Ao Plai Laem belongs to the category of wonderful places that are under your nose, remaining unnoticed. Moreover, you can get here within three minutes after unloading from the ferry in Tong Sale.
But people are made in such a way that they are not always ready for the fact that happiness can be obtained so easily. Therefore, 99% of tourists, with wide open eyes and maps, fly past this secret (for hurrying) place. But it is here that you will find a mix of the most important things for a beach holiday: shelter stones, fine sand, azure sea, palm trees over the water and - sunsets. But the beach is not without remarks.
The content of the article
- one Beach description
- 2 Entering the water, depth and waves
- 3 Sun beds and shade
- 4 Beach photo
- five Infrastructure
- 6 Houses and hotels on the beach
- 7 How to find the beach
- eight Beach Map
Beach description
Play Laem is located at the foot of a low wooded hill dividing Tong Sala and Ao Hin Kong. Thanks to this geography, the beach is absolutely invisible from the road, has a very winding and interesting coastline, about 1.2 km long.
At the very beginning of the beach, going down to the sea is quite problematic due to the steepness of the slope, but from the middle and further to the north, the already not steep hill becomes more gentle. There are already good concrete paths that lead directly to the beach. At its core, Play Lam on Phangan is not a continuous strip of sand, but a series of small coves separated by mangroves or rocks..
Entering the water, depth and waves
Ao Plai Lam is ideal for a beach holiday without any pretensions for full bathing. The bottom here is shallow, and to the depth you have to cut from 200 to 400 meters towards the horizon, and that's not all. The first hundred meters will be clean and soft, and the next 100-200 will be slippery stones overgrown with shells. In general, walking barefoot there is very fraught.
This is its only drawback. Otherwise, we have here: a clean sandy bottom along the coast, huge boulders and stones are scattered all over the beach, behind which you can hide from prying eyes.
The sand is fine and grayish yellow, without unnecessary impurities. Weather permitting, the beach looks like a picture on a screen saver. At high tide, the beach disappears along its entire length, and the sea comes close to the rocks, shore and artificial fences.
Sun beds and shade
There is no specialized rental point on Ao Plai Lam, and all the sun loungers are located in the territories of rare hotels. The whole beach, in principle, looks wild, and sun loungers for it are more the exception than the norm. At low tide, sun loungers can be placed on the sand closer to the water, but within the shade of the trees.
The main shadow here is of natural origin, from palm trees and mangroves, this good is here in bulk. If you walk along the coast, then sometimes you have to wade right through the mangroves, under which, if you wish, you can quite comfortably settle down at low tide.
Beach photo
View to the left towards Tong Sala, which is not visible because of the cape.
The water is slightly cloudy and you can see stones under the water. Monsoon season, low tide, afternoon.
View to the right, because of the mangroves, the rest of Ao Plai Laem beach is not visible
The shore behind the beach is all overgrown with greenery of various sizes.
If you walk along the coast, then not before the ebb and flow and not in the shale
In some places you will have to go through thickets of mangroves
Here I filmed the sequel to Ao Plai Lam, after exiting the thicket
In the approach, it is clear that the coast is generally deaf further, I did not want to go to the end
Infrastructure
On Ao Plai Laem, most infrastructure facilities are located between the sea and the main road, and for the most part they belong to those resorts and hotels that are built on the first line.
In fact, this is a small hotel village, where there is almost no private sector, and tourists receive all services and amenities at the place of accommodation. The buildings are very rare, there are many vacant lots, there are practically no shops, only a few private tayshops.
From local attractions - Amsterdam bar, which is located higher up the hill and is considered an iconic bar and viewpoint in the west of Phangan. There is a lesser known and more behind the scenes nearby Top Rock Bar.
All major shops and banks, restaurants and rentals are located three minutes south of Thong Sale.
Houses and hotels on the beach
As I said above in the text, mainly housing on Ao Plai Lam is represented by hotels and guesthouses. There are several private villas on the hill behind the road with excellent views of the Gulf of Thailand, Koh Samui and Andaman Marina Park.
More than half of the resorts have high ratings from visitors, so there is plenty of room to roam when choosing a location. In my opinion, it makes sense to settle in Ao Plai Lame only if you like to watch and walk at the sea, but prefer to swim in the pool..
Due to the unpopularity of the beach, there are always few people here, but Tong Sala is close by, magnificent views and a lot of cozy places on the shore. Here are three options that I considered on my recent trip:
- Glass Cottage
- The green palm
- Sea Scene Resort
Hotels near Play Lam>
Be sure (and I insist) to check for discounts or special offers on the excellent Roomguru service. He will quickly and easily show you discounts in all existing booking systems. In Asia, for example, there are a lot of offers on Agoda.com, which are much more interesting than for exactly the same hotels on Booking.com.
For the lazy, here are the direct links to the hotels listed above:
How to find the beach
The main thing is not to accelerate too much, moving away from Tong Sala in a westerly direction. You will be there in just five minutes. As a guide, I would recommend looking out for a metal structure along the way, such as those on which road signs are hung in the Russian Federation..
A metal U-shaped arch with a banner along its entire length is so difficult to overlook. Near this arch, any turn to the left will lead to the sea. I went down the hiking trail at the very beginning of Ao Plai Lam, walked about a hundred meters along the shore and returned to the road at the new Ban Jaidee Resort.
Hiking trail from the main road. For an amateur.
Access to the sea from Glass Cottage and Baan Jaidee Resort
Beach side view of Glass Cottage and Baan Jaidee Resort
Beach Map
Ao Plai Laem Beach Map
Ao Plai Laem Beach Map:
