Our first Thailand beach stop was Railay Beach in Krabi. It's an isolated part of the peninsula that we needed to take a bus and boat to get to.
Of course it was raining during our boat ride!
And basically the whole time there. It limited some of the experience, but it was still gorgeous there. And one of my favorite stops in Thailand. I can only imagine if we would have stayed longer or had better weather.
We stayed at Hotel Avatar. We got an amazing deal because it was just opening. It was easily a 4-5 star hotel by US standards, which we paid ~$30 USD per night for. It was awesome! The room was modern. And all the rooms overlooked a long pool, which you could literally walk right into from your porch if you had a bottom floor room.
We arrived in the early evening so we basically enjoyed a luxurious hotel and went to dinner in the main strip of restaurants which was right nearby. We ate a Mama's Kitchen, which was really good local food.
In the morning, it was still raining, but luckily lightly so we set off exploring. We went everywhere there was to go!
First we went to Princess Cave and the South Cave Beach.
The one cave is known for a fertility shrine.
We continued walking up through the jungle and out to the Ton Sai village. It was really cool, but remote, very hippie and bare bones. There seemed to be a lot of cool bars. I would have ventured back in the sunshine for happy hour (if we were there for longer or had better weather....it is a decent 45 min to 1 hour walk / hike)
We walked down to the beach and there were lugar monkeys playing in the trees. They were cool and had white eyes.
Instead of double backing through the jungle, we decided to walk the beach back. There was a trail that took us through some rocks. All was fine except at the end we had to wade in the water and waves were crashing up in the rocks. I slipped. It was pouring rain. Not great with phones in tow.
We spent the rest of the day enjoying the warmth of a nice hotel room.
That night we went to dinner at a shop along the east beach walkway and then to a fire show at last bar.
I really liked Railay. It was probably the only place in Thailand I wish we stayed longer at. We didn't stay because of the rain and we thought we wanted to see more of the islands. Looking back, all the islands are much more similar than descriptions lead you to believe. I liked the vibe here, and would have liked to kayak through the cliffs. I also would have gone rock climbing if it wasn't raining (or if Josh wasn't afraid of heights). And I heard the snorkeling and Emerald Cave trips were good.
I thought where we stayed in East beach was the coolest area and best to stay, with a great strip of restaurants and bars. But it wasn't super party rowdy.
West beach had the big famous beach but I didn't find the big resorts there all that impressive. If it was sunny, the long tail boat restaurants would have been there, but we didn't get to see that.
The other strip of action is inland, which we walked through but didn't venture back too bc it was raining and muddy back there.
A lot of people come here for a day trip, and I would definitely recommend longer.
