The name "pancake trail" was given in honor of the local popular street food
They started driving along it at about the same time as the Hippie Trail. The fact that India was a dead end for land travel did not stop all tourists. Many moved by air to Southeast Asia - Bangkok was already a major aviation hub at that time — and continued their journey further.

In fact, both the Hippie Trail and the Banana Pancake Trail were part of a network of popular backpacker routes leading from the UK to Australia. Kabul— Kathmandu— Kuta. Tony and Maureen Wheeler were one of the first to document this path in their guide "Across Asia on the Cheap" in 1973. In two years they will publish their second guide "Southeast Asia on a Shoestring". So the history of the most popular backpacker guide Lonely Planet will begin, and "Budget Southeast Asia" will survive another eighteen editions.
If political conflicts began to arise on the Hippie Trail, because of which the flow of tourists stopped, then in Southeast Asia the situation was exactly the opposite: over the years everything became calmer and safer.
In the 60s and 70s, for backpackers, the Southeast Asian region was mainly limited to Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia. There was a civil war in Cambodia. Vietnam was divided into two warring states. The Northern Democratic Republic of Vietnam was communist, and it was simply impossible for citizens of capitalist countries to enter there. The Southern Republic of Vietnam was paranoid about possible communist spies and could easily refuse a visa if a stamp of an undesirable socialist country was found in a tourist's passport. Laos did not particularly welcome homeless-looking backpackers, and in order to leave it, sometimes it was necessary to apply for an exit visa. And in general, traveling around the region was not very easy: flights and ferries cost much more than buses in the Middle East and Hindustan.
Now the situation has changed a lot
Military conflicts have ended, and today, with rare exceptions, this region is almost the safest on the planet. The transport infrastructure has become much more developed, and thanks to low-cost airlines, it is now possible to move between countries quickly and cheaply. Visa policy has also become much more liberal, and people now live in Southeast Asia for months, moving from one country to another.

The list of points on the Pancake Trail has not only not decreased — it has overgrown with new places. Moreover, there is no canonical list either - every tourist has their own views on noteworthy locations, and someone even adds cities of India, Nepal and China to the route. But usually, when they talk about the Banana Pancake Trail, they mean the most popular tourist places in Southeast Asia: Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines.