were shown and the details explained by a little girl not even 15 years old. Entrepreneurship at its best, isn’t it? Is Rojana less safe and secure than its serenity suggests? Perhaps not, though I wouldn’t recommend this place to a lone female traveller. Keep in mind that at the weekend Thai guests like to party late and sometimes get drunk. If the alcohol-and-xxx combination doesn’t deter you, you may end up enjoying your stay at Rojana. But for us once is more than enough.

We had booked bungalows at Rotchanas Retreat on Mekong outside of That Phanom before we started our 10 day road trip and stayed at this beautiful place for 2 nights. We all loved it here, what a fantastic find it was and we will definitely be back. The retreat is Thai and Australian owned and there are only 6 quaint bungalows on the Mekong River overlooking Laos. Meals are in Rotchana and Andy’s house, there are no menus, just delicious home cooked food. We loved our stay here, the gardens are just beautiful and there are 3 beautiful little dogs that would come visit us, birds and hundreds of butterflies. We paid 600baht per night which included breakfast and free wifi. It was perfect sitting outside on our verandah at night having a few drinks with Andy and Rotchana and we will definitely stay here again. What more could you ask for, the perfect hosts, the most beautiful setting overlooking the Mekong and total privacy. We highly recommend Rotchana’s Retreat on Mekong at That Phanom.