Wang Thong Hotel Maesai

The staff were polite and friendly, and the room was comfortable, clean, and well kept. Breakfast was an okay buffet with the usual choices: sausages, fried vegetables, congee, basil pork, hard-boiled eggs, fruit, bread, coffee, tea, and orange juice. The hotel is right beside the border, which is a very convenient spot. We had a pleasant stay, and the bed was comfy too.

The hotel is handy for both the Myanmar border gate and Sai Lom Joy Market in Mae Sai District. Parking is convenient and very spacious. The building is aging, though, with old facilities, and only one of the two elevators was working, so there can be a wait at busy times. Staff recommended a room without carpet, but it had an unpleasant smell.

For 850 baht, breakfast was included with the standard room. It's safe, has a private car park, and is the closest place to the immigration checkpoint. The bed was hard, but clean. Good value if you need to walk to immigration while it's open.

The staff were very friendly, but the stay itself was a mess. We paid 1,600 Baht for a family room with a very mediocre breakfast. The pool was being renovated, there was no hot water in the morning, Wi-Fi was unreliable, and the lifts seemed like they could snap and fall at any moment. The room was dark, the wallpaper was peeling, and the original boiler no longer worked, so we had an electric shower like you'd find in a cheaper hotel or private home. Water pressure was weak. They said hot water would come on around 8am, but we had to be at immigration when it opened at 8.30am and couldn't wait. The hotel is run down and overpriced. The lobby was dark and looked untouched since the 1980s. The car park was 100m away, and we had to carry our luggage to the lobby ourselves unless we went back to ask for help. We booked this place for two reasons, neither of which would apply next time. The previous day we'd driven from Sipsongbanna, China, to the Golden Triangle through three countries with a young child who gets cranky in the car. Even though we only drove a short way to Mae Sai after leaving the GT around 3pm, we chose to stay overnight. We also needed re-entry permits for my Chinese friends. I was told there were only two immigration offices in Chiang Rai, in Chiang Saen and Mae Sai. Later I learned there was another one near the airport. If I'd known, we'd have found somewhere much nicer in Chiang Rai town and been closer to our next destination. At around 9.30pm I went downstairs to ask reception how to use the TV and phone. You have to press a button on the old night table between the beds. Then a rude woman, possibly Thai, Lao, or Burmese, who was talking with three or four other women some distance away, interrupted my conversation with the receptionist to "translate" for me. I speak Thai fluently and was having no trouble communicating. She understood what I said, then repeated the receptionist's answer as if I needed her help. It made no sense. I'm not sure she worked at the hotel. She mumbled that she'd stayed at the dump for 10 days and had taken a while to figure out the switches. Maybe she was an official translator for the TV crews covering the cave rescue who were staying there. Either way, I felt offended. In all my years living and traveling in Thailand, nobody had talked over me and the person I was speaking with like that. When I couldn't speak Thai, I never got help, but now that I didn't need it, someone butted in. Just weird and rude. I would have preferred someone to explain the details of crossing into Myanmar, including what to do with a car. A friendly, helpful Thai customs agent ended up explaining that instead. I don't know why the Channel Nine News Australia team stayed here. They'd have been better off at almost any other Mae Sai hotel. The good ones are a little outside town, around 1-2km away and even a bit closer to the cave. Another option would have been the Imperial Golden Triangle, an excellent resort just 33km from Mae Sai and about 30km from the cave. We stayed there the night before and should have stayed again if I'd known better.