Krabi Travel Upgrades for Luxury Hotels Private Tours and Better Views

To get to Thailand, you’ve probably flown halfway across the world, possibly with multiple connecting flights. Depending on where you’ve flown from, this might be over 24 hours of travel. After you spend an hour or so getting through immigration, you now have to queue for another hour to get a taxi. On top of that, this taxi looks like it’s been held together by glue, you have to negotiate the price, and you might not even be able to correctly find the place you’re looking for.

This happened to me multiple times, and now the simplest way to combat this is to book your ride in advance. When I arrived in Krabi last night, the driver was sitting there waiting for us with our name printed off so we could easily find him. He took us to a nice van and took us directly to our hotel. It was much simpler and much safer.

Hands down, the one factor that is going to determine the quality of your stay in Thailand is the accommodation that you choose. I’ve stayed in some truly awful places in my time in Thailand, with cockroaches falling all over the place and noise from the bars next door, and it really just affects the quality of a trip.

Trust me, there are some of the best hotels in the world in Thailand, and you don’t have to break the bank to stay here. I think one of the biggest misconceptions people have when planning their trip to Thailand is how cheap it’s going to be. Some people still have this idea that it’s going to be one of the cheapest countries in the world and that they can stay in luxury for dirt cheap. However, I don’t think that’s the case anymore, but you don’t need to break the bank to do it.

Ironically, though, the best deals are to be had on the higher end of the spectrum. That sounds counterintuitive. How can the more expensive places actually be the most cost-effective? If you’re looking at the mid-range budget, you get quite unimpressive hotels sometimes. They can be okay, but quite often they’re not really that impressive. If you’re willing to pay a little bit more, usually you can get somewhere like this, which I’ll show you around in a second.

Centara Grand Krabi Private Beach Resort Review

This hotel that I’m staying at here in Krabi had its own private beach area, which was nice because Ao Nang and Railay Beach can get quite crowded at times. To access this hotel, you have to take a 10-minute speedboat from the pier.

As you can see, this hotel is built into the side of the mountain and it’s home to one of the best views in Krabi. This is the Centara Grand, and what I liked most about it was the natural feel to the area, surrounded by trees and directly on the beach. There were even monkeys feeding nearby as we were eating our breakfast.

This hotel wasn’t perfect. It was a little worn down in places, but it is definitely one of the best places I’ve stayed at in Krabi. I paid a little more, but I’ve seen the hotel available for around $150 per night.

Five Ways to Save on Luxury Thailand Hotels

How can I stay in a hotel like this without breaking the bank? I usually follow these five simple tricks to make sure that I can get the best prices and stay somewhere like this without spending too much money.

Tip number one: Don’t travel during holidays. If you travel during times like Songkran or during a Christmas period, prices go way, way up and it’s going to be a lot more expensive. If you can travel outside of those times, then you’re going to get much better deals.

Tip number two: Choose wisely where you stay. The islands of Phuket and Koh Samui are going to have the most expensive hotels in Thailand by far. If you’re traveling in other beach destinations, maybe Krabi like I am here, you’re going to get a few better deals. The best deals to be had, though, are in the north of Thailand.

Tip number three: Avoid the bigger hotel chains. They tend to be a bit more overpriced. If you look at more boutique chains, local Thai brands, or luxury hotels, then you can get better deals. This hotel is a Thai brand.

Tip number four: Book in advance. If you book your hotels in advance, you can generally get better deals. Usually, book at least three months in advance. If you can book six months, you might even get better deals. Very rarely, there are last-minute deals to be had if places don’t sell out, but this is Thailand. Places sell out.

Tip number five: Avoid the city center. If you stay a bit further outside of the town, then you get better deals. This one is even better. It’s good to have a private beach of its own, so it’s actually even nicer, but it’s not directly in Ao Nang, which means you have to travel by boat to get to Ao Nang.

Private Hong Island Boat Tour from Krabi

Thailand is a stunning country with absolutely amazing experiences to be had. However, most people only get to experience the crowded beaches and crowded tourist spots, and for me, there’s one simple way to beat the crowds on some of these tours: take a private tour.

The first thing you notice is the quality of the boat itself. I’ve been on some tours where they use a pretty dingy longtail boat, and not only that, they cram four people into it. This one looked a lot nicer from the beginning, and it had lots of nice touches: fruit, a cooler for us to drink cold water, and speakers so we could play music as we were on the boat.

I’ve been on some other tours where the boat is pretty janky and they don’t even really have life jackets for everyone, so it feels a little bit dangerous as well. However, this was a private tour, so we got to dictate how many people were on the boat, which was just me and my family.

If you take the standard boat tours, they’re going to fill the boat with as many people as possible, so it’s going to be pretty crowded. You aren’t going to have a lot of space or a lot of time to take pictures. The worst aspect is that the big boat tour companies round you up. You can see them every morning on Ao Nang Beach, with hundreds of people waiting to take the boats.

It’s not just that you have 20 or 25 people on the longtail boat. All the longtail boats are leaving from that same destination at the same time, so when you arrive on the beach, it’s like there are 15 or 20 other longtail boats as well. That’s when you get really crowded beaches, because you have a swarm of boats all traveling together, and that’s where you lose a bit of the atmosphere.

We made three stops during the day. The first stop was the Emerald Lagoon, and we noticed that we were one of the few boats that actually stopped there. They let us go out to swim in the lagoon, and we spent about 45 minutes there as the drivers prepared us some fresh coconuts. The next stop was to Hong Island and its viewpoint. We climbed to the top of the stairs to get a view of the islands and the beaches below before taking some time to swim at the stunning beach. The nicest touch was the picnic towards the end. They took us to a private beach where there were only a handful of longtail boats. We got to eat lunch, play some music, and relax on the beach, which made it one of the better boat tours that I’ve ever done. If you’re in Krabi, the name of the longtail boat company is Railay Eco Tours.

Missing The Grotto Restaurant at Railay Beach

I made a simple mistake that I think a lot of people make when they visit the country, too. If you want to experience some of the best views in the country, there are a number of different bars and restaurants which have some of the most amazing views in the country. However, they get booked up pretty quickly.

The Grotto is probably the best restaurant in Thailand. It’s this amazing restaurant on Railay Beach. The beach is stunning, it has great sunsets, and it’s set inside a cave, so it looks really beautiful.

However, when I called to make a reservation a day in advance, The Grotto was fully booked and you couldn’t get a seat. I ended up missing out on one of the best restaurants in Krabi.

The Grotto is what I think would have been one of the best restaurants in Krabi, but it’s quite easy to find some of these resorts and places around Thailand. If you look for sunset bars or sunset restaurants around the islands of Phuket or Koh Samui, you can find some amazing places, but often they’re quite popular, so you need to call in advance.

Obviously, you don’t need to eat in the fanciest and finest restaurants the whole time that you’re here, but I think it’s worth doing at least once on your trip.