Thai Islands

floyd333

Hi All. I'm in Vietnam at the moment. Going to Cambodia then. Hope to hit some Thai Islands/ coast in about 10 days. I'm a bit worried as it's the start of rainy season. Are the islands effected much by this? I heard that the Phi Phi/ Phuket coast gets it worse. I want to chill somewhere for a few days, don't want anything too mad. Beach by day, few beers by night. I am thinking of doing ko Lanta. phi phi or Ko Pan yang/ Ko Tao;. Where would you guys recommend? Cheers.;)

kraggy

Rainy season doesn't really affect things from the point of view of weather as it just rains intensely for about an hour each day. Then everything's dry again with minutes of stopping.

Only other advice I'd give you is to leave out Koh Lanta. It's nice, but peak season is after finishing and it's going to be VERY VERY quiet from now until next October-ish.

When I say quiet, I mean we were 2 of about 12 tourists in the whole of the bottom half of the island. It's nice for a few days, but after a while it gets a bit much and thus is hardly worth the ferry and minbus combination you'd have to do from Krabi to get there.

Leave it out I reckon.

Phi Phi is nice but VERY commercial. Koh phangnan is ok. North of the island has some very nice quiet resorts with nice beach.

Haven't been, but heard Railay (near Krabi) is very nice and not as commercial as the other places.

preddy2

Koi Samui is nice if you wanted to stay on other side of the main land....

v.e.r.b.a.l

Personally, if I could advise anything, it'd be to stay away from Koh Samui. Unless, you're an old man going through a crisis and want to get yourself a young Thai bride for a fee.

Railay was actually a bit of a disappointment. Gorgeous scenery around the beaches (huge limestone cliffs), but the beach itself is covered in pebbles and the water is only up to your ankles for about a mile out to sea, which makes swimming almost impossible.

Ko Phi Phi is amazing, but only on Long Beach. I'd stay away from the maze of street stalls and go for the quieter side of paradise. A few nice bars out there too if you want to have a tipple!! Don't be put off by the touts or the shockingly overpriced accomodation on Phi Phi - it's actually worth it. The place is gorgeous.

(sorry, i don't have any advice about the rainy season - i was there in dry season. a friend told me that there were huge downpours, but they only last an hour or so and then it's fine again. but, then again, he also told me that you could avoid the rain by jumping between the drops, so i don't know if i'd trust him too much!!)

Chickus

Been to a few of the Thai islands and the only one I actually enjoyed was Koh Tao. It's great for diving and was defintly the most laid back island, although it's not the most picturesq island. I found there was a great athmosphere.

Pi Pi was one of the least relaxing places I've ever been. It's beautiful, but it's unfortunate it's been destroyed. It would have been great 20 years ago. I'm sure if you forked out big bucks for fancy accomodation it could be nice. In my opinion it's over rated, over commerical and over priced. Hard to relax on a beach when you've noisy long tail boats cruising past every 30 seconds. Contrary to what Verbal says, I don't think pi pi is worth it.

I'm pretty sure the islannds off the west and islands off the east different rainy seasons.

v.e.r.b.a.l

Maybe if you stay in the village, but if you make an effort to get out to Long Beach, you'll find yourself with a small group of people away from the noisy nightlife, with hardly a light around. Gorgeous huge beach, amazing scenery and not too many longtails. It's a bitch to get back into the village if you needed to (a choice between an overpriced longtail and a 45 minute jungle trek, climbing up a steep mud hill by rope past snakes!!), but tbh if you saw the village, i don't think you'd want to go there.