Budo-Sungai Padi National Park

Description

Budo-Su-ngai Padi National Park (Thai: อุทยานแห่งชาติเทือกเขาบูโด – สุไหงปาดี) is a national park in Narathiwat Province, Thailand. It is part of Sankala Khiri mountain range that divides Thailand and Malaysia.

The area was a haven for guerrillas and few people ventured in to see the natural beauty of the jungle here. However, when the situation improved in 1974, the Royal Forest Department established Pacho Waterfall Park that became Budo-Su-ngai Padi National Park.

The park has an area of 294 square kilometres and covers parts of Narathiwat, Yala and Pattani province. The Budo mountain range is part of the Indo-Malayan tropical jungle that has high humidity because of the year-round rainfall that it gets. This type of tropical jungle is found only in equatorial zones (the area between the 23.5 degrees north and south of the Tropic of Cancer). In Thailand, this area is from the Kra Isthmus down.

The park has several waterfalls, such as Phu Wae, Pacho and Pako. The best known and accessible is “Pacho” that has a high cliff. The word “Pacho” is a Malay word meaning “waterfall.”

The most distinctive plant is the “Golden Leaves” or “Yandao.” This plant was first discovered in 1988 here. The vine leaves are gold in colour, similar to a hardwood tree of the genus Bauhinia, but considerably larger. Some leaves are even larger than the palm of a hand. The edges of the leaves are curved throughout, like 2 ovals connected to each other. The leaves have a soft velvet-like texture. Rare animals in the area are rhinoceros, agile gibbons, tapirs, and Sumatran serows. The most important animal is the spectacled langur that inhabits Southeast Asia in the south of Myanmar and Thailand all the way to Malaysia and some islands. It lives on high mountains and in deep jungles in groups of around 30-40. The strongest male is the leader. The langur is usually shy, afraid of humans and not aggressive like monkeys. Apart from the spectacled langur, there are 3 other types in Thailand; banded langurs, gray langurs and northern spectacled langurs. All 4 species of langurs are currently endangered mammals.