I like your style Sunbear

Thanks McBabe...though style is not usually a word associated with me...unless its lack of it

Sorry Jeannette but knowing the hotel it did make me chuckle- a Freudian slip. Reminds me of the time I sent an e-mail to IT support at work telling them of the problem I was having with my hard disk on my PC. Some how I typed dick rather than disk. Boy did I get ribbed about that one as the e-mail got forwarded around the office.

nothing wrong with a bit of wishful thinking.

I've been to the Hyatt Regency Hua Hin last year and it's wonderful. It's a luxurious low-key resort where even the poolboy knows you by name. The pool area is wonderful and the largest in Hua Hin, possibly the largest in Thailand offering not only freeform mainpool areas but also interconnected rivers and waterslides, grottoes, waterfalls and jacuzzis. It's also got the best Thai-place in town, where there is an all-you-can-eat-served-by-the-table-option for about 600 baht. The rooms however are not as stellar as the rest of the hotel since they are not really big. Ground Floor rooms are larger but have no balcony, Upper floor rooms have balconies but are smaller (the balcony is the portion that is enclosed in downstairs rooms). The beach is so-so, like everywhere in Hua Hin.

hello all, we have just booked our honeymoon to the anantara going on the 10th sept, when the rainy season starts is it continous for two months ie goa or is it just downpours then back sunshine? also why do people describe the beaches as so-so? it will be our 1st time to thailand and have no idea what to expect. thank you. phil ps how many baht do you get to the pound?

there are 73 baht to the pound just now( usually only in the 60s)
RE HH the beach is not why you go to Hua Hin. You will spend your time by the pool. While we enjoyed our holiday I was disappointed with HH and would ONLY consider going again if all I wanted to do was crash out for a few days after a busy time in Bangkok. I did not find that there was a great deal to do. There were some lovely restaurants and we did have a right laugh at the beginning as we arrived in time for the Songkran festival( April)This involves people throwing buckets of water over everyone, having smeared your face with foam first. We knew about it but someone on one of our trips had not known and stepped outside his hotel in designer gear to a bucket of water. I remember thinking I was glad I wasn't going home at that time!
Our hotel, the Marriiott was lovely and the Anantara has a super reputation. One tip, make sure you have a loo stop before setting off for Hua Hin. The stop off half way along involves squatting toilets!

just checked the rainfall for HH in September and, to be quite honest I would not go then. 202mm is some rainfall. Do a bit more research by trying
http://www.travelforum.org/thailand/main.html
and post a question there to get others who have actually been to answer. Koh Samui has only 75mm of rain in September and has lovely beaches. There is also an Anantara there if you have second thoughts( I would think that would make it easier to change)
I know this is not news you want to hear but I think it is best to be truthful.

The Anantara in Hua Hin is a lovely hotel. Personally I quite like Hua Hin as it has the feel of a real town. It has a good night market and some good restaurants. There are some interesting trips out...Petchaburi with King Mongkuts summer palace and observatory, Sam Roi Yod national park. You can also do the River Kwai from Hua Hin.

Weather wise the stats I have show Hua Hin as having 116mm average rainfall for September compared to Koh Samui having 193mm so I would stick with Hua Hin

That is interesting about the stats- have now checked three brochures- two have my stats and one has yours Sunbear. Why can't they get it right?

Sunbear
just realised we have already had this conversation!!!!

You think thats bad Fiona...sawasdee.com has Hua Hin on 82mm and Koh Samui on 209mm for September. Most of the websites I have visited have Hua Hin as drier than Koh Samui in September. Kuoni brochure has 5ins for Hua Hin and 8ins for Koh Samui which sort of ties in with the figures I quoted previously which I got from the Hong Kong Observatory website which gives figures for places in SE Asia.

Thats right Fiona I rememberer you saying you got some figures from Thomas Cook brochure - I remember going through a TC worldwide brochure a few years ago and they could not even get the photos of the hotels right..I imagine a few people were ending at hotels and thinking they looked nothing like the brochure photo.

Phil
sorry to give you the wrong stats info!

Oh yeah with regard to the beaches being described as so so. They aren't that bad...kind of remind me of beaches in Florida like Clearwater..a long strand of beach that stretches for miles...not as good as the beaches in Samui or Phuket or Krabi but OK.

thanx everyone, is it monsoon rains in thailand or is it more like a tropical downpour that lasts for a couple of hours then back to sunshine? also is the sea swimmable? i should really have looked into this before booking me thinks. sorry one more.. are there any other beaches near hh that we could explore? thanx again all. phil

Phil I don't think you should worry too much. Phuket and Krabi are going to be much wetter in September...you have picked one of the drier areas of Thailand to visit. The Anatara is a very nice hotel set in great gardens.

Sawasdee.com describes the best times to visit Hua Hin to be December to September - the rain season running from October through November, Koh Samui is described as already being in the rainy season.

There are a number of nice beaches south of Hua Hin. we visited one in the Sam Roi Yod national park though this was a few years ago, and things have a habit of changing rapidly in Thailand. Best to check which ones to visit when you get there. There is an island off the coast that some trips do for swimming and sunbathing.

Fiona,
you are right about the brochures they seem to have completely different weather stats...I've just been through about 20 of them. I think I'm going to stick with the figures I got from the Thai Meteorlogical office a few weeks back that had the rainfall for Koh Samui and Hua Hin as being about the same give or take a couple of millimetres. There do not seem any kind of figures that agree.

this probably explains why there always seems to be some heavy showers when we go to KS in July! I thought it seemed an awful lot for 50mm!!!
( seemed to rain almost every early evening which was ok as we never went out till they finished anyway!)