Camp with creature comforts

If you think tents mean leaky canvas and sagging guy ropes, try the Four Seasons Golden Triangle in Thailand, where every luxury is taken care of, and even the elephants are pampered, says Teresa Levonian Cole.

When the man in the dark glasses at the CIA first coined the term "The Golden Triangle" in 1971, little did he know how evocative the phrase would become. The badlands have (we are told) been tamed. Yet a whiff of the illicit lingers in the name, suggestive of the opium fields and warlords of yesteryear.

The Golden Triangle refers to the area of north-east Thailand, where it nudges neighbouring Burma and Laos. And this is where the latest triumph from the Four Seasons hotel group lies: a hillside jungle setting, in the heart of deepest nowhere.

To get there, you fly to Bangkok, thence to Chiang Rai, where you are collected and driven to a tiny landing stage, about one hour away. A long-tailed speed boat - all teak and brass and a foretaste of Four Seasons style - then whisks you along the Ruak River to your temporary home, where you are greeted like the long-lost member of an exclusive club. The inaccessibility is all part of the fun.

And what fun it is - in a Mark Twain, Swallows & Amazons kind of way - though note that the hotel is off limits to under-16s. Rather, the Four Seasons Golden Triangle is for grown-up children, burning with the spirit of the Adventurer, but thwarted by the velleities of the Sybarite. In the middle of this Eden, 160 members of staff tend to the whims of 30 guests, from sunglass-polishing at the rock-camouflaged swimming pool to world-class cocktails in the Burma Bar.

Between the pool and the bar, which mark the two extremities of human habitation (more of the non-human part later), lies the accommodation. It is strung like creamy pearls along half a mile of mountain path, riven by a gorge and reconnected by a towering suspension bridge. If you weren't fit before, you will be by the time you leave, despite the temptation of the Asian and European menus, and the wine cellar, a rotunda-style temple to Dionysus.

Imagine a treehouse, crossed with a 19th-century explorer's tent, and invested with every comfort you have forgotten to wish for: this is your abode. Accommodation consists of 15 exquisite tents, cantilevered over the hillside. Inside, all is teak and bamboo, stone and hand-beaten copper. There is a free-standing bath in the middle of the room, its pipes lagged with leather, and an outdoor shower on a screened platform for al fresco ablutions. A huge wooden veranda overlooks Burma beyond the Ruak. In the absence of television, you are entertained by the sounds of the jungle.

When not listening, wine in hand, to that strange bird that forever trills, there is plenty to keep one amused. Your own private picnic or sunset cruise along the Mekong, for example, in the camp's boat. Embarking in Thailand, you make towards China, between Burma on your left, and Laos on your right.

Saffron-robed monks whizz past in speedboats and moor at the various temples that dot the riverbank. Women scrub their laundry, and children play in the murky waters, splashing their hellos, as though the 21st century never was.

The most fun, however, is to be had in the part of the camp that belongs to its non-human residents. Beyond the Burma Bar live six of the most pampered elephants on Earth. Occasionally, when there is an evening barbecue at the Elephant Camp, they appear during pre-prandial Champagne, neatly scrubbed and on their best behaviour like Victorian children, to be cooed over by the guests before retiring to bed and leaving the grown-ups to carouse. Transported into this haven of luxury, well-stocked with bananas and sugar cane, the elephants work to rule: a maximum of four hours a day, taking the camp's guests on jungle treks.

Togged in a blue mahout outfit, you are collected by boat and taken into a jungle clearing. Here the elephants and their handlers await, as do liveried staff presiding over a table laid heaving with refreshments. The scene is surreal. But once aboard your elephant (you are taught several ways to mount, each more indecorous than the last), perched on her head nine feet in the air and wondering with alarm why Nellie will not obey your carefully rehearsed instructions as she heads for the river, it is an exhilarating reminder that for all the comforts provided, you really are in the wilds.

There remains only the matter of aching limbs, stretched into unwonted positions that correspond to an elephant's girth. Even that has been thought of. A visit to the spa - two heavenly huts isolated amid the bamboo forest and open to the elements - for the Mahout Recovery Treatment, will leave you walking on air.

(courtesy:www.telegraph.co.uk)