Banthaisangthain Resort — Hotel in Ko Samet

A long weekend with friends in a sea view room. ||||The view was beautiful like in the pictures and very relaxing. But the sliding door was stuck, so repairs could be helpful. A bit of bad luck during our trip: since there was a loud high school group on site (20 teenagers), a bit disrespectful at times noise-wise (but they are kids, depends on your tolerance). Noise isolation was not great... But it's often the case these days. ||||For the beach itself, very lovely. Restaurant food was very decent according to my Thai friends (great seafood dishes), but as expected prices are island prices, so keep that it mind. It was nice though to have a drink and eat in the evening with a relaxing music in the background and then a live acoustic music bit. ||||However, the service is below 3 stars. The staff generally had a listless attitude and did not seem well trained. Perhaps it stems from the lady who is at reception, who seemed to be stressed out all the time and was not very good at answering questions, nor that friendly. Our last day, a cleaning staff asked us to leave our room for check-out. Since her tone was a bit abrupt, my friend told the reception. Friendly service is basic hospitality knowledge. The Restaurant staff guys did their job, but at times service was slow, as mentioned in other reviews. One or two of them were really great and kind to us for the full 3 days :) ||||In sum, 3/5 stars. The location and cadre of having a calmer beach area was great. Night activities were fun, good relaxing music and a fire show (a plus). A needs improvement would be the service. I also noticed that some of the staff were friendlier with the white tourists, which is a shame. But we'll leave it to the staff management to educate themselves about internalized racism. Hopefully one day that...

Don’t get this place confused with the Sang Thian Beach Resort a few doors down. We did, and ended up spending one night in a place we hadn’t already paid for. Yikes. Although both places are fairly equal, each with its own benefits. Ban Thai is a small hotel built in the traditional style. It’s located in the middle of the beach with restaurants in both directions. The beds were nice and comfy, which is a big deal in Asia, as most beds are rock hard. The owner is very nice and friendly, and her English is quite decent. The beach in front of the hotel is hard to describe. It’s hemmed in on both sides by cement decks from the neighboring hotels, and additionally hemmed in by some naturally occurring rocks, but it is a white sand beach. It is fairly quiet, even though we were supposedly there during high season. We really loved the shady trees covering most of the beach, where we able to place a couple of chairs and a table, read our books, watch the birds and the ocean and take occasional dips in the water. We were at Ban Thai for 5 nights and our room never got cleaned or straightened. Our only other complaint is with the noise. We really need to stay away from “Traditional Thai Architecture.” Although lovely, it means the rooms have absolutely no sound-proofing from the neighbors. This means you here all there conversations and whatever tv show or music they decide to listen to. But, we are sensitive to sound, so this might not bother others. But we really enjoyed ourselves on the beach, we may have never had such a relaxing vacation...

We stayed here in a low season. It means one thing: completely empty beach and a total peace but also a total lack of everything around. No minimart open, one (excellent) restaurant in a nearby hotel opened until 6 pm. The resort looks fantastic on the photos but reality is rather different. Small very dark wood room with just one very shaded window covered with a dusty mosquito net, no light at all. It gives a sense of staying in the closed box. The bathroom has its own weird restrictions and a shower works when it wants to. Wifi was ok only because there was nobody but us. Beds are a real nightmare, hard and slippery. Fortunately we were alone and could actually hear every single word behind a wooden wall. I couldn't imagine how one can share the bungalow with other people. The AC is noisy and quite old. The stuff are lazy and either don't speak English or don't want to. A bunch of girls wandering around doing nothing or directly laying on a floor of the reception, completely annoyed. We booked a super offer on booking.com and had a bad surprise. The hotel wanted the whole amount of money, not the offer. After half an hour discussion we came to an almost half price. Instead of attracting people to the hotel in a low season they do everything to repulse them. I wouldn't advise to anyone the bungalows up the hill, unless you're a very athletic person and walking up the stairs every day is ok for you. The resort is very pricey for what they...