SAii Koh Samui Villas - Adult only 12 plus — Hotel in Ko Samui

My partner and I stayed at SAii Choengmon in September 2022 and we didn't want our time here to end! We loved every second. Our very detailed review below, but if you don't want to read further please take this as our highest recommendation - we were on Cloud 9 the entire time!

FACILITIES The room/bungalow is gorgeous, modern, clean and spacious and has everything you need. A/C worked without problems, and the blackout curtains are lovely. The hotel has an app where you can find information, contact reception, order room service, request more items etc. which worked great. The wi-fi worked without problems. The private pool is cleaned daily. The grounds are very clean and extremely well cared for. The walk to the restaurants, spa, pool and beach is lined with greenery and you will be accompanied on your way by colourful butterflies, birdsong, and chirping cicadas. The pool area right by the beach is stunning! Lying on the upper deck you're in a lush green oasis; on the lower deck you're right by the beach. The bay is secluded and clean and the waters calm. The hotel provides snorkelling equipment, protective shoes and kayaks for free. We didn't use the gym, but from the outside it looked like a clean, well-equipped fitness room.

STAFF The staff are exceptional. Every single member of staff is extremely friendly and will go above and beyond. They perfectly balance being available and responding quickly to your needs without hovering or pestering you. At no point did anyone try to upsell anything to us. When we had day trips planned, the staff at reception made sure everything ran smoothly with the hotel transfers and were quick to help with contacting organisers etc., even though we hadn't booked the trips through the hotel! Truly fantastic. We hope these wonderful people are compensated well for their amazing work!

FOOD & DRINK The breakfast buffet is great. There's all the western breakfast you would expect; pancakes, french toast, croissants, hash browns, an egg station with omelettes etc. made to order, fresh fruit and juice, yogurt, cereals, bread and spreads, as well as a Thai breakfast buffet with soups, rice dishes and dim sum. Coffee and tea are served fresh by the staff. Beyond breakfast, food and drink prices in the hotel are very much western. We ate lunch at the hotel once and the food was good, but the restaurants in the nearby towns and villages are much better and more authentic, while also being much cheaper. The pool bar has a nightly Happy Hour with 2-for-1 drinks, which we used a lot. They're generous with the alcohol in the cocktails.

LOCATION The hotel is a little off the beaten track, which has the great upside of having the beach basically to yourself, but does mean that you'll need a taxi/moped/car to get into town. There's a 7-11 a five minute walk from the hotel, as well as a couple of restaurants on that particular strip (we highly recommend Pui Relax!) and The Moon massage spa which is FANTASTIC. Cheongmon village is about a 15-20 minute walk...

I felt this hotel was lacking atmosphere. It’s quite a small place, with all rooms having private pools as far as I’m aware. The room itself was done to a very nice standard, and was very spacious. A cot was provided for our baby. We had a small private pool beside our room and it was all well maintained.

Unfortunately there was an ant infestation in our toilet area. We reported it and housekeeping did a good job of sorting it for a couple of days but by the last night they were back. There was also a leak in our bathroom ceiling when it rained heavily.

The most disappointing thing was our visit to the restaurant on the first night. The service was terrible, not a single smile from the waiter and my husband had to go up to get service from him twice despite the restaurant being almost empty. As expected the prices in the hotel restaurant are much higher than any restaurants outside the hotel so we expected good service at least. The chicken was also very dry. Breakfast was ok, and the service was much better, but one day the croissants ran out by 9am and sometimes there was very little bread available. Again it felt like there was very little atmosphere at breakfast, maybe because it’s quite a small place with maybe up to 10 couples eating breakfast at a time, with very little conversation.

We complained to the manager about the service at the restaurant on the first night and she offered us a complimentary dinner which we accepted. The food and service were decent but only after we had finished did they tell us only the food was complimentary but not the drinks. This felt unreasonable given we only had a similar amount of food and drinks to what we had had on the first night.

There’s a small private beach (shared with the hotel next door) which although very pretty has quite a bit of plastic rubbish in amongst the sand. The hotel really need to put a bit of effort into cleaning that up. For us it was a bit of a downside that we couldn’t walk out to restaurants along the beach because it was so small there weren’t any. Generally there were enough sun beds although on one occasion not.

The hotel has an app you can use to contact the concierge and they always responded extremely promptly and helpfully. You can get your laundry done at an external place but organised by the hotel so you just drop off and collect at reception. Not as cheap as taking it outside by yourself but much more reasonable rate than most hotels.

Overall I don’t think I’d recommend it. If you’re looking for a very quiet place to go as a couple where you just relax by the pool and maybe get a taxi out for dinner then this place is fine. But I think it should probably be adults only as it’s not really suitable...

Myself and husband stayed at Outrigger for 5 night for the last leg of our mini tour around Thailand. This hotel was exactly what we wanted it to be after such a busy tour we just wanted something that was peacefully relaxing and quiet. It was a little out of the way from central Ko Samui however we didn't mind. If you did want to get into town the hotel offers a free shuttle service leaving twice daily. Alternatively you can also get a cab into town for 400 TBH from the hotel or use an App called Grab which you can download to your phone and get taxes a lot cheaper. We pretty much used Grab for our whole stay in Thailand, great tip that someone told us just sitting in the shopping mall one day. Anyway, the hotel was a bit small to what I am use to but was really beautiful, I really liked the boutique feel about it, great pool area, meals under the big tree on the beach was also lovely first thing in the morning and in the evening. The beach is a lovely natural beach, however unfortunately its not that usable because there is a lot of rock etc under the surface as you enter the sea. The hotel does provide special shoes that you can use to go in but not a lot of people tended to use them. The pool bar was also great and the cocktails were full on! just how I like them. I was very impressed with our bungalow - it was modern with a natural relaxing decor, spacious and felt very private. Our private pool was great and loungers inviting. One issue we had is that we seemed to have a infestation of little flies in the toilet. Even though the hotel was good with coming in to remove them and spray the room, they still managed to find their way back every morning. To some degree because of the location and the greenery you should expect some kind of insects anyway so I wasn't bothered too much. The hotel was always more then happy to clear and remove them for us when we asked. The other was that there was no mosquitoes net on the sliding doors which I would have thought would have been a standard, it just meant we couldn't really keep the doors open at times. The staff was super polite, friendly and attentive - always giving advise and tips to help our stay better and making the experience as relaxing and effortless as possible. Breakfast I think was one of my favourite things at this hotel as there is also an al a carte menu to order from as well as a buffet, the scrambled egg and smoked salmon with dill cream was divine! and the general buffet selection was great. This was certainly different to any place I've been but loved every minute of Outrigger, beautiful hotel,...