Thailand with Kids: Which Coast, Which Month

Thailand is an unusually easy country to bring children to. What decides whether the trip is the one you hoped for is not the hotel or the flight. It is the month, and the reason is specific to this country: Thailand has two coasts that keep opposite seasons, and school holidays do not move.

Why the month decides the coast

This site measures rainfall on both coasts from thirty years of reanalysis data, and wave height at twenty-one beaches from four. Both measurements say the same thing: the Andaman coast on the west and the Gulf on the east run about three months out of step with each other.

For an adult travelling on flexible dates that is interesting. For a family it is the whole planning problem, because the dates are handed to you by a school and the only variable left is where to point the aeroplane.

Each holiday window, measured

February half-term: the best week there is

February is the driest month in Thailand. Five of the six places we measure record their annual minimum rainfall in it: Phuket 32mm across six rain days, the islands 25mm, Koh Samui 41mm. The sea on the Andaman coast is at its calmest of the year, and the Krabi bays are averaging around a quarter of a metre of wave height.

If you have a February half-term and the budget for a long-haul flight in it, this is the answer and there is no serious competitor. Book early; it is not a secret.

Easter: cross to the Gulf

April is where the Andaman turns. Phuket goes from 93mm in March to 152mm and twenty rain days, and it is the hottest month of the year everywhere in the country. The Gulf has not turned: Koh Samui is still at 99mm and still in its dry run.

The other April consideration is Songkran, 13 to 15 April, which is the Thai new year and three days of nationwide water fight. With children it is either the highlight of the trip or an ordeal, depending entirely on the child and on whether you saw it coming. Transport sells out weeks ahead of it.

Summer holidays: the Gulf, and it is not close

This is the single most useful thing on the page. In July and August the Andaman coast takes 223mm and 248mm of rain and its west-coast beaches average wave heights above 1.1 metres. Koh Samui in the same weeks takes 90mm, and Chaweng averages between 0.31 and 0.36 metres.

The Gulf in the northern summer is not a compromise for families who cannot travel in winter. It is the calmer sea, the drier weeks and the better beach, and the only reason more British families are not there is that nobody tells them the country has two seasons.

October half-term: the difficult one

October is the Andaman’s wettest month everywhere at once. Phuket 315mm, Krabi 338mm, the islands 297mm, all annual maxima. And the Gulf has turned as well, with Koh Samui at 270mm on its way to a wetter November.

There is no dry coast in October, and it is the one school holiday where the honest advice is either to accept rain or to go north instead: Chiang Mai comes down to 132mm and is on its way to the best month of its year.

Christmas: the Andaman, at a price

December brings the Andaman back under control at 103mm and the sea to about half a metre. Bangkok records its driest month of the year, 11mm across two rain days. The catch is entirely commercial: from roughly the 20th, prices on both coasts go to their annual peak and stay there into January. The first two weeks of December are the same weather at a fraction of the cost, which is small consolation if you are tied to term dates.

Where the calm water actually is

Within the right season, the second decision is which beach, and this is where the wave measurements earn their place. Ao Nang, Railay and Phra Nang in Krabi never average more than about 0.43 metres in any month of the year. Kata and Nai Harn on Phuket reach 1.34 metres. They are sixty kilometres apart in the same sea.

The reason is geography: Krabi’s beaches sit inside Phang Nga bay with Phuket island itself between them and the open Andaman. If small children and swimming are the point of the holiday, that fact is worth more than any hotel review.

On the Gulf side, Bophut on Koh Samui’s north coast is shallow and calm and is the one most families settle on, with Chaweng’s length and noise a short drive away when somebody wants a change.

Getting there and moving around

It is eleven and a half to twelve hours nonstop from London Heathrow, and about fourteen with one stop from anywhere else in Britain. Bangkok is the arrival point for almost everyone, and everything beyond it is a domestic connection: ninety minutes to Phuket, an hour to Koh Samui.

Two things worth building into the plan. Island ferries mostly stop running in the early afternoon, so a flight that lands at four means an unplanned night on the mainland. And crossing between the two coasts is the longest journey in the country: Phuket to Koh Samui is 261 kilometres and can take ten hours by road and boat, or under an hour in the air.

The ordinary practicalities

• Mosquitoes. Repellent in the morning and again at dusk, and long sleeves in the evening. This is the daily habit that matters most.
• Food. Less of a problem than people expect. Rice, noodles, grilled chicken, omelettes, fresh fruit and mild curries are everywhere. Mai phet means not spicy, and it is worth saying before the dish is made rather than after.
• Sun. Thailand is between six and twenty degrees north. The middle of the day is genuinely fierce and the standard local answer, which is to be somewhere else between eleven and three, is the right one.
• Scooters. Do not, with children. It is the most dangerous thing visitors do here and the insurance rarely covers it.
• Water. Bottled or filtered. Ice in restaurants and bars is made commercially and is fine.

What a family fortnight looks like

In winter, three or four nights in Bangkok to get over the flight and see the palace and the river, then a domestic hop to Krabi and the rest of it on one beach. Two moves in fourteen days. In summer, the same start and then Koh Samui instead, which is an hour’s flight from Bangkok.

The temptation with a fortnight is to add a third place. With children it is usually the thing that turns a holiday back into travelling.