I was extremely impressed with Apple’s Guesthouse and Restaurant. It is owned by two women in their 30’s. Paula, our Intrepid trip leader, said that women business owners are unusual in Thailand, and that traditionally the businesses failed due to lack of community support. This situation is rapidly changing in Thailand, but women still need extra support for success. Intrepid has always supported Apple’s Guesthouse for this reason, and also because it is just an excellent quality place.
The owners are Apple, who does most of the cooking and teaches a cooking class, and Noi, who waitresses and does a zillion other things to run the guesthouse. They also run a travel booking service on the property, so you can arrange day trips with them. Noi was our tour guide for a day trip to the Hellfire Pass Museum. Her brother, also named Noi, was our tour guide for a bicycle trip to Pha Tad Waterfall in Sai Yok National Park. They were both exceptional guides, some of the best we had in Thailand (and we had a lot of guides). The brother also works in the restaurant when it is very busy (which is often, because the food is EXCELLENT). When asked if the women were looking for husbands, they said that they weren’t, because they would be forced to give up their business, and they weren’t willing to do that. You can tell they love their work and care about their customers.
The Guesthouse consists of about 16 rooms in a bamboo bungalow. The rooms are set back quite a ways from the road, and the road isn’t extremely busy anyway, which makes for a quiet relaxing atmosphere. In front of the bungalows is a grass lawn (also not common in Thailand) with tables and chairs for relaxing. At the very front of the property is the restaurant and travel agency. The whole place is surrounded by trees and flowering plants. It is very beautiful and cozy.
The rooms are small but clean. There is no air conditioning, but there are fans. Cold water showers only. It is a 30 minute walk to the bridge over River Kwai, and a 5 minute walk to the train station. Beyond that, I didn’t get to walk around a whole lot. There was a great massage place about 5 minutes away and an internet shop also nearby. There are plenty of other restaurant choices close by, but really, the food was so fabulous at Apple’s that we didn’t venture anywhere else. All in all, I highly recommend Apple’s Guesthouse. They have such a great reputation, and I think they are in the most recent Lonely Planet guidebook, that they are quite busy so you may want to make reservations. Also, apparently there is another guesthouse trying to profit from Apple’s great reputation by also calling themselves Apple’s, so be sure to get the real Apple’s Guesthouse.