Phlio Waterfall

There are two explanations of the name. Silpa Wattanatham says "Phlio" may come from a word in the Chong language meaning sand or sandy beach, or from the "phlio" tree that grows on the sandy soil here. The Chong are an indigenous people of eastern Thailand.

In 1874 King Chulalongkorn (Rama V) first visited Phlio Waterfall with Queen Sunanda Kumariratana and remarked that "nowhere is more beautiful than here".

On his second visit in 1876 he had a round, Sri Lankan-style laterite stupa built on the cliff above the falls to mark his visit on 1 January 1876, naming it "Alongkorn Chedi". Some sources call it "Chulasirachumbot Chedi" (the name used by its Wikimedia Commons category).

In 1880 Queen Sunanda Kumariratana drowned when her boat capsized on the Chao Phraya River on the way to Bang Pa-in Palace, which is why she is popularly known as "Phra Nang Ruea Lom", the queen of the capsized boat.

Queen Sunanda Kumariratana, a daughter of King Mongkut (Rama IV), was born on 10 November 1860; her daughter, Princess Kannabhorn Bejaratana, was born on 12 August 1878. Silpa Wattanatham recounts that on 31 May 1880 the royal barge, towed by the steamer Pan Marut, capsized after another vessel struck it, off Wat Ko Phaya Jeng in Bang Phut, Pak Kret, Nonthaburi. Both the queen and the princess died. Many accounts say a palace law forbidding anyone to touch a royal consort hindered the rescue, but that remains an interpretation still debated.

The royal cremation took place in March 1881. Thai PBS says Rama V had 10,000 copies of a prayer book printed and given out, regarded as Thailand's first funeral book. Besides the Phlio pyramid he built several other memorials to her, including monuments at Bang Pa-in Palace and Saranrom Park, a stupa at Bang Phut and Sunanthalai School, so the Phlio memorial is one of many expressions of his grief.

In 1881 Rama V had local officials build the "Sunanthanusawari" near the falls, a pyramid-shaped memorial holding her ashes. Silpa Wattanatham says he chose a pyramid because "any other shape would not last". Its inscription speaks of love and deep grief. Locals call it the "Pyramid of Phra Nang Ruea Lom", and couples now come to pray for lasting love.

Tripniceday cites the king's reasoning that a monument of any other form, standing in wild forest with no one to look after it, would not last, so he chose an Egyptian-style pyramid to endure amid the forest and stream. It adds that the queen had visited Phlio in 1874 and been enchanted by its beauty, which is why the memorial was placed here.

Silpa Wattanatham records that Rama V returned to see the stupa and memorial in 1884 and made his last visit in 1889, when he had his royal monogram carved on a rock at the top of the falls; Rama VI and Rama VII also visited and left their monograms. TrueID says Rama V visited 12 times, so the count differs between sources.

A few years after the king's last visit, the area entered a difficult period. Thai PBS recounts that in 1893 (R.S. 112) France occupied Chanthaburi over a territorial dispute, building the "Red Building" as its headquarters and the "Khuk Khi Kai" chicken-dung prison at Laem Sing, the same district as Phlio. France withdrew from Chanthaburi in 1904. The name Laem Sing comes from a crouching lion-shaped rock at the tip of the cape.

The area around the falls was declared Khao Sa Bap National Park on 2 May 1975, Thailand's 11th national park, and renamed Namtok Phlio National Park on 29 September 1982. It covers about 84,062 rai (about 135 sq km) across Mueang, Laem Sing, Khlung and Makham districts.

The Sa Bap range is the western tip of the Cardamom Mountains, made of heavily eroded karst. The park's highest point, transcribed by Wikipedia as Map Wa Krok, is about 925 m. The tropical rainforest includes agarwood, Hopea and Dipterocarpus trees, and wildlife such as Sunda pangolin, lar gibbon, pig-tailed macaque, muntjac, serow and hornbills.

The falls are famous for huge shoals of soro brook carp (pla phluang hin), a protected fish. Thai Holiday Guide advises not to touch or feed them and to skip sunscreen or insect repellent before swimming. Some travel articles mention long beans sold for feeding the fish, but park rules should take precedence.

Besides Phlio, the park has the Khlong Narai, Makok and Trok Nong waterfalls. Wikipedia says Namtok Phlio National Park received 671,396 visitors in 2019, making it one of the busiest parks in eastern Thailand.