Geography
The average elevation is 200 m and it covers an area of about 155,000 km². The saucer-shaped plateau is divided by a range of hills called the Phu Phan mountains into two basins: the northern Sakhon Nakhon Basin, and the southern Khorat Basin. The plateau is tilted towards the south-east, and drained by the Mun and Chi rivers, tributaries to the Mekong that forms the north eastern boundary of the area. It is separated from Central Thailand by the Phetchabun mountain range and the Dong Phaya Yen mountains in the west, the Sankamphaeng Range in the southwest and by the Dongrek mountains in the south, all of which historically made access to the plateau difficult.
These together with the Truong Son Range in the north-east catch a lot of the rainfall, so the South-West monsoon has much lower intensity then in other regions—the mean annual rainfall in Nakhon Ratchasima is about 1150 mm, compared with 1500 mm in Central Thailand. The difference between dry and wet season is much stronger, which makes the area less fertile for rice. The portion known as Tung Kula Rong Hai was once exceptionally arid.
Read more about this topic: Khorat Plateau
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