Sri Nakhon Khuean Khan Park and Botanical Garden

This guide to Sri Nakhon Khuean Khan Park in Bangkok follows a short ferry ride across a bend in the Chao Phraya into Bang Krachao, a pocket of jungle that developers and roads circled for decades but never took. It traces how King Bhumibol Adulyadej spotted the land from a helicopter in the 1980s and how a 1991 conservation project acquired it community by community rather than by force. Along the way it picks up the wildlife that still moves through the canopy and shallows. Take the ferry over and listen for the kingfisher by the lake.