Walk through the world's first nocturnal zoo
Opened after dark, 1994
Night Safari occupies 35 hectares of secondary rainforest at Mandai and opens only in the evening. Around 900 animals across more than 100 species, all of them ones that are awake when you are not.
Why it's unique
It opened on 3 May 1994 as the first zoo anywhere built specifically to open after dark, and Guinness holds the record under exactly that description. Every other night zoo in the world came afterwards and was modelled on this one.
The engineering is the interesting part. The whole park is lit by artificial moonlight, calibrated to be bright enough for a human to see by and dim enough that nocturnal animals behave as though unobserved. You are not watching sleeping animals in daylight, which is what a conventional zoo offers; you are watching them do the thing they are actually built for.
Before you go
Book ahead and go on the first tram of the evening — the queue doubles within an hour of opening and the animals are most active early.
Ride the tram first to get the layout, then walk the four trails, which is where the visit actually happens. Flash photography is banned and enforced, for good reason. Note this is first, not only: Chiang Mai runs a night safari of its own.