Bailan beach – What to expect
2023 – 24 Update
✔ Value for money accommodation. But you’ll probably want to rent a scooter.
✔ Close to Lonely Beach , but more R-E-L-A-X than P-A-R-T-Y
✔ No natural beach. What there is, in front of Mercure Hideaway, is pleasant but artificial.
Lonelier than Lonely beach
Bailan Bay is the least developed area on the west coast of Koh Chang, which is why we liked it so much when we first visited back in 2003 and originally planned a small bungalow place here. The land that we rented is now the site of a builder’s merchant. Back then, the lack of a sandy beach meant that there hadn’t been the same mad dash to buy up land and build resorts as on other areas of the west coast.
That’s still the case, but things are changing and there are a growing number of small resorts in the area plus one 4 star, the Mercure Hideaway (formerly the Dusit Princess) And adjacent to the Mercure is Treetop Adventure Park, a ‘must visit’ if you or your kids enjoy an eco-friendly adventure plus some thrills up in the trees.
The resorts in Balian are low key affairs, intended for travellers who value a bit of peace and quiet and who have grown out of the urge to party till the early hours every night. This in turn means that the road through Bailan hasn’t seen any large scale shophouse development. The quiet hamlet still retains a laid back local vibe far removed from that of Lonely Beach, a 15 minute (1km) walk to the north.
As you head south from Lonely Beach the first resort you reach is Bailan Bay Resort. You won’t see the bungalows but will see their restaurant on the right, on the roadside at the top of a rise. Steep steps lead down to the bungalows which are fairly simple but are in a beautiful location on the shoreline. No sound except the waves lapping on the shore.
The small headland gives great panoramic views south across the bay and north along the rigged coastline towards Lonely Beach. Another, slightly more plush, but still laid back resort is adjacent, The Mangrove. A kind of designer hut resort with very simple, but stylish, wooden huts hugging a hillside that leads down to an open kitchen / restaurant area and small strip of beach. It’s one of those places that doesn’t do any advertising and attracts customers by word of mouth recommendations.
Flashpacker Haven
During the late 2010s half a dozen new backpacker bungalow resorts have sprung up in Bailan. Many are very nice little bungalows – mostly wooden and clustered around tropical gardens.
The best of the mid-range bungalow resorts in Bailan is probably Harley Moon Hideaway, owned by a big bike loving South African couple. Seven cozy bungalows plus restaurant around a landscaped garden and with a blood red pool. (As seen in the photo further down the page.) Their nearest rival is probably the new Fresh Bailan run by an Aussie / Thai couple that has new bungalows from just 1,000 Baht/night.
Target visitors for these type of resorts seem to be older flashpackers who want a bit more comfort than the normal budget hut provides and also a quiet place to chill. But as this area doesn’t see many visitors outside peak months, so you can often find some great deals on rooms here and get far more for your money than you can on Lonely Beach.
On the beach, the grandly named Bailan Beach Resort has AC rooms and bungalows and a pool by a small strip of sand for 1,500- 2,000 Baht/night in High Season. It was a very popular, peaceful place. However, it’s popularity seems to be its downfall – at least as far as keeping it as a simple bungalow resort goes. A new hotel block opened a couple of years ago, followed by a huge concrete restaurant / reception area.
On the roadside, directly opposite the entrance to Bailan Beach Resort is ‘Lazy Republique‘. A small resort with a pool and handful of AC bungalows for around 1,000 Baht/night, very friendly, knowledgeable owners and good food. It gets great reviews.
Nearby, ‘Kwaimaipar Orchid Resort’ is attempting to take the wooden hut theme more upmarket and appeal to people wanting a more organic food / spa type of place to stay. A bit pricey for what it is though. Directly opposite lies ‘St Tropez’, a handful of fan bungalows plus pool, restaurant and Petanque court / pitch. Yep, the owner’s French.
And then you have then new ‘Tarzan Island’ , a large roadside restaurant with range of new wooden bungalows on the hillside at the rear. Opposite is another nondescript concrete bungalow resort – Kamrai which has simple aircon bungalows in a garden setting.
One more place to check out is ‘Jungle Garden’, which was formerly just a bar & restaurant – albeit a very good one – they now have brand new bungalows and the island’s only dedicated Hammock Hut, with handwoven hammocks from a small village in the north of Thailand. Even if you aren’t staying there, well worth checking out if you’re looking for a good quality hammock.
Following the side street in the middle of the village will bring you down first to the newly opened ‘Fresh’, and then ‘Green Cottages’, owned by a Thai singer/actress and with fan & AC and a small pool, big enough to cool off in but you won’t be doing laps.
Also down here by the sea are couple more relatively re-named including Elephant Bay Resort (formerly Gu Bay Resort) which is better value than most budget resorts as it has a pool, large garden area, is by the sea and there’s some funky decor in the restaurant / reception / bar area.
Rounding off the resorts, at the end of the track is Bailan Hut a.k.a. Koh Chang 7 Guesthouse, some interesting pre-fab AC bungalows right by the shore and more traditional ones behind. Also has a large restaurant and does some good deals on set meals.
For at least a little bit of a sandy beach you then have to head back to the main road and south a couple of hundred metres, take the turning to Lucky Gecko Garden, flashpacker bungalows that always get good reviews, to ‘The Whitehouse’. This has pretty good bungalows and a very nice freeform pool right by the sea. There are cheaper rooms in a hotel block at the rear of the restaurant, these look out over the car park. But as the resort is usually quiet, you should be able to get a good deal on a bungalow even in high season. They have a small beach which seems to be formed from sand that has washed over from the Mercure Hideaway next door.
The Mercure Koh Chang Hideaway is a resort owned by one of the ferry companies but managed by first the Dusit group and now Accor. It aims to rival the Emerald Cove, KC Grande and The Dewa as Koh Chang’s best hotel. It doesn’t though. But is often much cheaper.
The resort itself isn’t what you’d call attractive, it’s concrete and more concrete with not a lot of garden area or open space, other than the car park. However, prices are often very good for a 4 star hotel – with some great deals outside of the High Season. And the rooms are stylish and modern. Plus there’s a picturesque beach.
In the past there was no real beach, just rock pools at low tide here. However it’s amazing what a couple of breakwaters and several thousand tons of sand can do. Hey presto, as if by magic, the resort had a nice little beach.
But at low tide you’ll see the sludgy, rocky mess that still exists. Nice place if you want to relax by the pool, not so good if you want to swim in the sea or walk along the sand for more than 50 metres. You can’t. The big plus is that adjacent to the resort is a very laid back little beach bar / restaurant called ‘Lisca Beach‘. If you stay at the Mercure you’ll probably find yourself hanging out beachside here. Adjacent, there is also a small shop ‘Tid Koh Studio’ selling homemade clothes and handicrafts during high season.
And for something a bit different, Lisca Beach has a couple of ‘glamping tents’ i.e. posh camping.
Map of Bailan beach
This is just the highlights to help familiarize yourself with the area.
Bailan bay itself is very beautiful, a kilometre wide crescent of shallow water. At low tide you can see locals and workers from the hotels wading out a couple of hundred metres to collect shellfish and crabs. The shore is still lined by mangrove in some places, although most resort owners have decided that their properties are more attractive to visitors if it’s cut down.
Back in 2003, we met the guy who was supervising the land clearing in preparation for the construction of, what is now, the Mercure. He had a small shack on the land and used to get up early in the rainy season to watch the dolphins that could be seen off the southern tip of the bay. He’s long gone and so are the dolphins.
On the main road the village centre of Bailan is one of those ‘blink and you miss it’ places, it’s hard to tell when you are in the centre of the hamlet and by the time you realise you are, you are already heading up the hill and on towards Bangbao.
In the centre there is a cluster of small restaurants and a couple of local families have also now turned their houses into small homestays and discovered that visiting backpackers would prefer cornflakes for breakfast rather than rice and Thai curry. A revelation made all the more pleasing by the fact that the profit margins on cornflakes, sandwiches and English teabags are far higher than those on a plate of ‘Pad kapow moo sap’ and a 15 Baht bottle of Coke.
Down the sidestreet leading to Koh Chang 7 Guesthouse (formerly Bailan Hut ), you’ll also find a Muay Thai training camp. They offer a range of training plans and you can sign up for just a day’s training or a month’s depending on your level and desire to learn how to kick ass in the traditional Thai way. ( Note: it’s currently closed – as of mid 2023 )
A couple of other places worth a mention are ‘Bailan Herbal Sauna’, the first herbal sauna on the island and the only ‘adobe’ style building. They still do all manner of herbal teas and massages to ensure you are well and truly ‘chillaxed’ prior to a night out. Also in the same area are a cluster of small massage places. There’s also a small cocktail bar on the roadside nearby
A hundred metres to the south ‘Rock Inn’, the last place to stay before you leave Bailan, this has a restaurant and bungalows overlooking the Mercure Hideaway.
If you are in need of a night out then there are a few hangouts in downtown Bailan, ranging from the small reggae place by the bridge, to ‘Tarzan Island’ which has live music. Or the nearby Jungle Garden which has a few tables and chairs in a laid back garden setting. They do great cocktails and western snacks and it quickly got a reputation as the best place to meet, talk and generally chill out after your evening meal in Bailan.
Adjacent to the Mercure Hideaway, on the cape, is the Treetop Adventure Park, an example of an eco-friendly attraction that provides fun, thrills with a unique way to see the island from way up in the jungle canopy. Safety is obviously a concern when there’s just a wire preventing you from plummeting to your death, but the multitude of ziplines, rope climbs, bridges and obstacles way up in the trees have been put together by a French team that specialise in such things.
There are safety procedures and a mandatory training session before you are allowed to head off on your own. A deservedly popular attraction and one where you can easily spend a half day. There is also a course for young kids aged 5-9, so no need for to leave them locked in the hotel room whilst the rest of the family go out and have fun.
Just outside Bailan, in the no-man’s land that lies between here and Bangbao a couple of kilometres to the south, what used to be Nisa Cabana Resort is now home to a drug and alcohol rehabilitation centre, ‘DARA Rehab ‘.
And a more Artistic Map
This excellent map of Bailan village was made by Arm Yoojarearn from Lisca Beach in Bailan.
Whilst Bailan isn’t for beach bums and not really ideal for families with young kids, anyone looking for a place to stay long term, is looking for good value accommodation or planning a dive holiday should consider Bailan as a place to base themselves. The simple reasons are that it offers a fairly cheap, quiet place to stay whilst being only 5 minutes motorbike ride from the nightlife on Lonely Beach to the north and under 10 minutes ride to the dive centres and laid back Klong Kloi beach in Bangbao to the south.
Despite the current development it’s still far less tacky and loud than Lonely Beach, making it a good spot to do nothing except enjoy the views from your hammock and read a book.
Hotels in Bailan
These resorts and bungalows are in Bailan and are all bookable on booking.com. The price shown is a typical high season nightly rate. It may well vary and expect it to be higher at holiday weekends and during peak season.
Bailan Beach Resort – The beach is a bit of a misnomer, but good value rooms by the sea & a pool – 1,600 Baht
Koh Chang 7 Guesthouse (Formerly Bailan Hut) – Budget fan and aircon bungalows by the sea – 650 Baht
Elephant Bay Resort – Laid back flashpacker bungalows around large beachfront garden with a pool – 850 Baht
Lazy Republique – Small, friendly resort with just a handful of rooms and great reviews – 1,100 Baht
Harley Moon Hideaway – The top rated resort in Bailan. Cosy, boutique bungalows and pool in the centre of the village – 2,600 Baht
White House Bailan – Older resort with seafront bungalows and pool – 1,400 Baht
Mercure Hideaway – Large 4 star resort with private beach from the well know resort chain – 2,800 Baht
Baansanook Bungalows – AC bungalows set around a pool just off the main road – 900 Baht
Jungle Garden – Wooden huts and the island’s best hammock store – 700 Baht
Fresh – New, value for moneyAC bungalows in a garden setting – 1,000 Baht
Google Map of the Lonely Beach area
More details and Reviews of hotels and resorts in the Bailan area
Next: Winding down to Bangbao