Lipa Noi Beach in Thong Yang Bay - sunsets and fine sand

Thong Yang is one of the two most famous beaches of Koh Samui, which are positioned as «wild and desolate» for connoisseurs of true island solitude, silence and contemplation. The second wild beach is usually called Taling Ngam, which is on the same side of Koh Samui.

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

Toponym «Tong Yang», this is the name of the bay in which the beach is located, which, by the way, has another, more common name - Lipa Noi. Although, in fact, Lipa Noi is a village that stretches along the coast of the bay. The beach starts from the promenade Ko Samui Hospital, known for its humane prices for medical services.

It stretches along the Tong Yang Bay for 4.5 kilometers to the Naval Base with a checkpoint, a barrier and a machine gunner. Before reaching the checkpoint, the road along the beach turns left, and Lipa Noi continues around the corner of the island for another 1,200 meters.

From Thong Yang Beach, the island chain of the Ang Thong National Marine Park is visible. Throughout its entire length, Lipa Noi beach is distinguished by an enviable constancy in its width, about 5 meters. Moreover, this beach is not the widest on Koh Samui, especially at high tide..

The sand on Lipa Noe is very fine and sticky, yellow in color with a strong admixture of black sand, which generally gives the effect of a gray beach. Lots of seashells. The cleanliness of the beach is maintained only in front of hotels, villas and resorts, which are at a decent distance from each other. The north of Tong Yang is dirtier than the center.

The central part is relatively clean, but in the south, closer to the base, there are already deposits of marine and human debris. The beach becomes completely abandoned after the Naval Base, in the area of the Raja Ferry pier, which is also called Lipa Noi Pier.

In case anyone is interested in reading about other places, I have a short overview of all the beaches of Koh Samui, will help you decide on the choice of the beach.

Entering the water, depth and waves

There is entry into the water with a flat sandy bottom in most areas of Lipa Noy, but only in the center of the beach is the bottom slope steeper than other places. Shallow water is also present here, but still, after 50-100 meters, you have a chance to take your feet off the bottom and take a human swim. The sandy bottom here has a small muddy coating, in which small mollusks live.

By scooping up sand with your palm and washing it, you can get a handful of shells of different sizes and colors. Sometimes you step on stones invisible under water with your feet.

The water on Tong Yang is muddy, and in cloudy weather it is not at all pleasing with the scenery. At low tide, the sea moves back no more than 5-7 meters in the central part of the beach, but this distance increases in the north and south of Lipa Noi. Where serious shallow water begins. In the evenings, a lot of locals come to the shore with children, an ideal beach for children.

Sun beds and shade

There are no exotic boulders on Lipa Noi, like on Lamai, but there are a lot of trees. There are plenty of areas with natural shade on the beach, in some places the beach is blocked by the strongly protruding stone foundations of a villa or a bar. But these same villas and bars offer sun loungers..

Beach photo

Infrastructure

The Lipa Noi area is located on the edge of an island civilization, but it is not such an abandoned place. Many foreigners live here and even more local people. Of course, Lipa Noy loses in terms of the activity of life, in comparison with Chaweng, or Nathon, or Lamai.

The main entertainment is presented in the form of kayak and jet ski rental, there are also several bars and one large Nikki Beach club..

But not lovers of parties, shopping and noisy companies come here, but people looking for solitude. So for the goods of the nearest convenience store, you will have to go to the Ring Road or to the neighboring Nathon. Hypermarkets Makro and Big Sea are located strictly on the opposite side of Koh Samui, which is about 25 km and an hour away by car.

The nearest large shopping center to Tong Yang is Tesco Lotus on Lamai - 18 km, about 40 minutes drive. The nearest attractions of Koh Samui:

Waterfalls Hin lad and Wanorn Waterfall;
Temples Hin Lad and Ko Samui;
Chinese temple in Nathon;
Samui Cultural Center;

Houses and hotels on the beach

Since Lipa Noi Beach is indeed one of the least built-up areas of the island, guests of coastal hotels still have an amazing opportunity to see palm groves around the territory, and not the walls of a neighboring hotel. Distances between hotels are about 200-300 meters.

Buildings are interspersed with wastelands and truly deserted areas of the coast. In the interior of the island, you can find many options for self-rental housing. There are a lot of new buildings and plots of land cleared from the jungle that are being prepared for building.

Considering the plans of the administration of the island and financial investments in its development, there is not much time left for those who want to come to the island, and not a noisy, crowded resort.

From the hotels on the coast, one can distinguish luxury cottages and resorts with excellent reviews: the large houses of the Kanok Buri Resort, the pleasant and spacious Rajapruek Samui Resort and the superb stylish Nikki Beach Resort Koh Samui. .

Comfortable small houses with their own small pools: Sea Valley Hotel and Lipa Lodge Beach Resort. Little Pearl Family Resort lives up to its name - funny little beach houses, white both outside and inside. Think and Retro Cafe Lipa Noi Hotel - original houses made of iron containers, painted in cheerful colors. Also right on the shore.

If you want to book a hotel here in advance or look for accommodation on other beaches, I have selection of hotels on Koh Samui with a good rating and reviews.

Lipa Noy hotels>

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

There are many options to get to the beach. Tong Yang is too long and sparsely populated for its infrastructure to create any obstacles to travel to the sea. The most convenient option is the flat asphalt road 4174, which runs from Ring Road straight to the water, ending at the walls of the Lipa Bay Resort with a large parking lot for vehicles.