Millions of people arrive at Thailand’s International Airport every year with the aim to Travel Thailand and see as much as possible. Many will head North for lush tropical rainforests or West to Kanchanaburi for the Bridge over the River Kwai but a great deal many more will head south to the soft, tropical, whiter than white sands of Thailand Beaches.

Many of these travelers will be searching out for that elusive beach, you know the one, its deserted, its palm tree fringed and soft white sand as far as the eye can see. It’s a place were we can feel, for a moment or two, marooned on an uninhabited island. That you don’t really have to go back to work or the rat race or even the mountain of material possessions you have accumulated over the years. Or is that just me 

The reality however is that we will most probably end up on a beach paying for our lounger and shade umbrella. Sitting cheek to jowl with those on the lounger next to you, listening in on their lives they’re that close. Relaxing your holiday may be private and exclusive it’s not.

In the southern parts of Thailand beaches are a plenty yet most people all head for the same ones. If we had taken a few minutes during our holiday planning and thought maybe those jaw dropping beach scenes could be our holiday.

Holiday planning is the most essential part of any holiday, would you agree? Then why let someone else plan it for you? Most travel agents who sell you a holiday will have never been to the location they are selling. They only know the Thailand beaches that everyone else heads for because that is what they are given to sell you. What do you think makes these places popular? In my opinion nice beaches and exclusivity are not really that high on the scale of importance but high commission rates from hotels night be. Yes I am cynical about the travel industry.

So how do we get the best of Thailand beaches as we travel Thailand on our treasured break? Simple, research should be the start to any holiday planning and the research should include more that looking for the telephone number of the local travel agent.

I have outlined 7 points that I undertake when looking for my next break, not necessarily to Thailand beaches. You found this page so you know how to use the internet so what you will be doing isn’t rocket science and the list is by no means complete but it may give you an idea into what you can do.

7 Points To Great Holiday Research

1. Decided on what type of holiday you want, beach, city or forest break. If you want a combination of these then do the following 6 steps for each destination.
2. Note down 5 phrases or words that come to mind when you think about your chosen destination.
3. Put these phrases into Google or any other search engine you may use and have a look at the first page results, then ignore them.
4. Move to page 2 and 3 and working your way down ignore hotel booking services and visit the web sites that seem like information pages and have some relevance to your searched term or phrase.
5. Look for locations on these web pages that maybe you have never heard about or read about and take a note of the name.
6. Search for this unknown location and take note of the number of pages with the term.
7. The location with the least number of pages should now be your focus for your next holiday destination.

Here is how it all works:

I love Thailand beaches when I’m on holiday, I think of white sand, palm trees, blue waters, cool breeze and deserted beaches. So now I have my 5 terms I’ll put them into Google one at a time.

White sand Thailand returns 2.35 million results I skip the 1st page and go to page 2 and skip anything that looks like a hotel booking service. Bingo about half way down I see Amazing-Thailand.com – Tropicals Islands in Thailand a quick scan of this page shows me 2 locations I’m not familiar with and have not seen anywhere else, Koh Larn and Koh Turatao.

I search for Koh Turatao which returns 1,380 results and Koh Larn which returns 55,400 pages. So my first holiday research place would be Koh Turatao.

This type of holiday research may not work every time but it will open your eyes to the other destinations at your chosen location. Finding deserted Thailand beaches is not impossible today but a word of warning. The locations of these deserted beaches will be, by there very nature, far from any commercial outlets, medical centers or English speaking locals so it may not all be paradise. Finally, I would like to ask that if anyone does come across any Thailand beaches that may not be know yet as they travel Thailand then please keep it to yourself, after letting me know ofc

I have visited Thailand every year since 1998 with my wife at first then with our children as time went on. We have roamed from the north of the country to the south and stayed in accommodation no more than a bamboo shack. We have however travelled in a little more style and stayed in greater luxury than that shack, well you feel you must with children!!!

On one of our holidays we visited a small little know area in Krabi called Ao Nang. It wasn’t exactly Alex Garland’s The Beach but it certanly didn’t have all the trappings of your usual holiday destination.

Krabi is a province in the south of Thailand and is well known for its craggy limestone mountains and the island of Phi Phi. Ao Nang itself for many years was very much by-passed by many holiday makers except people from Sweden and Norway, I’m still not sure why this is or what was the attraction to just these nationalities!! But it was the mountain climbers that really made Ao Nang a holiday destination, with many of the small islands just off the beach providing some of the best climbing in Thailand.

Ao Nang is a U shaped town with the bottom part of the U kissing the Andaman Sea and the legs up the sides with all the main hotels and few restaurants. The beach front now provides a beautiful walk along a decorative walk-way on the opposite side of the road to all the shops bars and restaurants. In the development of Ao Nang Krabi council are determined to learn lessons from mistakes that Phuket have made and as such there are different local laws here that protect the environment as well as you as a tourist. The town is a lot more quiet than most destinations in Phuket but there is also a lot less to do during your day, this can be a good or bad thing depending on what you want from your holiday

A positive point about Ao Nang is that unlike Phuket and Pattaya there is no visible bar areas, that’s not to say there is no bar areas, just that they are not in your face with their neon lights and pole dancing girls and they don’t come close to reaching the size you will find in the other 2 locations.

From a divers view there is very little difference in the travel time to the dive sites in the south part of the Andaman and in some cases the travel time is a little shorter. There are 3 main local dive sites Koh See, Koh Ha and Koh Yawabon and these are all about 30mins boat ride from the beach. Longtails are used to get to these sites which makes it a little difficult when kitting up and getting back on the boat but the main negative point to diving locally here is the poor visibility. On some occasions the viz may clear to give you about 15-20m of cloudy waters but it can go as low as 3-5 m which doesn’t make for great diving which is a shame because I have found some really nice underwater life here including seahorses.

So why is Krabi my choice destination?

Well making Ao Nang your destination in Thailand for your holiday gives you all the same dive sites in the Andaman that are avaliable from Phuket with no difference in travel time. You can still enjoy the Similans by liveaboard with transfers to Khao Lak just as easy as if in Phuket. It does have a nightlife, it’s just not as garish as other destinations, this to me alone makes it a more child friendly destination. The people in Ao Nang are not as out to drain every penny from you and seem far more friendly. The beach has no jet skies, banana boats or parascending thanks to some of those local Krabi laws, this seems to me like they are trying to return the beaches to the people, although in saying that there are far too many longtail boats there, i hope the Krabi council see this and sort it soon. You will not find any beach recliners on the sands so you can sit wherever you want and not where someone puts there chairs, another of those Krabi laws. The down side to this however is limited shade and this causes large groups of people to huddle under the nearest tree, of which there are not many. For me and mine? Well we just get off the beach and shade else where, like the ice cream bar, from the mid-day sun, but we would do that anyway shade or not. !!!!

This has just been a ’short’ post about some of the things that make me prefer Ao Nang in Krabi to other beach destinations in Thailand, what is your favourite Thailand destination? Why not leave a comment below?

A View Of Ao Nang Front