Phu Wiang: Khon Kaen's Dinosaur Mountains and the Museum of Thailand's First Dino Finds
Khon Kaen calls itself Thailand's dinosaur capital, and Phu Wiang is where that claim began. In 1976 a uranium survey team working in these horseshoe-shaped mountains, about 85 kilometres northwest of Khon Kaen city, picked up a strange fossilised knee bone. French specialists confirmed what nobody expected: it belonged to a huge long-necked sauropod dinosaur, the first ever found in Thailand. The mountains are now Phu Wiang National Park — some 325 square kilometres of dry forest, red sandstone and open-air excavation sites — paired with the Phu Wiang Dinosaur Museum in the valley below. Together they make the best family day trip in the province. A Whole New Dinosaur Family The finds kept coming. Palaeontologists named the sauropod Phuwiangosaurus sirindhornae , honouring Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn. Then came Siamotyrannus isanensis , an early relative of Tyrannosaurus from about 130 million years ago, and Siamosaurus , a fish-eating spinosaur identified first from teeth f...