One Month On The Thai Islands – Your Itinerary to Island Hopping
One month on the Thai islands hopping from island to island, are you smiling yet?! Laying on that warm sand, soaking up that Thai sun and drinking a cold coconut. That is going to be YOUR life for a month!
We see that smile getting bigger on your face 🙂 For us, a month of island hopping in Thailand was living out a dream. Get your sunscreen ready because here we goooooo!
How To Get to The Thailand Islands
Depending on your budget, which islands you want to see and how you like to travel, you essentially have a few ways to get to the islands…
- Fly
- Bus it down there
- Train it down there
For us, we took the overnight train from Bangkok to Surat Thani. Do we recommend it? Absolutely!
It was extremely comfortable. Did it take a while? Sure, it did, but we had the time and the price was right.
We went with a company called 12Go Asia via Thai Railways and it cost about $34 USD.
Best Time to Go To Thailand Islands
Thailand gets hit twice a year by two different monsoon seasons. For you, you only care about the one that hits the islands.
The best time to head down south is between January to May. The east side as well as the west side have favorable sunny weather that will allow you to get to and from any island on either side of country with ease.
West Side – Andaman Sea Islands (Krabi, Koh Phi Phi, Etc.)
As soon as June hits, the west side enters their wet season.
From June to October, the Andaman Sea islands get daily down pours and thunderstorms which makes outdoor activities and getting to and from the islands by boat, extremely difficult.
The weather starts to change from wet days to sunny days starting in November.
East Side – Gulf of Thailand Islands (Koh Phangan, Koh Tao, Etc.)
Unlike the West Side of the country, the East Side doesn’t see it’s rainy season pick up till about August.
From August till December, the east side islands enter their rainy season. Just like the west side, daily down pours and thunderstorms make outdoor activities and getting to and from the islands by boat, extremely difficult.
The weather begins to break in January and nothing, but sunny days lie ahead!
One Month Itinerary To Thailand Islands
For us, we concentrated on 5 islands – Two on the Gulf of Thailand side and the other three on the Andaman Sea side.
Below is our day-by-day route to help you plan your days in the Thai sun 🙂
- Day 1: Depart for The Islands: Bangkok to Surat Thani
- Day 2 to Day 6: Koh Phangan
- Day 7 to Day 14: Koh Tao
- Day 15 to Day 17: Koh Phi Phi
- Day 18 to Day 21: Krabi
- Day 22 to Day 24: Koh Lanta
- Day 25: Leave The Islands
A side note when viewing this route:
We left from Koh Lanta to head onwards into Malaysia to Langkawi island. For us, this route made sense as we were continuing south.
However, for those of you needing to return to Bangkok to fly out of the country, no worries. Simply switch the order of the last two islands.
For example, instead of going from Koh Phi Phi to Krabi then onto Koh Lanta rearrange it to be Koh Phi Phi to Koh Lanta then Krabi.
Fly out of Krabi’s airport to get back to Bangkok, Chiang Mai or wherever else you’d like to go.
TIP: If you want to continue south from Thailand into Malaysia, by ferry, we have a separate post on how to help you plan your over sea border crossing.
Transportation To & From Thailands Islands
Surat Thani to Koh Phangan and Koh Tao:
Getting to and from each island was pretty easy and fairly straight forward. Once we arrived in Surat Thani, we used ferries to get to Koh Phangan and to Koh Tao.
We booked our ferries through our accommodations and had no issues. There are several ferries that run throughout the day between Koh Phangan and Koh Tao so you have times to choose from.
Koh Tao to the Andaman Islands:
Now, this part was a little tricky as no ferry from the Gulf of Thailand can take you directly to the Andaman side of the country.
So how did we get from Koh Tao to Koh Phi Phi? We booked an overnight ferry from Koh Tao to the mainland.
Once we arrived on the mainland, a bus picked us up and took us to a ferry terminal where we caught a ferry to Koh Phi Phi. All in all, it was about a 12-13-hour journey.
We booked this through our accommodation in Koh Tao and had absolutely no issues. Once in Koh Phi Phi, we took a ferry to Krabi and then a minivan onto Koh Lanta.
Again, all of these were arranged through our accommodations.
About Our One Month Thai Island Route
For us, it was our first time to Thailand, so we wanted to hit those must-see spots. By no mean is our route “off the beaten path.”
Maybe with the exception of Koh Lanta, we visited the most popular Thai islands and for good reason…They. Are. BEAUTIFUL!
However, there are opportunities for you to “get away from it all.” There are more developed and less developed sides to these islands.
For us, it was a good mix of everything. We had crazy pub crawls to try if we so wanted or we could spend the day relaxing in a hammock surrounded by no one.
All in all, we can honestly say we really wouldn’t change our route. Our whole goal of this route was to scuba dive, snorkel, party some nights, hike a few viewpoints but mostly relax on the beach and just chill.
We are here to say, we did just that. Thailand you’re a 10 outta 10 in our book!
WANT MORE INFORMATION ON THAILAND?!
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Happy Travels,
– Lauren & Jesse Stuart (The Stüs)
