Railay

The nearest airport is Krabi International Airport (KBV), about 45–60 minutes by road-and-boat from Railay itself — there's no way to fly in closer, since the peninsula has no airstrip and no road. There are no direct flights from Scandinavia; the standard route is a long-haul flight into Bangkok and then a short domestic hop to Krabi — Thai Airways, Bangkok Airways, Thai AirAsia, Nok Air, Thai Lion Air, and Thai Vietjet all fly the roughly 1.5-hour Bangkok–Krabi route several times a day, so availability is rarely the issue. Krabi does pick up a handful of seasonal European charter and scheduled routes in the northern winter — SAS has flown Copenhagen–Krabi and Finnair Helsinki–Krabi in past high seasons — which can occasionally be worth checking if you're travelling November to March, though these come and go year to year, so treat it as a bonus rather than something to plan around. From Krabi Airport, a taxi or shared minivan to Ao Nang pier takes about 45 minutes and runs 400–600 THB (book through Grab for a fixed fare rather than negotiating curbside); from there it's the 10–15 minute longtail crossing to Railay. An alternative if you're combining Railay with Phuket is the seasonal direct ferry from Phuket to Railay — about an hour, once daily, sometimes stopping at Koh Phi Phi en route — though the more reliable option most of the year is the overland minivan from Phuket to Ao Nang (roughly 3–4 hours) followed by the same longtail hop. However you arrive on the mainland side, the final leg to Railay itself is always, and only, by boat.

There is no way in except by longtail boat — Railay has zero roads, so forget taxis, tuk-tuks, or scooters entirely; a rolling suitcase is more hassle than it's worth since you'll likely wade the last few metres to shore. From Ao Nang, shared longtails run roughly 7:30am–6pm, cost about 100 THB one-way (150–200 THB return) per person, and take 10–15 minutes; boats leave once around 8 passengers have piled in, so waits are rarely long except very early or late. One quirk worth knowing: at low tide, boats sometimes can't get all the way to Railay West's shore and a tractor-trailer ferries you the last stretch across the sandbank, which is more amusing than annoying — worth planning for if you're travelling with a lot of luggage. From Krabi Town pier the crossing is similar in time and slightly cheaper. After about 6pm shared boats stop running and you're into private-charter territory (800–2,000 THB depending on which beach and how late), so if you're day-tripping from Ao Nang, don't cut your return too close. Once you're actually on the peninsula, everything is on foot: Railay West, Railay East, and Tonsai are linked by a walkable path (10–15 minutes, tree roots and slick limestone steps included) that floods ankle-to-knee deep at high tide, so budget a few extra minutes and wear shoes you don't mind getting wet rather than your only pair of trainers.

Grab is genuinely useful on the mainland side of this trip — book it for the airport transfer to Ao Nang or Krabi Town, and it'll save you the haggling that comes with flagging a taxi at the pier. But once you're on the Railay peninsula itself, no ride-hailing app works because there are no roads or vehicles to hail — walking is the only way to get beach-to-beach, or you flag a longtail directly if you want a lift between beaches or over to Ao Nang. Food delivery apps like Grab Food and foodpanda cover Krabi Town and Ao Nang but don't reach across the water to Railay, so meals come from wherever you can walk to, not an app. Mobile signal gets patchy in the shadow of the limestone towers and on the jungle path between beaches, so download an offline map (Google Maps' offline area, or Maps.me) before you cross over — WiFi at guesthouses and restaurants is fine for messaging but slows to a crawl in high season. Most climbing schools and dive shops take bookings in person at their beachfront desk or over WhatsApp rather than through an app, so don't expect a slick online booking flow; and while PromptPay QR codes are creeping into the bigger restaurants and dive shops, the beach stalls, longtail boatmen, and walking-street vendors are still cash-only.

Bring more cash than you think you need — there are only a handful of ATMs on the whole peninsula (one between Railay West and East, a couple more on Railay East near the minimarts), each charging a foreign-transaction fee on top of your own bank's charge, so withdraw once in a decent chunk rather than repeatedly feeding the machine. Phra Nang Cave is a working fertility shrine full of carved wooden offerings; it's genuinely sacred to local fishing families who still leave flowers and incense, so look, don't touch, and keep shoulders and knees covered if you wander in straight off the beach. Watch your belongings on the path to Phra Nang and on the beach itself — the macaque monkeys here are bold and used to tourists, and will unzip a bag or snatch a snack right out of your hand if you leave it in reach; don't feed them, both because it's how bags get grabbed and because it's actively discouraged by local authorities. May to October is monsoon season here — boats still run but get choppier and occasionally pause in bad weather, some smaller bungalow operations close entirely, and the lagoon hike gets considerably muddier and more slippery, so if you're set on climbing or a specific bay, aim for the November–April dry season. Book any climbing course for early morning: the limestone gets brutally hot and grip gets slippery with sweat by midday, and the same goes for the viewpoint-and-lagoon hike — go before 9am if you want it cool and relatively quiet. Finally, the beach at Railay East all but disappears at low tide into a stretch of mud and mangrove roots, so if photogenic swimming is the plan, check a tide chart and aim for high tide, or just walk the five minutes over to Railay West or Phra Nang instead.

Railay West has the postcard beach — soft sand, turquoise water, and the sunset everyone's Instagram feed is chasing — and it prices accordingly, so expect to pay a premium for anything beachfront in high season; this is the side for couples and families who want to fall out of bed onto sand. Railay East trades the swimmable beach for mangroves and mudflats at low tide, but it's where the walking street, budget guesthouses, bars, and dive shops cluster, making it the practical, cheaper base if you don't mind a five-minute walk over to swim — it's also the side that catches sunrise over the limestone rather than sunset. Tonsai Beach, just around the headland, is the scruffier, laid-back climbers' enclave — bungalow-style stays strung with hammocks and slack-lines between the trees, cheaper food, and a noticeably younger, dirtbag-chic crowd who came for a week and stayed a month. Phra Nang itself has exactly one hotel and it's eye-wateringly expensive — think private-villa, honeymoon-splurge pricing — so most people treat that beach as a day-trip rather than a place to sleep. Whichever beach you pick, book ahead if you're coming in the November–April high season: the peninsula physically can't expand its room stock, hemmed in as it is by cliffs on one side and sea on the other, and the good places sell out weeks in advance.

The walking street connecting Railay West and East is where most of the eating happens, and a few names are worth seeking out rather than wandering blind: Local Thai Food Restaurant is the one worth prioritising, especially for the gai bai toey (chicken marinated and grilled in pandan leaf) that's become something of a signature dish there; Welcome Back Restaurant and Railay Family Restaurant are dependable, well-reviewed stops for Thai comfort food — think green curry, pad see ew, and whatever seafood came in that morning; and Coco 2004 Restaurant and The Grotto round out the middle ground for a solid, no-fuss dinner without a long wait. Summer Fresh @ Railay Beach is the go-to for smoothie bowls and something lighter after a day of climbing, Swasdee Railay 65 leans family-friendly if you've got kids in tow, and Baan Tree is worth the detour for homemade ice cream in the heat. For a quick, cheap bite or a beer on the move, 1 Stop Takeaway Shop does exactly what the name promises. For a low-key evening, Chillax Bar and Why Not Bar are the two most-loved spots for a sunset drink or a later fire show on the sand — both consistently the best-rated bars on the peninsula, and Chillax in particular gets going properly after 9pm. Over on Tonsai, expect simpler, cheaper climber-fuel — banana pancakes, big all-day breakfasts, and shared tables rather than anything fancy — since most of the crowd there is refuelling between climbs, not dining out.

Gai bai toey — chicken marinated in soy, garlic, and pepper, wrapped in pandan leaf, and deep-fried — is close to a signature dish here; Local Thai Food Restaurant's version is the one most often singled out. Because Railay is a fishing peninsula before it's anything else, seafood is the backbone of the menu everywhere: whole fish steamed or grilled and finished with a garlic-chili-lime sauce, squid in panang curry, and giant prawns or Andaman lobster grilled to order and sold by weight, freshest at the places closest to the boats on Railay East. Tom yum goong (hot-and-sour prawn soup, thick with lemongrass, galangal, and chili) and a good green curry are the reliable order at almost any of the walking-street restaurants, and if you want to taste the more distinctly southern Thai side of the region's cooking rather than the tourist-menu standards, look for khao yam (a herb-and-rice salad with toasted coconut and a tangy fish-sauce dressing) or the fiercely spicy, fermented-fish-based gaeng tai pla at smaller, more local kitchens. For something sweeter, mango sticky rice is everywhere in mango season, Baan Tree's homemade ice cream is the best cold reset after a day on the limestone, and Summer Fresh's smoothie bowls have become the go-to post-climb refuel. In the evening, a bucket of Sang Som and Coke or a cold Chang or Singha on the sand at Chillax Bar or Why Not Bar is as much a Railay ritual as the climbing itself, and over on Tonsai, banana pancakes and strong Thai iced coffee are the backpacker breakfast of choice.

Shopping here is small and beach-casual — the walking street between Railay West and East is genuinely it, lined with stalls selling swimwear, sarongs, elephant-print harem pants, hand-carved wooden souvenirs, and climbing gear (rent or buy chalk bags, shoes, and slings straight from the schools) alongside the pharmacies and 7-Elevens that cover the basics. It comes alive in the evening, roughly 5–10pm, when vendors set up alongside the food stalls and a henna tattoo table or two appears, so it's as much a stroll-and-snack activity as a shopping one — and prices on souvenirs are soft enough to negotiate a little, unlike the food stalls or pharmacy, which are fixed. Don't expect anything resembling a mall or a proper market here; there simply isn't the land for one. If you want a bigger selection, that's a boat ride back to Ao Nang, which has a proper night market and more formal shops, or further on to Krabi Town for a bigger, more local weekend market experience.

Climbing is the headline act, and it's a serious scene, not a gimmick — Railay and Tonsai have several hundred bolted sport routes on pocketed limestone, ranging from easy beginner walls right up to extreme test-pieces, which is why climbers who came for a long weekend in the '90s are sometimes still here. Half-day intro courses (gear, instruction, and usually a couple of climbs included) are widely available right off the beach and need zero experience; if you catch the bug, multi-pitch routes up the taller towers are a real step up worth a day or two more. Deep water soloing — climbing unroped above the sea and dropping in when your arms give out — used to be one of Tonsai's signature draws, though most of the classic spots were closed to the public after a fatal accident around 2016; a few operators still run supervised DWS day trips out to nearby islands if you want the experience with proper safety in place. Phra Nang Beach is the one everyone's after: powder-soft sand, dramatic cliffs on three sides, and the cave shrine at its edge where locals leave carved offerings to the sea princess said to protect fishermen — arrive early or late to get it without the midday tour-boat crowds. From the path near Railay East, a genuinely steep, rope-assisted scramble leads up to the Railay Viewpoint and then down the other side to the Hidden Lagoon, or Sa Phra Nang, over a series of progressively trickier rock walls — a jade-green pool tucked inside the cliffs that's slightly terrifying in flip-flops and completely worth it; go before 9am for cooler temperatures and a real shot at having it to yourself. At Railay East, rent a kayak and paddle the calm water out past the mangroves at high tide, or book a longtail island-hopping trip to Chicken Island, Poda Island, and the wider Hong Islands for snorkelling over coral in startlingly clear water. Round out a slower day with sunset yoga on the sand or a Thai massage at one of the open-air beachfront places on Railay West, and if the tide and light line up, cliff-jump off the marked rocks at the far end of Railay East.