We visited the Ban Chiang National Museum in January 2016. This archaeological museum is located ca. 50 km east of Udon Thani, the provincial capital.

It is a wonderful museum with a great exhibition. All items on display are described with labels in Thai and in English. The presentation is excellent.

We recommend you set aside at least two hours to go through the exhibition. There is a lot to see and to learn here.

Unfortunately, I have to add two negative points in this review:

(1) The museum uses double pricing. Thai citizens may enter for 30 TB, while foreigners must pay 150 TB. Foreigners have to pay five times more than Thais! How can the museum think that this makes the foreign visitor feel welcome?

(2) The museum has produced a guidebook about the collections. The book is available in Thai and in English. The price is 100 TB. We could see the books in a glass counter opposite the counter where you buy the tickets to enter the museum. But it was not possible to buy the guidebook! Why not? We were told that the member of staff who has the key to the glass counter was not at work on that day.

So they have the book and we could see the book, but it was impossible to buy it, because the person with the key was not present! The person who sold the tickets did not care. She just said: "No staff today."

How can the director of the museum allow this situation? Why is the person who sells the tickets not allowed to sell the official guidebook?

The museum is highly recommended, but the administration of the museum should be fair (no double pricing) and should be more modern (the book shop should be open when the museum is open).