High Season In Samui Now?

[huggybear]

Is it high season in Samui now?

Do you have a lot of tourists? Is it busy?

Anybody in the hotel/hospitality business? You full?Busy?

Just curious as to if you are seeing an impact on the tourist season due to global expense increases across the board.

Thanks and cheers,

HB

[Boater]

it is the low season, well in Lamai anyway.

there are not many arriving at the airport either.

[breezein]

Has been very quiet for about six weeks, past discrepencies catching up

[sbk]

It is always low this time of year. Has been ever since I started living here 20 years ago. However, according to TAT reports for Krabi and Phuket, tourist arrivals are down from the same time last year. So, presumably the same is true for the Gulf side as well.

Phuket Tourist Numbers Drop: Downturn Feared

Krabi’s Low Season Is Inactive This Year While Some Airlines Have Suspended Or Cut Down Their Flights.

[BigC]

It is always low this time of year. Has been ever since I started living here 20 years ago. However, according to TAT reports for Krabi and Phuket, tourist arrivals are down from the same time last year. So, presumably the same is true for the Gulf side as well.

Phuket Tourist Numbers Drop: Downturn Feared

Krabi’s Low Season Is Inactive This Year While Some Airlines Have Suspended Or Cut Down Their Flights.

yes i have been here 6 years i get the same people moaning every year. why so quite now. u would think that by now people specially thai's would know about the high low mid season. people need to calme down or move to bangkok where there is more business

[Samui Coconut]

It is always low this time of year. Has been ever since I started living here 20 years ago. However, according to TAT reports for Krabi and Phuket, tourist arrivals are down from the same time last year. So, presumably the same is true for the Gulf side as well.

Phuket Tourist Numbers Drop: Downturn Feared

Krabi’s Low Season Is Inactive This Year While Some Airlines Have Suspended Or Cut Down Their Flights.

yes i have been here 6 years i get the same people moaning every year. why so quite now. u would think that by now people specially thai's would know about the high low mid season. people need to calme down or move to bangkok where there is more business

Last night Chaweng heaps of tourists.....and my business has picked up as well...Let's hope for a good high season.

[BigC]

YES!!!

[huggybear]

YES!!!

So far the tally is 4 say it's quiet, we've got one that says it's happening. I put validity in the one that says it's happening as he says "his business is in an upturn".

The TAT statistics, well, questionable. Sure we took a hit here in Phuket with bad weather during the Nargis scenario, but we are coming out of it.

Those that say it's quiet, you own restaurants, Inns, hotels? Not to knock, just getting insight.

Cheers and thanks everybody,

HB

[SamuiRes]

I have been here eight years and July always seems to start slow and picks up as the month rolls on. In my usual watering hole in Chaweng there has been a slight increase in customers over the last couple of weeks but not enough to get excited about. However, I suspect that over the next three weeks as the European holidays click in we will see the usual upturn. What we cannot predict at this stage is what effect the financial problems (at least back in the UK) and higher air fares will have on people travelling to the Far East.

[Noodles]

TAT lowers tourism projections

[BigC]

i was in the gym yesterday and it was mobbed with people. YES!!!

[limbos]

The 'tourist' oriented business I work in, diving, definately has picked up over the last couple of days and driving through Chaweng sees an increase in people walking around at any given time of the day.

[PoorSucker]

Mostly families with children now.

They want to have different activities than playing 5 in a row with some bar girl.

[a_classic_cigar]

Mostly families with children now.

They want to have different activities than playing 5 in a row with some bar girl.

Here in Choengmon still quiet - but the numbers have been steady since April anyway. Best of luck to us all in the "business" that we get some arrivals at the airport! The fuel prices along with many aother variables are not really helping. TAT did give some hard figures though that show LOS overall dropping incredibly on the tourism point.

[NHJ]

<br />Mostly families with children now.<br />They want to have different activities than playing 5 in a row with some bar girl.<br />

I did notice that, also i see many young foreign couples nowadays spending their time in samui.

it looks like tourism in spain

[BigC]

i have notice chaweng packed lamui is dead at the moment well it was yesterday

[Samuian]

Estimates from the "core" of tourism related business - 20% downturn... but I agree with Samui Coconut, BigC ... - Chaweng Beach Rd. is a good indicator, yes it's getting busy.

[Mark Wolfe]

It is getting busier in Lamai. A few days ago, across from the Bangkok Bank office, at 1 in the afternoon I was nearly trampled to death by a mob of Russians/East Europeans. I don't know where they roost, but it was crowded for a while. We are coming out of a very slow time. I will miss it....

Oh, and there were two foreign dudes with some scratch cards touting something or other. I moseyed over and tried to see what was going on and the one guy said, "Are you with them?" (the two rubes he was talking to). I said no and he got aggressive, trying to hide what he was doing. I said I lived here and he said, "This is none of your business!" To which I told him in no uncertain terms that we both had the same right to be on the street.

Not for the first time I thought, "You are like 35 years old. This is the best you can do? Working the edges on the scratch-you-won-a-prize gambit in a podunk beach village? Christ! More foot traffic on God's superhighway!"

[flip]

Is it high season in Samui now?

Do you have a lot of tourists? Is it busy?

Anybody in the hotel/hospitality business? You full?Busy?

Just curious as to if you are seeing an impact on the tourist season due to global expense increases across the board.

Thanks and cheers,

HB

i have been to samui last week and actually, talking about chaweng it was quite busy already although it´s still low season..

(talking about the beach, clubs/discos etc.)

high season starts normally around november..

[limbos]

flip,

With all due respect, how well do you know Samui? Your observation that Samui was getting busy last week is correct, but stating that high season in Samui is during November is as far off the wall as you can get. High season now is gearing up towards mid/late July and August, with the European holidays. During November we have a monsoon starting and last year this monsson took the strudel by almost managing to have Samui being called a disaster area because of flash floods and floodings in general.

November is deifinately not high season in the Samui archipel.

[huggybear]

flip,

With all due respect, how well do you know Samui? Your observation that Samui was getting busy last week is correct, but stating that high season in Samui is during November is as far off the wall as you can get. High season now is gearing up towards mid/late July and August, with the European holidays. During November we have a monsoon starting and last year this monsson took the strudel by almost managing to have Samui being called a disaster area because of flash floods and floodings in general.

November is deifinately not high season in the Samui archipel.

Thanks for clarifying that limbos. I understood the high season in Samui was different than where I am in Phuket due to the nature of the monsoonal flows.

As you mentioned, the winds onshore here now mean blowing clear skies in Samui, when that shifts in November generally means the beginning of high season weather here, rains for Samui.

[notime]

HB

i have been to samui last week and actually, talking about chaweng it was quite busy already although it´s still low season..

(talking about the beach, clubs/discos etc.)

high season starts normally around november..

Absolute nonsense. Samui is not Phuket and we have different weather and seasons here. Here are the "official" Samui Seasons:

High saason: 1 Jul to 30 Sep and 15 Jan to 20 Apr

Low season: 1 May to 30 Jun and 1 Oct to 15 Dec

The Mother of All Peaks Season: 15 Dec to 15 Jan (but really 27th Dec to 3rd Jan) .. this is The Week when we make all the money ;-)

Now, to answer the question about the slow-down. It's obviuosly happening or about to happen but it's very difficult to predict its size. Most people are here because of much earlier bookings so there is a seasonal lift in arrivals. Some come from different countries than USA or even Europe that are hardly affected by the crisis like Middle East and Australia or closer markets like Malaysia and HK. The good places, like ours are full but some others, the marginal ones are empty and will remain that way. Now is the time to work hard on improvements and new markets. I feel that in the end even if our sources of guests may change the overall arrivals will still be down. With the exception of the New Year week of course when Samui is going to be chock-a-block full of course :-)

Yan

Baan Luxor

[marshall stanley]

The Low Season on Samui is from Songkran to Loy Kratong, the High Season are the winter months in between.

The Peak season is from around 15 December through to the end of January according to my track records of running a resort in Mae Nam for the past few years.

[Mark Wolfe]

Mostly families with children now.

They want to have different activities than playing 5 in a row with some bar girl.

Five-in-a-row? I never play those children's games but I recall looking at a contest or two and isn't four the magic number?

(The foreign owner/manager? of the Mexican restaurant in Chaweng told me a couple of days ago it was dead up until the 7th...and then they all came. It was hopping like a Mexican jumping bean when I was there.)