My Thailand Travel Guide

I've been traveling Thailand with my family since 2014. We come back three or four times a year – sometimes for a week, sometimes for a couple of months at a stretch. After dozens of stays in dozens of hotels, this is the running guide I'd hand a friend planning their first Thailand trip.

Thailand isn't all the same place. Bangkok is dense, chaotic, and the best food on earth. The north (Chiang Mai) is slower, cooler, and the easiest part of Thailand with small kids. The south (Phuket, Krabi, Koh Samui, Koh Yao Noi) is for beaches and resorts. You almost always want at least two of these on the same trip – usually Bangkok plus a beach.

If you only have time to read one page on this site, read Where to Stay in Thailand. It's the answer-first breakdown of which neighborhood (or which island) to base yourself in. Everything else builds from that.

Thailand is best for:

• Affordable luxury hotels – the same dollar buys more in Thailand than almost anywhere else. The Mandarin Oriental at $400/night is the same room that costs $1,200 in Tokyo.
• Family travel – kid-loving culture, easy logistics, and pools at every price point. We've brought ours from age 3 to age 16 and it's only gotten easier.
• Food – Bangkok and Chiang Mai both have world-class street food, and the best high-end Thai cooking on earth is also here. Plan one meal per day around a place.
• A second-week beach – pair Bangkok with Krabi, Phuket, or Koh Samui for the Bangkok-plus-beach trip that's the right answer for 80% of first-timers.
• First-time Asia travelers – friendlier than Vietnam to figure out, more food than Japan for the same money, and English is everywhere it needs to be.

Book the best hotels 3 to 6 months ahead for December through February (high season, peak weather). For the shoulder months (May–June, September), you can wait a little longer and you'll find better deals – the weather is also still fine, despite what the internet tells you.

If you have questions I haven't answered on the site, just email me. hello@bangkokjohn.com – I read every one.