What Chaweng's beach road looks like now...

[khunPer]

Now when getting closer to some more opening of amazing Thailand, some might be interested in what Chaweng - where there used to be lots of activity, and life, and parties - actually looks like now, where numerous hotels begin to clean up and make their premises ready for massive tourist arrivals.

 

I didn't get time the a healthy exercise by walking down the beach road with a camera - I could however do with a few less Covid gourmet kilos, so I should consider to do that - but some frames from my dash cam might give you an impression of the status of the well know beach road without tourism, but also without hanging wires and instead "green" environment friendly solar powered new street lights...????

 

Starting from Bar Solo/Soi solo going from north to south (one way street)...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[LA8RAT]

Wow.. I remember when the center of town had a mud road as its main artery.  And the house of the rising sun bar was on the very edge of town. Just a few years later that same bar was in the middle of the town. 

 

Cheers Khunper

[Swimfan]

And all the lovely electrical distribution boxes blocking the footpaths. I never used to mind the overhead wires. Still sadly looks like a ghost town albeit a slightly cleaner one. I hope they don’t get their hopes too high that masses are just going to return overnight. I would not be surprised if 70% of the businesses are closed permanently due to no capital left to resume operations. 
it’s likely to be a long road to full recovery. 
Hoping I can return in March.  

[Tropicalevo]

I rode through Chewang at about 20.30 on Friday night (15th). Yes - early for the 'old' Chaweng.

I only saw two places that were open.

Ark Store Bar and Black Bamboo.

[Danderman123]

I hope there are more than 2 bars open now.

[ozimoron]

On 10/16/2021 at 7:59 PM, LA8RAT said:

Wow.. I remember when the center of town had a mud road as its main artery.  And the house of the rising sun bar was on the very edge of town. Just a few years later that same bar was in the middle of the town. 

 

Cheers Khunper

 

[khunPer]

3 hours ago, Danderman123 said:

I hope there are more than 2 bars open now.

There are no bars open, perhaps from January, but restaurants are allowed to sell alcohol when serving food, so some places are now "restaurants", or at least they serve food. I think all still need to close at 11 pm or Midnight. The beach road in Chaweng is however still almost dead as a Dodo - apart from take way kebab - last time i checked. However, I must admit  that I'm not headed out dancing several times a week around beach road-area at the moment, as i would likely be disappointed and only get a ????

[steelerian]

The only 2 nightlife places open in the centre of Chaweng are The Ark Store Bar and The Black Bamboo.

Then there is Old Skool Bar by the lake, and also some open on Soi Reggae.
The Black Duck is now open also.

[spidermike007]

Samui is utterly devastated. As is Phuket and Pattaya. It appears to have been the intention, all along. Destroy the nightlife here completely, and rebuild tourism in their own image of snow white purity.

 

We know it to be hypocritical nonsense, but they seem to live the false Quaker facade. 

[Tropicalevo]

1 hour ago, spidermike007 said:

Samui is utterly devastated.

Bit of an exaggeration. Chaweng and Lamai are devastated.

Bangrak was quite lively when I drove through last night. Most bars open.

I am off to a bar in Maenam tonight that has been open for some time now.

Last time that I went there (before the rains) many other bars on the ring road were open.

Sorry. Restaurants. ????

[khunPer]

5 hours ago, spidermike007 said:

Samui is utterly devastated.

Chaweng and Lamai, not Samui, which is so much more than Chaweng beach road and ditto in Lamai; however, you are not here, so how would you know...????

[Tropicalevo]

13 hours ago, Danderman123 said:

I hope there are more than 2 bars open now.

Sunday night - I have just driven to a friend's bar in Maenam.

From what I saw in Bangrak, all of the bars were open except Papa Joe's. There were even a couple of bars open near Bangrak market.

Heading from Bangrak to Maenam, about six bars open on the ring road just before the police station.

Not many customers, but that was at 19.30 on a Sunday night.

 

[spidermike007]

4 hours ago, khunPer said:

Chaweng and Lamai, not Samui, which is so much more than Chaweng beach road and ditto in Lamai; however, you are not here, so how would you know...????

Visited twice in the past year. And weekly messages from friends on the island. Seems to have improved slightly lately. Not much. Will take years. 

[gearbox]

22 hours ago, Tropicalevo said:

Sunday night - I have just driven to a friend's bar in Maenam.

From what I saw in Bangrak, all of the bars were open except Papa Joe's. There were even a couple of bars open near Bangrak market.

Heading from Bangrak to Maenam, about six bars open on the ring road just before the police station.

Not many customers, but that was at 19.30 on a Sunday night.

 

I spent 7 nights in the Phuket sandbox, and I'm back in Samui since late last week. Compared to Phuket Samui is dead as Dodo.  Some of the beach bars in Patong were 100% packed during the day, the alcohol flowing freely, the staff running around to get extra chairs and tables. Bangla road night time looks surreal compared to any place in Samui. No "certified green zones", "blue zones" "whatever colour zones" and tons of other hard to follow restrictions - are they expecting in Samui the tourists to read and memorize this cr1p?

The sha+ and the other hotels are attractively priced, my 4 star hotel had happy hours serving great cocktails 170 baht for 2 cocktails. One would have hard time to find any good place in Samui serving cocktails in this price range.

Before covid Phuket was still getting more tourists than Samui, but now the relative difference is huge - there are many more times tourists in Phuket. Looks like in the Surat Thani province they have no idea what to do to attract more business.   

[khunPer]

13 minutes ago, gearbox said:

Before covid Phuket was still getting more tourists than Samui, but now the relative difference is huge - there are many more times tourists in Phuket.

November is high season on Phuket, and no season on Samui, earlier many resorts simply closed fra 1st November until just before Xmas. Furthermore it's little different different clientele visiting Phuket and Bangla Road than Samui, so not easy for a straight comparison, not to forget that Phuket's airport can handle long distance international flights, and also have European charter flight arrivals...???? 

[Tropicalevo]

9 hours ago, khunPer said:

November is high season on Phuket, and no season on Samui, earlier many resorts simply closed fra 1st November until just before Xmas. Furthermore it's little different different clientele visiting Phuket and Bangla Road than Samui, so not easy for a straight comparison, not to forget that Phuket's airport can handle long distance international flights, and also have European charter flight arrivals...???? 

Yes. Many forget that before we had 'no season' that this time of year was 'shut-down' season here on Samui.

 

Just as a reminder. If anyone has friends/family coming - car hire. We have some guests coming in December and they are struggling to find car rentals. (Hertz has closed at the airport. Not sure about others.)

[PoorSucker]

17 hours ago, gearbox said:

I spent 7 nights in the Phuket sandbox,

Same experience in September.

[steelerian]

15 hours ago, Tropicalevo said:

Just as a reminder. If anyone has friends/family coming - car hire. We have some guests coming in December and they are struggling to find car rentals. (Hertz has closed at the airport. Not sure about others.)

Yes many are all booked up, and expect to pay normal pre covid prices for car and motorbike rental again now. 

[The Hammer2021]

Samui was ruined through over development completed by the building of the airport. Hopefully, that kind of dreadful mass tourism will never return and a less crass, less brash environmentaly friendly tourism will develop. The airport ruined it

[Albert Zweistein]

You call this beach road ? Never been on Patong beach road I suppose.

[khunPer]

10 hours ago, Albert Zweistein said:

You call this beach road ? Never been on Patong beach road I suppose.

You see, the great benefit in Chaweng is that tourists actually live in charming boutique resorts hidden among palms and trees on the beach side, and therefore don't need to stay in tall hotel buildings, and cross a heavy trafficked road to get to a public beach like in Patong; Chaweng's land side is mainly shopping, and some of the restaurants and nightlife...

[Albert Zweistein]

2 hours ago, khunPer said:

You see, the great benefit in Chaweng is that tourists actually live in charming boutique resorts hidden among palms and trees on the beach side, and therefore don't need to stay in tall hotel buildings, and cross a heavy trafficked road to get to a public beach like in Patong; Chaweng's land side is mainly shopping, and some of the restaurants and nightlife...

Apart from Patong Tower no tall hotel buildings along Beach road in Patong, 3 years ago I stayed in a charming boutique resort as you call it at Chaweng and it seemed boring to me.

I was happy to escape from there after a week but of course everybody have different ideas.

[gearbox]

On 11/24/2021 at 4:28 PM, khunPer said:

You see, the great benefit in Chaweng is that tourists actually live in charming boutique resorts hidden among palms and trees on the beach side, and therefore don't need to stay in tall hotel buildings, and cross a heavy trafficked road to get to a public beach like in Patong; Chaweng's land side is mainly shopping, and some of the restaurants and nightlife...

I can't see any benefits at all, especially for the tourists on the wrong side of the Beach road, they either have to trespass through some hotel or walk up to a kilometer or two to access the public entry places to the beach.

It is a pleasure to walk the promenade at the Patong beach, walking Chaweng sometimes it is just not possible, the resorts and restaurants in their greediness encroached so much beach land,  now at high tide the beach is not passable and their structures suffer damage as well.

 

 

[gearbox]

On 11/23/2021 at 2:54 AM, khunPer said:

November is high season on Phuket, and no season on Samui, earlier many resorts simply closed fra 1st November until just before Xmas. Furthermore it's little different different clientele visiting Phuket and Bangla Road than Samui, so not easy for a straight comparison, not to forget that Phuket's airport can handle long distance international flights, and also have European charter flight arrivals...???? 

True, but July and August are high season in Samui and low season in Phuket....and what did Samui get? One thousand tourists coming with 100+ flights.

 

I was told by a restaurant owner that to be included in the "Green zone" to sell alcohol one needs to prepare tons of paperwork and pay 3000 baht for the privilege. Total nonsense for an island where pretty much 100% of the adult population is fully vaccinated and only fully vaccinated visitors are allowed as well.

[A1Str8]

I used to live there for some time. 

It's such a shock to see it this way.

[suzannegoh]

On 11/24/2021 at 12:36 AM, The Hammer2021 said:

Samui was ruined through over development completed by the building of the airport. Hopefully, that kind of dreadful mass tourism will never return and a less crass, less brash environmentaly friendly tourism will develop. The airport ruined it

Didn't the airport open in 1991?

[khunPer]

18 hours ago, gearbox said:

I can't see any benefits at all, especially for the tourists on the wrong side of the Beach road, they either have to trespass through some hotel or walk up to a kilometer or two to access the public entry places to the beach.

It is a pleasure to walk the promenade at the Patong beach, walking Chaweng sometimes it is just not possible, the resorts and restaurants in their greediness encroached so much beach land,  now at high tide the beach is not passable and their structures suffer damage as well.

 

 

That is nature, i.e. high tide and monsoon season, not greediness; you are posting pictures from the rainy monsoon period - which is October till mid January on Samui - and a closed entertainment venue, closed for long time like all entertainment venues in Thailand, which make it look more dystopian. Chaweng is a great set at the moment for another dystopian Hollywood thriller...

 

So how are Phuket's beaches during the rainy monsoon period over there, and especially Patong's beach - it's a different period from Samui, as Phuket is mainly hit by the west monsoon, where samui is hit by the east monsoon. I forund a few pictures on Google from monsoon period over there...

 

Caption says "Patong Beach 9th June".

 

Caption says "Pathong Beach".

 

Caption says "Rainy season view from room 7319 - Picture of Amari Phuket".

 

And then there are a number of Google-pictures og garbage washed up on the beach, which happens everywhere after stormy weather, and of course also on Samui.

 

All the years I've been living on Samui the wide beaches become narrow during monsoon season, with water all way up to the palm lines, and sand washed up or away. Some places it's changing with the season and direction of the waves, the same sand being pushed forth and back. It's not greed, it's nature, and it's probably been like that long time before the German backpackers commuted to the island with the coconut boat, and thereafter wrote an article in a travel magazine about "paradise". When tourism began, luckily some started to build corrosion protections by sandbags and cement to protect part of the coast line, without those protections nature might have moved even more sand, and damaged the palm trees.

 

Some beaches are hardly walk-able during the monsoon season in November (top) compared to dry season February 2(bottom); images are from this year, 2021...

 

And massive of sand can be moved during the year, it's the same every year; here with western current from July and up to October (left image is from October 2021. you cannot walk there), and then in November the eastern current moves the sand back, ready for next high season from Xmas to April (right image is from April 2021)...

 

But Samui of course don't have a beach promenade as Phuket and Pattaya, and if that's what you want, you shall not chose Samui for vacation - luckily we are all different - some like to live on the beaches, other prefers to live further back and take a walk on a nice promenade; however, Samui has a bit like it in a smaller scale by Fisherman Village in front of The Wharf...????

[Tropicalevo]

 

2 hours ago, suzannegoh said:

Didn't the airport open in 1991?

Just before then (1989).

The 'over development' didn't happen until much later.

[khunPer]

Little updated dash cam-stills driving from north to south on the normally busy middle section on Chaweng's beach road in the evening 4th January 2021. Much more light and life now, and taking the Covid-situation into consideration it has improved a lot, but unfortunately still many closed places...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Tropicalevo]

7 hours ago, khunPer said:

Much more light and life now, and taking the Covid-situation into consideration it has improved a lot, but unfortunately still many closed places...

I think that the recovery is going to take a very long time.

The government policies make Thailand a less attractive destination.