Hi, looking for a nice place to stay on Koh Samet in the next 2-3 weeks, beachfront private pool villa, or beachfront villa. Can consider other room types if the hotel / restaurant is outstanding. Ideally on a quiet beach that has good swimming in the sea ( is it choppy this time of year? and if so are their any sheltered beaches? ) We have never been before and would like to hear from people familiar with the island. We will possibly just stay a few days and it would be nice for me to do some cat sailing in the daytime and be close to a night market ( do they have one? ) to keep wife, 7 year old daughter and nanny happy in the evening..If you know anywhere that fits the bill please let me know.

Also any recommendations for similar on the mainland around Ban Phe, can be 50-100km south too. Here we would most likely be interested in renting a villa, we stayed in a nice house at Crystal beach development a few years ago.. Is there anything similar in this vicinity. Or hotels on the beach that are quiet and family friendly.

any help much appreciated.

CM2

Hi

A nice resort you should take a look at is Saikaew Beach Resort - located on Saikaew Beach. they have some nice beachfront poolside villas

it's also close to samet village for evening walks & beach restaurants / bars. Koh Samet won't be busy at the end of june "low Season" - luckily the gulf of Thailand escapes all the high seas & monsoon rains, seas are good to swim in & you can rent hobbi cat at Saikaew beach resort..

a great website for up-to date accurate info on the island is http://kohsamed.net.

best wishes

Well if you prefer a quiet beach then stay away from Saikaew and Ao Phai. I would say most hotels on Ao Phrao fit your requirements or alternatively Paradee resort on Ao Kieaw (most expensive on the island). You should know that Koh Samet is probably the worst value for money in all of Thailand. The hotels are ridicoulesly overpriced and quite poorly maintained. The service level all over the island is also horrible with lot's of cambodian and burmese service staff who can barely speak thai.

Ms Conners wants to go to Koh Samet this weekend. Well she really wanted to go this week but it seems to be a lot of rain but it looks better for the weekend. Question is if it's going to be chock full of Bangkok weekenders? Considering it was just a long weekend maybe it'll be relatively quiet this weekend?

I've never been to Koh Samet so I don't know much about it. Is there any difference in the car parks available? Any particular one recommended?

I understand there are different piers for boats going to different areas? What's a nice are with decent beaches and not too much noise? No need for nightlife, we have plenty of that in Pattaya.

Any inexpensive but decent hotel recommendation ?