The Waters Khao Lak by Katathani

The Good, rooms spacious, comfortable and clean, ok may need a lick of paint but no complaints there. Staff 99% fantastic and helpful. Location fantastic, 5 minutes walk to beach. Lots of restaurants close by. The bad, breakfast not great but was sufficient. The Worst - we booked direct with the hotel which included the transfer from and to the airport, on arrival fantastic, they were there waiting for us. The day before we were due to return we went to reception to find out our times for pick up and was informed the return taxi to the airport was not included. After a long and what ended up as a fairly heated discussion, we asked to see the manager, we were informed she wouldn't be in until the following day. On the day of departure we went to see the manager (who quite blatantly ignored the fact that both the arrival and departure date's along with flight numbers were stated in the confirmation) informed us that if we wanted them to organise the transfer they would charge us another 2000 bhat. Unfortunately this has put a real dampner on our experience. We have every intention of returning to Khao Lak for a 3rd time, but will be looking at other accommodation, which is a shame, but we don't like being 'ripped off'.

The good: Breakfast was OK. Some of the other reviews mentioned breakfast was lacking and we can see why. The food didn't taste greatng, but we found it more than suitable. It's by far not the best breakfast we've had on holiday, but good enough. The pool area and bar were great. Gym was good (for a hotel gym). Bed was comfortable, room was clean and pillows were OK. Rooms were cleaned and serviced everyday. The hotel had free motorbike parking and every shop/resteraunt you could ever need, including a cheap wash-and-ford next door to the hotel. Beach is a 5 mintue walk.

The Bad: Gym had no air conditioning. WiFi was unreliable. After my third attempt to make a bank transfer I had to go to a nearby cafe and use their WiFi. The Air Conditioner wasn't fantastic, it was good enough to get to sleep but the room was never comfortable, I think maybe the air conditioner needs a service or filters cleaned, it's almost as if the humidity stayed in the room but the head was removed. The air conditioner unit made 'snoring' noises which was odd, although didn't affect sleep too much. The showers hot water runs hot/cold which makes for a very unhappy shower. The toilets are western, but you can't flush toilet paper down, have to use a nearby bin. The photos of the rooms "conveniently" omit the sign advising the toilet style.

The Worst: Each night, around 10pm and lasting to anywhere from 10:30pm to Midnight, the nearby bar starts the live music which for any light to medium sleepers would keep you awake. Our room had ZERO noise insulation. The first night this was amusing to hear a local Thai man singing "Country Roads" at full volume at 11:30pm, by the 3rd night it was frustrating. If this wasn't annoying enough, my partner purchased two drinks at the hotel bar. She paid in cash, however the hotel then tried to charge us on checkout for the drinks. They let us go, telling us everything was OK and we wouldn't be charged. A day later we noticed my credit card had being charged for the amount of the drinks. This is straight up, no way to avoid it, stealing and theft by the hotel. I never authorised the credit card transaction.

Conclusion: We wouldn't return to the hotel and can't believe how they've gotten such high reviews, unless people come to visit Khao Lak only and go home without experiencing hospitality of the rest of Thailand. We can see why the rating and reviews are high, but we thought they were overly generous reviews given some of the shortcommings, not to mention the outright theft by the hotel. Having explored the local area we'd probably stay at some of the hotels further north (Pakarang Cape to Bangsak Village area) which are a similar price however you get a much much higher standard of hotel than the ones near Nang Thong. From there you can take a scooter into town when needed, but given we were SCUBA diving and on snorkling trips for most of our holidays, we never really needed to be near the busier parts of town.