Experiences

Charlie's Bar & Restaurant

Tapas and cocktail bar · Hin Kong · 700 m, about a 10 minute walk south along the beach road

Charlie's opens at five, which is about when the Hin Kong sunset starts doing its thing. Tapas and cocktails come out in the bar and lounge, while the restaurant behind runs a blackboard menu of larger plates that changes with what came in that day. The barman knows his spirits, and the wine cellar sells bottles to take away at a discount if you would rather drink yours back at the villa.

Coco Locco Beach Bar & Restaurant

Beach bar and restaurant · Haad Yao · 4.5 km north, about 12 minutes by scooter on the west coast road

Coco Locco is built into the front of TropiCoco Beach Resort on Haad Yao, so you can drink upstairs with the whole bay laid out in front of you or take the steps down and eat with your feet in the sand. The kitchen covers tapas, Thai and Western plates and a long list of Italian pizzas, and the bar does a buy-one-get-one happy hour on its hundred-baht drinks. There is a saltwater pool alongside if you want to turn it into a whole afternoon rather than just a sunset.

Photo: Christophe95 · CC BY-SA 4.0

L'Alcove

French beach bistro and bar · Hin Kong · 300 m, about a 5 minute walk south along the beach

Two French hosts run this bistro straight onto Hin Kong sand, five minutes down the beach from us. The kitchen swings between French plates and Thai ones, and the cellar holds over sixty wines by the bottle with a good spread available by the glass. On Friday and Sunday nights the music turns into a full show with dancers and fire, going until around eleven.

Closed Mondays. Live musicians play at sunset most nights, but the singers, dancers and fire show only run Friday and Sunday evenings, from about 9pm.