Ko Lanta for Kids

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As we have already traveled to many parts of Thailand, the goal for this trip isn't to sightsee, but just to pick a spot to hang out in for a couple of months and experience daily life with the kids. But which island? Ko Phangan? Too much partying. Ko Phi Phi? Too overrun and expensive. Ko Samui? Too much sleaze. Phuket Island? No, just no! Ko Kradan or Bulon Leh? Nice, but not enough infrastructure for staying long term with small kids. We need access to medical in case something goes wrong, and a minimart for essentials - diapers, wipes, snacks...



It had been ten years since we'd last been on Ko Lanta. We had good memories of it being at that right level of development. Not overrun by large concrete hotels, but with enough infrastructure. After doing some research, we decided that we'd give Ko Lanta a go as a family. It definitely met our expectations. Here's the scoop...



Ko Lanta is an amazingly kid-friendly island, thanks in part to the hundreds of Swedish families that come here each year for months on end, and put their kids into one of the two Swedish schools. We stayed on Phra Ae (Long beach) for the entire two months, but at three different hotels, which I'll review later. But first an overview of Ko Lanta and Long Beach. We decided to stay on Long Beach as that's where we'd stayed before and we remembered the beach to be wide and sandy and the sea to be nice and clear with a soft sandy bottom. No rocks to hurt little feet. When we arrived on the island it was just as we'd remembered and we were instantly happy. Unfortunately, it was a weird weather year and we had an unusual amount of rain and stormy weather for high season. This meant that the beach got eroded away by big waves at times, and the ocean got churned up, making it far less clear than usual. But like I said, it's been unusual weather. You can usually expect clear waters and a deep beach.

ACCOMMODATION

In the past in Thailand, I'd only remembered seeing small huts with just a double bed and not a lot of room for much else, so I was interested to see what would be on offer now that we were looking for rooms for four. Did they even exist?



The first place we stayed was confusingly named Somewhere Else bungalows, located towards the northern end of Long Beach. We had a big concrete bungalow just steps away from the beach with two double beds inside. It was cooled by two wall fans and surprisingly had a hot shower (usually only air-conditioned rooms have a hot shower, so this was a nice surprise!) We paid 1,000 baht per night (about $28). This seemed expensive compared to what we used to pay in Thailand (more like 300-500 baht per night) but we did have four people, and times have changed since we were here ten years ago! The restaurant at Somewhere Else was good and we'd eat breakfast each morning on one of their ocean-view platforms. This worked out well as the kids could run around on the beach searching for hermit crabs while they waited for the food to arrive. At night, the restaurant wasn't lit up invitingly like most of the others on Long Beach and they didn't play music. This was perfect for getting little ones to bed! This hotel isn't on any website to book, but you can instead do it the old-fashioned way - call Mr Tom or Mr Dang at (66) 089-7311312 or (66) 081-5360858

Pros: big room, hot shower, very close to the beach, good restaurant, fairly cheap

Cons: big windows with thin curtains that let in light and heat (making afternoon naps tough)



This room was already booked for the Christmas season so we had to move out. We decided to book another place using booking.com as Christmas can be an accommodation nightmare in Thailand. We came across a hotel called Good Days Lanta Beach Resort which was touted as very family friendly. It even had a pool, which would be a nice treat for the kids over Christmas. We decided to book an a/c room as we were not sure how the fan room would be for the kids sleeping. It cost a lot for Thailand at about $60/night so we were definitely flashpacking, but at least it included breakfast! We stayed in a total of three different rooms. All had either two single beds or a double bed, but nowhere for the kids to sleep. When we asked for extra beds for the kids we were told that each was charged at 1,000 baht per night. What?! That would completely change the price, effectively doubling it, which is why I hate to book online. When we objected they quickly backed down and agreed to two mattresses on the floor for free. Phew!



The rooms were much smaller than at Somewhere Else but it was nice to have the air-conditioning, especially for naps. They pushed the adult beds to the side of the room and squeezed two kid-sized mattresses on the floor right beside. The space was so tight that one of the mattresses was curled up slightly, overlapping the other. This turned out to be a good thing as it made a more defined edge to each kid's bed, stopping them rolling into one another in the night. Another thing we liked was having a fridge in the room to store their bedtime milk and a bit of fruit. Two of our rooms here had blackout blinds, and one annoyingly had paper-thin curtains.



The breakfast was buffet style which was actually quite good for the kids as they could try a bit of everything to find what they liked. Also, we could encourage the kids to eat a little fruit without having to buy an entire plate for 100 baht, only to have them waste most of it. It wasn't the best breakfast buffet though, and it was loaded with flies, which was extremely off putting.



Pros: a/c and fridge, nice pool overlooking the beach, free breakfast

Cons: expensive, small rooms, beach in front wasn't as nice as the northern end, not a lot of eating options on the beach so you had to walk up to the busy road.



After the Christmas and New Year rush was over we were happy to move back up to the northern end of the beach. We spent our final three weeks on the island at Best House, located directly behind Somewhere Else Bungalows. It's a big two-storey building instead of the beach huts we are accustomed to in Thailand, but it was tastefully done. Everywhere you looked we're potted tropical plants and strings of intricately threaded shells. We booked in person at reception, but it can also be found on agoda.com. We had a huge family room with a double bed and two single beds (which we moved to the floor so the kids don't fall out!). There was a/c and hot water, and even a little kitchenette attached (which we didn't use). It was 2,000 baht/night, or about $56. The only major downside was the lack of view. In Good Days Resort we'd had huge patio doors, which were great when we were stuck in our room on stormy days. This room had two small windows with frosted glass that you couldn't see out of but that let those evil early morning sun rays in. We tacked a thick blanket up the whole time, effectively turning the room into a dungeon! Still, we were back at the better end of the beach and it was so nice to have restaurant options on the beach, meaning we never had to trek to the busy main road.

Pros: great location, a/c, fridge, big family room

Cons: a bit pricey, dungeon-feel

RESTAURANTS

We found an amazing variety of restaurants catering to children. Here's the lowdown:



ThaiCat: This is probably our favorite, and the kids' favorite too. It's a huge outdoor restaurant with tables right in the sand, sparkling lights in the trees above and, most importantly, toys placed on the beach right in front. Most popular were the blow up horses you can ride on, but they also had an impressive collection of trucks and diggers. They had an extensive menu, including a huge kids' menu, great food, and great service - the waiters would literally sprint the considerable distance from the kitchen to your table! They soon got to know us and would greet the kids by name as we approached. It's located a five minute walk north of Somewhere Else Bungalows.



You & Me: This Swedish-run restaurant overlooks the beach and has a kids' corner in the back of the restaurant with a few toys and a TV showing Disney movies. They also have live music most nights, and the food is good. It has an expensive children's menu, even though our picky eaters would eat nothing on it. We ended up feeding them crackers and cheese and fruit from the minimart beforehand, saving us a ton of money as we then didn't need to order them food. They were far too busy watching the movies to have time to eat anyway! It's located right on the beach, next door to Somewhere Else Bungalows.



Patty's Secret Garden: This Brit-Thai run restaurant, named after the owner's daughter, became our favorite when we stayed at Good Days. It is on the busy main road, but when you go inside you'd never know it. True to the name, you enter through an archway of creeping plants and into a little green oasis. There's a fairly large kids' area with a huge amount of toys, but it isn't well maintained and the toys are often broken or dirty. Still, our kids loved it. The food was tasty and they had a kids' menu/comfort food menu! It was located on the main road a short walk south of the Good Days Resort access road.


Bambie's Restaurant: Located overlooking Klong Dao beach, this restaurant has a small splash play area suitable for the 2 to 6 year old crowd. It's completely free if you eat there, and Kyla and Jake loved it! The only downside is that the water is quite chilly so my kids were too cold to continue playing after about twenty minutes. Go on a hot day!



Indian Bar: Also on Klong Dao, this is great at sunset when you might get a visit from "bubble man." He's not paid to be there, so there's never a guarantee, but he is apparently there at sunset most nights, unless it's too windy. After dark, there is a fire show most nights by the kids in the local Swedish school. Friday and Saturday nights tend to have the most fire dancers as there's no school the next day!



Mama's Dining Room: We only ate here once but I'd definitely recommend it. We ordered pizza instead of our usual Thai choices and it was excellent. My four year old daughter was instantly in love with the mango sticky rice as it came out in a flower shape! They had two play areas, one with blow up horses to ride on and a few toddler/baby toys, and a separate area with a small metal play structure. It gave me heart attacks though as it was placed over concrete (part of the reason we never went back). It was located on the main road, just a little further south than Patty's.



Karlsson's Restaurant: This restaurant is part of the Lanta Manda hotel. It's very characterless and we were not impressed by the food. We only went once to be fair, so we could have just ordered the wrong dishes. We ended up here during a rainstorm as Mama's was closed. It had a great play area for the toddler crowd so we were happy to spend a couple of hours here, letting the kids play. It's located between Mama's and Patty's Secret Garden.



San Sun Set Bar: This bar/restaurant isn't catering specifically to kids like the others I've mentioned, but it does have a nightly fire show, starting anywhere between 8pm to 8:30pm. Our kids were obsessed with it! Try the pineapple fried rice, served right in the pineapple, yum! Neighboring Sea Sun Bar also has a nightly fire show. We often went there for just a drink at fire show time.

ACTIVITIES

When looking up activities to do on Lanta, they seem to focus around tours to neighboring islands or animal activities. We didn't want to pay the mega bucks for the islands tours as we'd already seen them on past trips to Thailand, and I'm pretty sure the kids couldn't care less. So I looked into the animal activities. Elephant riding is the big thing, but there's also a snake park and a monkey show. After researching for only a few minutes on each one, I quickly came to the conclusion that all were not treating the animals fairly and I didn't want to support such a business. So what did we do on our two months in Lanta?...



Our major activity was the beach. Most kids love the beach, and Lanta has a great beach for making sand castles and playing in the sea - no rip currents or big waves (usually) in high season at least. One thing we did do was hire a "truck-tuk" for the day with my parents to see more of the island. The kids had fun exploring the different beaches and especially enjoyed watching a man pull coconuts down from the trees with a long stick. We ended the day at old town. There is a playground there but it was pretty run down and there were burning hot embers from a bonfire the night before, right in the middle of the playground. A bit concerning! We did hear of a restaurant in old town called The Royal which supposedly had a playground and even bumper cars that the kids could drive on! Unfortunately, it was closed for a month when we visited!



One other fun activity for the kids was painting some batiks. One day, as we were sat on a platform at Somewhere Else, we watched two Thai guys setting up sarongs to sell. They then looked around at the restaurant crowd and mentioned that, in honor of Children's Day, they had some free paintings. Kyla and Jake both jumped at the chance! They enjoyed it and wanted to do another one. Given that I'm not exactly a fan on their first batiks of Pokémon characters, I decided to design my own. I gave my fish design to them, and the next day they showed up with the canvases all ready to go. The kids again had a fun time painting them, and I'll have a cute souvenir from this part of our trip. After painting them, the men have to take them away to boil the wax away, dry them, and return them the next day. All of this they did for just 50 baht (less than $2) for each one!



One "activity" that a lot of families did was check their kids into one of the Swedish schools or, for other nationalities, the Global Village School. We checked it out but didn't end up having them go, but we did hear good things about it. For preschoolers, you can sign them up for a whole semester full time, pay for just a few days per week, or you can pay on a drop in basis, perfect for if you need childcare only once in a while. It's worth checking out at http://www.gvslanta.com/





To sum up, I can't imagine a more kid-friendly island in the world, but I'm certainly going to be continuing the search!



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