Mini-Holiday at CASTLE HOW CHOW Resort

[Muni]

My 10 year old daughter’s birthday falls during school vacation so this year, instead of a party, I told her to invite 3-4 friends, along with 2 grown Thai ladies, to go on a mini-holiday. I didn’t go & I didn’t want them to drive too far so after reading all the reviews; we decided to try the CASTLE HOW CHOW Resort in Kranuan. They stayed 3 days, 2 nights, returning yesterday. Sadly, once again, I have been miss-lead by internet. Here are their comments:

Swimming / Volleyball
1) The pool is not salt water
2) There is no “man-made beach”. The only sand was the volleyball court
3) The pool has many cracked tiles. 1 little girl cut her foot
4) I understand day swimmers might be charged but making overnight guests rent a volleyball (30 Baht) or kickboards for the pool (65 Baht !!! ) seemed a little “Ki-niaow.”

Accommodation
1) Rather than take several small bungalows, I decided to go all out with the “3 room poolside chalet” despite the high price. The 3 rooms were a living room, a bedroom & a bathroom(?). All 3 rooms were very small. The bathroom was "tiny"
2) The A/C’s were not remote control. 1 room was too hot, the other too cold.
3) The bathroom door was broken as was the glass shelf under the mirror.
Not exactly what you would expect for the 2800 Baht/night price.

Restaurant
I had already read the food was expensive but was shocked to hear the prices were comparable to SIZZLER without the salad bar, etc. A small bucket of ice was 50 Baht. Ouch...

Despite all this, kids will have a good time anywhere & fortunately Kranuan is a good sized town with LOTUS, BBQ, etc. The concept looks great but sadly the place is not being maintained. When I asked the kids if they’d like to go on another mini-holiday, they all said “Yes”. When I asked them if they wanted to go back to HOW CHOW, they all screamed “No”

[papaguido]

Thanks for the report,

My kids love the water and was considering CHC resort for a mini holiday, but after reading this forget about it.

Check out Nakhaburi resort, they have small water park and it's 14K from the ring road Nong Khai intersection and close enough to go for the day. Also stayed there and accommodation is about fair to good. Restaurant on site.

http://www.nakhaburi.com/about-e.html

[Muni]

The kids have all been to the Nakhaburi resort many times. There's just something special about going "out of town". sleeping over, etc If anyone knows a place that would be fun for kids, please let me know. MUST have a pool. Thanks

[mak]

Thai Visa is having their ten year anniversary there (Castle Howchow) on Oct. 20. I hope they know what they are getting into.

[stattointhailand]

Doubt that they will notice all the faults ........ unless the wi fi doesn't work and they have to look up from their screens

[Lao-miner]

That will be a very Moderated party , from what i gather from a brief perusal of Thai Visa

[Techland]

If you stay over night then nothing beats a trip to Korat, visiting the Zoo and the big water park beside it (including slides), plus a visit to The Mall in town, which has its own slide-equipped water park. You kids will scream YES even if not asked

[roongsi]

Dear all.
We apologize for any inconvenience to all of you, but I feel that I should let you know the full facts as this post if not correct.
The writer of this post did not come to Castle Howchow Beach Resort Hotel. The customers were two elderly Thai ladies of which one stayed in the room all day taking care of the young baby.


1. Our swimming pool is salt water chlorinated with 7 x pumps and filters working 24 hours per day, but at this time of year (rainy season) we also have to put chlorine in our pool because the deluge of rainwater dilutes the chemistry of the water very quickly, likewise we have to monitor the Ph daily also.
2. We do have our own man made beach on the left and right hand side of walk way to the pool. We do in fact use some of the beach area for a volleyball/badminton court.
3. We accept that there are some cracked tiles in the pool, these are replaced as and when required.
4. Our policy is to charge every customer that rent our pool accessories, If they bring their own accessories we do not charge. The charges are "a daily charge". The children rented a volleyball for 30 Baht., 2 kick boards for 30 Baht each and 1 large size rubber ring for 150 Baht. And we let them use them throughout their stay, without ever charging them again. They were charged the first day only.

Accommodation.
1. When we first got the telephone booking stating that they would like to book one of our Suite Chalets for "1 adult 4 children" they were quoted 2,800 baht per night including 2 Full English Breakfasts. But when the guests arrived there were 2 x adults plus 4 grown children plus 1 baby. Our staff asked one of the Thai women if she would like to have a look at the room first, because the Suite Chalets have 1 individual size bed in the bedroom area plus a sofa bed in the lounge area, they were also offered an extra bed for the children at no extra cost (normally extra bed 350 baht per child including breakfast) but she said never mind the children would be fine.
2. During to their stay guests are asked daily if we can be of any assistance plus were there any problems that we can resolve, the leading Thai woman said "everything was fine" if this was not the case why didn't anyone say at the time? so we can resolve any miss understandings. Reference to A/C. The air-con unit in the Suite Chalet and Deluxe Chalet have "hot tanks", this means that the residual heat from the Air-con compressor produces hot water for showering. In our Suite Chalets there are 2 fan coil units that work from the same compressor thus giving equal spread of cool air to both the bedroom and lounge areas because these rooms are adjoining rooms with no door to seperate the rooms(it is ONE LARGE ROOM). Remote controls are available for all rooms but people with no knowledge of air-con can easily become confused with modern technology(they can very easily switch between air-con, re-circulate and de-humidify. All our rooms are set to 25 C if a customer find it too cool we will provide assistance to increase the temperature(likewise if a customer find the rooms not cool enough we will assist them to lower the temperature)
3. We apologize for the fact that the sliding door to the bathroom / shower room is a sliding door and sometimes a little stiff to open (this is being rectified).Thank you for pointing this out.

Restaurant
Our full menu is shown on our website with pictures and prices.
The children ordered on the first evening 2 x grilled loin of pork (200 g.@ 200 Baht. with choices of Jacket potato/Mash Potato/Saute' potatoes or French fries with steamed vegetable and a salad starter. 1 x T-bone steak (250 g.@ 380 Baht. with choices of Jacket potato/Mash potato/Saute' potatoes or French fries and steamed vegetable plus salad starter. 1 x tuna salad (80 Baht). We served salad as a starter with all our main-course dishes but we don't have salad bar like Sizzler! For a small bucket of ice we charge at 20 Baht. The guests ordered 2 x large buckets which were charge 50 Baht each.

Normally we would not respond to this type of post but in this instance we feel that mis-information is wrong.This Hotel is privately owned and we take pride in trying to do our best to make all of our guests stay a with us a memorable occasion. We accept and apologize for inconvenience caused and we now know where we need to improve. For someone to criticize when they didn't attend is wrong, as we all know in Thailand thing can get exaggerated out of all proportion.

Roongsi

[Laan Yaa Mo]

Techland, don't forget the Yaa Mo Memorial in the centre of town. Even better than the Mall is the outdoor market, Save One, or Sell One, or something like that, it may not be as extensive and interesting as the Thapae Gate outdoor market in Chiang Mai, but it beats anything in Udonthani. About 40 miles from Khorat in Khao Yai National Park, there are numerous resorts. Oh, and Khon Kaen boasts a new market sponsored by Fairy Plaza than has 200+ stores and restaurants. I can't remember its name, but it doesn't matter as it is far removed from the topic of this thread.

Sukhothai has a nice resort, and I forget the name of that one too.

[thrilled]

I have always heard that it's A nice place to stay.i will check it out.

[lassebasse]

I stayed there 2 years ago with my family and I can only say I will NEVER go back.

[mally]

Different people....different idea's......I stayed there a couple of years ago and loved the place, in fact I was recently thinking of taking my Camb GF & kids there on our next visit.

[martynsnowman]

Thanks for the report,

My kids love the water and was considering CHC resort for a mini holiday, but after reading this forget about it.

Check out Nakhaburi resort, they have small water park and it's 14K from the ring road Nong Khai intersection and close enough to go for the day. Also stayed there and accommodation is about fair to good. Restaurant on site.

http://www.nakhaburi.com/about-e.html

just got back from 4 night stay at Nakhaburi resort , everything spot on , the room was clean large and by the pool , the breakfast in with the room price was o.k with some farang food , hotdogs , ham , fried or boiled eggs fresh orange juice not from a carton .
by the pool drinks not over priced , lg leo 80 bt lg singha 90 bt . snacks very good and size , had 1 of the best club sandwiches i,ve had anywhere at 110bt .
with discount the deluxe room was 840bt a night , parking right outside the room ,
will be going back for xmas if they,re not to busy .