POSTED: 18 SEPTEMBER 2010

Destination: The Golden Triangle

Glyn May discovers a surreal alignment of stars at the intersection of Thailand, Mianmar and Laos

When the chill of late winter gives way to early summer in Thailand’s Golden Triangle, the sun turns an eerie blood red as rice farmers burn residue from recently harvested crops,

For several weeks each year, a surreal haze drifts across the mountains, valleys and jungles in this always mysterious pocket of Southeast Asia, where illicit opium poppy crops once flourished at the convergence of three countries — Thailand, Myanmar and Laos.

Chiang Saen, the sleepy little three-border village 60 kilometres north-east of Chiang Rai’s international airport, basks in the title of Gateway to the Golden Triangle, but recently it became the focus of a new and decidedly odd set of circumstances.

In a most unseemly flurry of unrelated activity, there gathered together a diverse cast of characters and props right out of a James Bond movie — playboys, glamorous women, multi-millionaires, cocktail parties, private jets, and shady Chinese high-rollers. And elephants.

Scene one opens a few minutes drive from Chiang Saen at the splendid five-star Anantara Golden Triangle Resort and Spa, sprawling across 65 hectares of indigenous forest and landscaped gardens.

Set within Anantara’s lush bamboo forest is the resort’s Elephant Camp, home to 31 elephants rescued from a grim existence in Bangkok and other Thai cities.

As we approach the camp on this quiet, grey morning, the unmistakable voice of an educated English gentleman suddenly booms across loudspeakers, shattering the silence and, we suspect, scattering birds and minor jungle creatures for many kilometres.

“The pace is truly frantic,” he cries. “There’s a mid-field skirmish, the ball is moving fast towards the goal … a mighty swing. Oh, my goodness, they’ve missed again!”

We emerge into a clearing where a game of elephant polo is in progress and Peter Prentice, the frenzied commentator and one of the best elephant polo players in the world, is in full flight.

This is a man capable of talking underwater with a mouthful of marbles — a skill well suited to talking up a sport which is about as exciting as watching grass grow.

But the social scene, champagne, gala dinners, dancing and romance, set against a backdrop of some of Thailand’s finest countryside, is another matter.

For aficionados of this sport of the very rich and moderately famous — in particular the 40 players and their entourages from 15 different countries here for Thailand’s ninth annual King’s Cup Elephant Polo Tournament — there is a true adrenalin rush.

The Thailand King’s Cup event, an annual spin-off tournament of the World Elephant Polo Association based in Nepal, where the world tournament is held every year, has raised more than US$300,000 for the protection and support of the Kingdom’s embattled elephants, of which there are only about 5000 left from a population of 100,000 at the beginning of the 20th century.

Sponsored by one of the world’s oldest and prestigious watchmakers, Audemars Piguet, the list of team backers reflects the pedigree of the event — Mercedes Benz, Veuve Clicquot, Price-Waterhouse-Coopers, IBM, Amex, to name a few.

Elephant polo is played on a marked pitch, 100 metres by 60 metres, using a standard-size polo ball. There are three elephants per side, each carrying a mahout and a player swinging a huge mallet.

Meanwhile, in the midst of this comparatively frivolous activity, local Thais in Chiang Saen are trying to come to grips with the presence of a huge, garish Chinese-owned casino that has descended upon their doorstep a few hundred metres away across the Mekong River in tiny Bokeo, one of the most remote rural provinces in the bordering Communist socialist republic of Laos.

A Chinese company, Dok Ngeokham, has a 40-year lease of the 827-hectare site of prime Lao-Mekong riverfront land on which the casino and five-star hotel complex sits, and has a cash hoard of US86 million to spend on a golf course and trade centre.

As night falls and the casino bursts into a blaze of light, the bewildered Chiang Saen locals on the Thai side of the border indulge in their favourite new sport: whispering about men in black emerging from private jets in the middle of the night at Chiang Rai airport and of ominous happenings in the crop fields of Laos.

Peter Prentice ... frenzied commentator and one of the best elephant polo players in the world.

IF YOU GO

§ Thai Airways International flies non-stop to Bangkok with connections to Chiang Rai. Visit www.thaiairways.com.au

§ The next King’s Cup elephant polo tournament will be held in Hua Hin from 7 to 11 September 2011. Visit www.anantaraelephantpolo.com

THINGS TO DO

§ Visit hill tribes, see the new Hall of Opium Museum. www.maefahluang.org <(www.maefahluang.org)

§ Take a half-day trip into the mountains to Doi Tung — magnificent floral gardens and a Royal Villa. (www.doitung.org)

§ Cross into Burma for a quick glimpse of the Thai border town of Mai Sai.

§ Excellent inexpensive accommodation in Chiang Saen town right on the Mekong River at the Serene Hotel — huge rooms and friendly staff. (www.sereneatchiangrai.com)

§ Bangkok stopover: The new Radisson On Sathorn Bangkok hotel is strategically located within the financial and business districts Sathorn and Silom with views of the Chao Phraya River. (www.radisson.com)

§ For something different, take a fast boat on the klongs to the new Amita Thai cooking class. (www.amitathaicooking.com)