Guide to Ban Jabo Village: Magical Sunrises & Noodle Shop Above the Clouds

Ban Jabo only started to gain notoriety around 10 years ago for its jaw-dropping sunrises – Now it attracts travelers from all over North Thailand who want to stay overnight at one of Ban Jabo’s many guest houses (there are over 30!) to guarantee a spectacular view of the sunrise, or they get bussed in from Pai on 4:30 AM tours. The small village is also home to the famous “Noodle Shop in the Clouds” where you can enjoy world-class coffees and local noodles with your feet hanging over the edge into the abyss. 

✔️ Essential Info

• 💵 Price: 300 – 500 baht per person for guest house
• 📍Location: 1 hour from Pai / 20 minutes from Tham Lod Cave
• 🛵 How to get there: Via scooter or take an organized tour from Pai
• 🌄 Best time to go: November – February so you can see the morning mist
• ⏳ Duration: Overnight, or visit for sunrise from Pai (4:30 AM departure)
• 👉 Note! Pack warm clothes, it was freezing overnight when we went
• 👉 Tip: Visit after Tham Lod Cave or part of the Mae Hong Son Loop
• 📧 How to book: Just show up and ask around, there are over 30 guest houses

How to Visit  

Ban Jabo Village is located around an hour’s drive from Pai, and 4 hours from Chiang Mai. We drove scooters to Ban Jabo Village after visiting Tham Lod Cave, which is a route I highly recommend since the village is only 20 minutes from Tham Lod Cave, they’re two activities that group well together. If you’ve never driven a scooter before, it’s probably not the best to embark on this trip right away since even though roads in Thailand are well paved, it’s a mountainous windy road to get there that’s also quite remote. 

Mae Hong Son Motorbike Loop 

The Mai Hone Son Loop is a circular loop that covers around 600 KM of ground in North Thailand, starting and ending in Chiang Mai. You can visit popular tourist sights like Ban Jabo Village and Tham Lod Caves along the way. It’s recommended to devote at least 4 days to the Mae Hong Song Loop. 

From Pai 

Coming from Pai, you can either drive your own scooter like we did or sign up for a tour. I have seen tours that depart for Ban Jabo at 4:30 AM and charge 300 Baht per person.

How to Stay at a Guest House

The most typical way to visit Ban Jabo Village is to stay overnight in a guest house. I’ve read online about how the guest house experience in the village used to be more of a cultural encounter, but now it’s really just the locals allowing you to sleep on their floor for a fee 😅. When we visited, it cost 300 Baht per person to stay in a guest house. Do know that these guest houses cannot be booked ahead of time, you just show up and ask around. It’s said that there are over 30 guest houses in Ban Jabo, so you don’t need to stress too much about them running out of space for travelers looking to spend the night. 

About The Noodle Soup House in the Clouds

Ban Jabo Noodle Soup House is a not to miss stop if you’re visiting the village at any time of the day. There are some copycats in the town, and I personally think it’s worth making sure you go to the main one because it has the best viewing platform. The Noodle Shop used to just sell noodles, but now you can get all manner of world-class cafe drinks like Americanos, Mochas, Lattes, etc. 

Do know that while the Noodle Shop sells Western Coffee, they don’t sell Western Breakfast. If you would like to enjoy your meal with your feet dangling over the clouds, you need to eat breakfast as the locals do: Noodle soup. You can choose a base broth, style of noodles (Egg, glass, ramen, etc), and toppings for your soup, and the hot steamy breakfast soup pairs wonderfully with a cold mountain sunrise.

The Lahu Hilltribe 

Ban Jabo, and the surrounding hills of Mae Hong Son, are home to the Lahu People. These traditional people are a subgroup in Thailand. We did not find the Lahu people in Ban Jabo to dress in a traditional way or live especially differently from our guest house experience. I have a feeling that people who report seeing the local Lahu dressed in traditional garb and playing wooden instruments were treated to a kind of “tourist show” of sorts. 

What we encountered at our local guesthouse was thoroughly modern. The Ban Jabo villagers were dressed in sweatshirts and puffer jackets since it was cold. The children had Spiderman and Hello Kitty t-shirts on. Come nightfall, the locals who ran our guest house turned on Karaoke machines, drank beer, and played chess – Visiting was still a cultural experience, but not a performative one.

My Top Tips for Visiting 

• 🏆 Be Awake On Time for the Sunrise: The sun rises at different times throughout the year, but when we visited during the winter sunrise was at 6:30. Everything in Ban Jabo, including the famous noodle shop, opens at 7. Alas, the magical sunrise people stay overnight to see starts at 6:15 AM and goes on till 6:40-ish. 
• Book a Guest House With a Viewing Deck: My advice is to book a guest house with a deck so you don’t miss anything since the Noodle House’s platform will be closed. 
• Pack Warm Clothes: The village is high up in the mountains and gets very cold, especially at night! 
• Ask for a Hot Pot for Dinner: Hot Pot is a specialty in Ban Jabo, but it’s not always listed on the menu at restaurants and guest houses. In our experience, you can ask for it. 
• Visit after Tham Lod Cave: Ban Jabo Village is located around a 20-minute drive from Tham Lod Cave, so staying overnight is a perfect add-on activity after an afternoon of cave-hopping.
• Download Google Translate: No one in Ban Jabo spoke English, we don’t speak Thai, so we used the Google Translate App extensively in Ban Jabo!  
• Be Prepared to Rough it: The facilities in the village are rough, maybe in the coming years the village will open a 5-star resort, but as for right now expect bucket-flush toilets and a mattress on the floor. (It’s worth it though!)

My Experience Staying Overnight at a Guest House

We stayed at Tham Lod Cave until 6:30 PM in order to see the sunset bird migration into the cave, so we didn’t set off for Ban Jabo until after dark. When we arrived at Ban Jabo around 7 PM the entire town was shuttered. The popular Noodle Soup Shop closes at 4 PM, and the rest of the town seems to follow suit. The town was so dark when we arrived that we weren’t sure if we were even in the right place!

We asked the first villagers we saw (with the help of Google Translate) for the nearest guest house, and they quickly offered up theirs. Most houses in Ban Jabo double as guest houses for tourists. The rooms were simple, really just a bucket-flush toilet (but it was Western-style, not squat), and a mattress on the floor. We had electricity and blankets, and that was about it. Luckily, that’s all that we needed, since we were in Ban Jabo for the same reason everyone else was – to see the famous sunrise.

We tried to get to bed early to be up before sunrise, but a time-zone-deficient rooster that started crowing at 3 AM (aren’t they supposed to crow for the sunrise????) kept us up most of the night. If you’re staying overnight, I recommend bringing earplugs because our shack had little to no insulation against noise like roosters crowing. 

For some reason, everything in Ban Jabo opens at 7 AM, even though the sun rises at 6:30. We ended up having lucked out with our guest house choice because it had its own viewing platform, so we could watch the sunrise at 6:30 before the other spots in town had their viewing decks open. The sunrise was just as fantastic as it was hyped to be. I’ve been to other sunrise spots in North Thailand like the Yun Lai Viewpoint right outside of Pai, and I personally think Ban Jabo is well worth the trip.