Not many people venture to Thailand without heading south to the tropical paradise that is the Thai islands. When I was planning my trip I was overwhelmed by the amount of choices I had when picking which islands and beaches I wanted to visit, so I hope this guide can help you plan your best week in Krabi Province, Thailand.
I spent 5 nights in the islands snorkeling, drinking, and most of all relaxing. You don’t really need a set itinerary when you visit the islands, but it is good to plan for which islands you want to visit, and how easy/ difficult it is to get to them.
There are two main areas you can fly into, Phuket and Krabi. After reading many blogs, I chose to fly into Krabi. From what I’ve gathered, the Krabi province is a little cheaper, and Phuket is more built up with large resorts. You can easily island hop between both areas, so you can really fly into either one!
Krabi Town & Ao Nang 0-1 Days
The Krabi airport is located just outside Krabi Town, so if you have a lot of time to spend in the islands I would recommend checking it out, especially if you’re interested in seeing every day Thai life, as it’s not very touristy. If you only have a week or less, I would recommend skipping it.
When flying into Krabi, the easiest beach destination to get to is Ao Nang, which is a ~30 min Grab ride from the Krabi airport. There is also a bus from the airport that cost 150 Baht per person. Our Grab ride cost 600 Baht.
Ao Nang is not an actual island, just a beach town, but it can be a great place to base yourself to explore the islands, and the accommodations can be cheaper than on the islands.
Tonsai Beach & Railay Beach 2-3 Days
Similar to Ao Nang, Tonsai and Railay are not islands, but beaches. Tonsai is a single beach, and Railay is a penisula with three beaches: Railay West, Railay East, and Phra Nang. However they both feel like an island because you can only reach them by boat, as they’re cut off from all roads from the mainland by tall limestone cliffs like in the picture below.
The cliffs also make these beaches one of the most popular climbing destinations in South East Asia. You could do most of the main activities in 2 to 3 days, but if you love climbing or just relaxing on the most beautiful beach I’ve ever seen, then you could be happy here for 4+ days.
Getting to Tonsai or Railay from the Krabi Airport
Getting to Tonsai and Railay is no big deal, you just have to take a plane, a bus, and a boat. Piece of cake, especially at night!
But really… you should try to fly in with a couple hours of daylight to spare. It’s especially important if you’re staying on Tonsai which is pretty remote and its “pier” (just a section of the beach, waterproof shoes are recommended) does not have any lights. So don’t be like me. Don’t show up to Tonsai at 8:30pm with only your phone light to guide you from the beach, through a jungle path to your hostel.
Don’t let any of that scare you! This beautiful, unspoiled beach is worth a little extra work and travel time! After you land in Krabi, you can either take a cab/Grab or a bus to the Ao Nang pier. If you flight lands late, you could stay in Ao Nang for one night, then head to Tonsai or Railay the next day.
Once you get to the Ao Nang pier, buy a ticket for a long tail boat to take you to whichever beach you’re staying at. Tickets cost 100 Baht, but the prices are raised to 150 Baht after 6:00pm. The boats do not have a schedule, they just leave whenever they have a “full boat” or 10 people. We waited for about 30 minutes, and only 8 people had showed up. We chose to all chip in an extra 37 Baht per person to pay for the “extra 2 spots” so we could leave without waiting for 2 more people to come.
Should I stay on Railay or Tonsai?
We spent 3 nights in a hut on Tonsai beach. It is popular with the climbing crowd, but is also a good spot for anyone who prefers a more laid back and quiet beach experience. Don’t expect any luxuries here though, our hut only had electricity from 6:00pm-6:00am, and WiFi is restricted to the common areas.
Railay is larger and has more options than Tonsai. If you want to stay in a hotel, or really anything more than a hut, Railay is for you! Railay also has many more restaurant and bar choices.
If you really can’t chose between the two, there is good news! Tonsai beach and Railay West beach are a 10 minute walk through a jungle path, or a 5 minute long tail boat ride apart!
The above picture is the path between Tonsai and Railay beach. Beware of crossing during high tide, as the end of the Railay side of the path will be under a foot or two of water. It’s still possible to cross, just make sure you’re not wearing long pants or shoes that can’t get wet!
Activities
Aside from climbing (which you should totally try if you’re into it) the main activity is to take a tour of the neighboring islands. There are various tour groups you can go with, or you can hire a long tail boat driver to take a private group out.
We booked our “5 Island Tour” with a man that has a little travel agent stand set up outside the bungalows we stayed in on Tonsai. I think they run the tours everyday, so don’t worry about booking before you get there.
If you’re staying on Railay, you get picked up in the big tour boat, but for us coming from Tonsai, we actually took a long tail boat out to meet the bigger boat and went from there.
You get to explore two islands on foot, snorkel around two islands, and the 5th island, Chicken Island pictured above, is just for photos.
The tour costs $40 USD per person, with a big portion of that cost going toward a National Park entrance fee. The tour also includes snorkel gear and lunch.
Our island tour took us to the beach near Railay’s most famous cave, the Penis Cave! If your tour doesn’t, make sure to find it for yourself. It’s actually a shrine dedicated to the goddess of fertility, but it’s quite a sight to behold!
Koh Lanta 3-4 Days
Koh Lanta is a large island south of Railay Beach and south east of Koh Phi Phi. While the beaches aren’t as dramatically beautiful as those of Railay, it’s still a wonderful island paradise. Koh Lanta has a very laid back vibe and feels very different than other pats of Thailand. Koh Lanta is close to Malaysia, a Muslim country, so many of the locals Thai people are Muslim, and the food has its own Southern Thailand twist.
There’s a lot to see a do here, and a bigger variety of restaurants and beaches than Railay or Tonsai, so you will need 3 to 4 days to see experience everything Koh Lanta has to offer.
Where to Stay on Koh Lanta
Koh Lanta is much larger and more spread out than either Tonsai or Railay Beach. The entire west side of the island is lined with small hotels, hostels, and huts. We stayed just over half way down the island, and the further south you go, the more spread out everything is.
The east side of Koh Lanta has more local housing, including an old fishing village! We didn’t get the chance to explore the east side of the island, but I can’t wait to do so when I come back to this beautiful island.
Getting to Koh Lanta
There are two ways to get to Koh Lanta: by flying and driving, or by ferry. We arrived by ferry and left by car, and both ways are easy.
By Ferry
We took the ferry from Tonsai to the Koh Lanta pier. The ferry run every day from 10:00a-12:30p and cost about $18 USD per person. There are also ferries from Ao Nang, Railay, and Koh Phi Phi.
The ferries all arrive at the pier on the northern tip of the island. Getting off can be a bit hectic with all the tuk tuk drivers coming up to you asking for a ride. We tried to call a Grab to get a better deal, but it appears you cannot use Grab on Koh Lanta, unlike the rest of Thailand.
Because Grab is out of the question, and we didn’t have any other form of transportation set up to get to our hotel, we took a tuk tuk. I even got to wear that awesome helmet the driver gave me to put on before we drove past some police officers.
All the tuk tuk drivers have a map of the island with sections of hotels grouped together by price. The further from the pier you were staying the more expensive it got. They also quoted the price as per person. Luckily they were willing to negotiate to a lower price and we ended up paying about $10 USD for the roughly 3 mile trip. Still pretty pricey for Thailand standards.
Driving from the Krabi Airport
We were headed back to Bangkok after our time on Koh Lanta so we were headed straight for the airport. We booked a van through our hotel, which was very easy, as they arranged everything for us and handled the payment.
Make sure to budget at least 2 hours for the trip. We were staying about 2/3’s of the way down the island and were the first people picked up, so we made at least 4 other stops before we were finally on the road to the airport. The van also has to cross a waterway and waiting and boarding the ferry took around a half hour.
Activities & Food
Relax on a Different Beach Everyday
Koh Lanta has so many different beaches to explore, you can visit a new one every day for a week or two! There’s so much beach front that you never need to be too near other people.
Rent a Scooter and Explore
Everyone on Koh Lanta seemed to have a scooter! The island is large, and some of the bars and restaurants can be pretty spread out. If you really want to explore the island you will need to rent a scooter, especially if you want to visit the east coast of Koh Lanta.
Go on an Island Tour and Snorkel
Snorkeling and diving are popular activities to do around Koh Lanta’s many beaches. You can also opt to go for an island tour. We did our island tour from Tonsai Beach and loved our experience! If we had stayed on Koh Lanta for more than two nights I would have loved to do another island tour to discover even more unique islands .
Enjoy the Local Cuisine
Koh Lanta has so many family run restaurants to enjoy! Our favorite was 3 Sisters’ Cafe, located on the main road on the west side of the island. It was very much a restaurant for tourists but the prices were great and the food was even better. It was so good we went a second time in our short 2.5 day stay.
If there’s a rainy day during your island stay, consider taking a cooking class. My boyfriend and I took a Thai cooking class in Chiang Mai (read more about our 3 days in Chiang Mai here) but I saw many advertisements for cooking schools in Koh Lanta as well.
Koh Phi Phi 1-2 Days
The last major area to explore in Krabi is perhaps the area’s most famous: Koh Phi Phi! While I did not chose to visit Koh Phi Phi on my stay in Thailand’s Krabi province, I hope to visit it someday. Koh Phi has mixed reviews, with some people calling it Thailand’s most beautiful island, and others saying it has been overun with resorts and mass tourism.
Either way I hope to see it for myself one day and decide from there. If you don’t want to commit to staying on Koh Phi Phi, as it can be more expensive than other islands and beaches in the area, day trips to the island are a popular choice.
Have you been to Thailand’s Krabi Province? What was your favorite island or beach that I have to visit next time? Leave your comments or questions below!
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