Thale Noi, Phatthalung

A must visit in Southern Thailand. Ride a long tail boat to see the beautiful lagoon covered with lotus flowers, home to many exquisite aquatic birds, and where water buffalos raised on the wetlands, swim and graze in the water.

Thale Noi is a protected lagoon and wetland located north of Songkla lakes in Southern Thailand. If you look at a map of Thailand, you can see a very large lake/lagoon in the South which is Upper Songkla and Songkla lake which has brackish water. At Thale Noi, people fish off the water here using large square net apparatus and villagers make wickerware for sale using the plants harvested from the water. The area is rural and closest town is laid back Phatthalung town.

My 11 year old and I were on our way to Koh Lipe which is on the Andaman sea. Since we have a week’s time and have made our way to the south, we spent a couple of days to see Thale Noi in Phatthalung Province. The area is a bit off the usual tourist route so it took a bit of figuring out how to travel there from Hat Yai.

How we got to Thale Noi

We flew in to Hat Yai airport from Bangkok. From Hat Yai airport we took a taxi at the terminal entry. Our ride to our accommodation by Thale Noi took about 2 hours. (This was not my original travel method - more on that later). The roadway all the way there was decent and we drove along a road running next to Upper Songkla lake which was so big it looked like the ocean.

Where we stayed at Thale Noi

The place we are staying for one night is called Baan Tonlamphu Pakpra (Baan means home, ton means tree, lamphu is a cork tree, Pakpra is the name of the area). This eco themed resort is make of a simple but charming Thai country style wooden open air reception/kitchen/dining pavillion, with separate thatch roof huts along a canal, and open thatch roofed gallery area. You can do the short walk on the wooden path along the canal to the end to see the expanse of Upper Songkla lake and the mouth of Pakpra Klong (canal).

Our room was tastefully decorated, has air conditioning and a comfortable bed, daybed and clean bathroom. We did not have any issue with bugs considering the hut is built over the water. If you have young kids, you might want to think whether they will be ok with the lack of rails along the canal.

The eco resort is run by a lovely couple with their young daughter and friendly staff. We were greeted warmly by the hostess Khun Sai with whom I had been exchanging emails to figure out how to reach the resort without my own car. You can speak English with her.

Activities at Thale Noi

Because we did not have a car to explore the area, our hostess recommended a nearby walk to see the Phatthalung Botanical Gardens and offered their scooter for me to ride to the entrance of the Gardens since the day was pretty hot. Unfortunately I do not know how to ride the scooter, so we made use of their sun umbrellas and walked along the main road to the treed side road leading to Botanical Gardens.

On the way there, we enjoyed the peaceful countryside atmosphere with the sounds of many birds. My son spotted red/orange headed lizards and we ran into a group of monkeys hanging out on the road and in the trees. We were warned to be careful with the monkeys but they did not bother us. There were also some unusual trees along the road.

At the end of the road we reached the water’s edge. The water level was high which unfortunately flooded a lot of the pathway that ran by the lake. There was a couple of pavillions looking over the water that we were able to climb onto and get a closer look at the mangroves.

After looking around we decided to walk back; it was late afternoon. We were both really hot and sweaty so we stopped by the boutique resort next door to ours called Sri Pakpra Boutique Resort Phatthalung, where there is a restaurant with view of the lake. Being a resort restaurant, they had English menus and prices were probably more than the other local restaurants but it was not unreasonable and we were happy with our frosty watermelon smoothies and local Thai dishes. There is no dinner provided at our resort so this was a good place to eat before it got too dark. Our resort hostess had given us a couple of walkable restaurant choices; both have water views but this one was closer.

Restaurant at Sri Pakpra Boutique Resort Patthalung

The Thale Noi boat tour

We headed back to our resort and got ready to wake up early in the morning for our boat tour. The boat tour (1200 baht a boat for a couple of hours as of Feb 2023) is on a longtail boat and is organized by our resort. We departed before sunrise right off the reception area on the canal. Bring mosquito repellents or wear long pants and long sleeves; it is not a problem when the boat is moving but if you are waiting around, the bugs will come find you especially when you are in the canal area.

Early morning boat ride from the resort canal

Our boat driver took us into the Upper Songkla lake, into the Pakpra Klong (Canal), back out into the lake and into Thale Noi lagoon, then looped back to the resort. The scenery was magical. The water was like a mirror that morning. We saw villagers operating the fishing nets, many, many beautiful birds, and water buffalos swimming/walking in the water. The villagers raise the buffaloes in pens on little islands on the water and during the day, they let them out to free graze in the wetlands. I wonder how they manage to corral them back into the pens at the end of the day.

Bridge between Upper Songkla Lake and Thale Noi

Time of the year to visit Thale Noi

We came here in mid February; the lotus flowers had not bloomed yet so alas we did not get to see a lagoon full of flowers. The flowering time is supposed to be between February and May but it depends on the weather. Bird migration times also determine how many bird you will see. Nevertheless it was still amazing. In fact, the boat driver was able to take us through a lovely tunnel of trees growing out of the wetlands. He said as the months go by into the dry season, the water level will drop and they would not be able to drive the boat over some of the areas we are seeing on this trip.

After we arrived back at the resort, it was breakfast time at the dining area. The resort provides delicious local specialty Thai food for breakfast but the hostess asked us if we needed anything special and they would try to prepare something for us if we had some dietary requests.

Getting back to Hai Yai from Thale Noi

We took the train back Hat Yai. The resort can call a taxi for you to the Phatthalung train station or back to Hat Yai if you want. The resort owners were going into Phatthalung town so they generously gave us a ride to the station and even stopped by a 7-Eleven for us to get some snacks for the trip. Such amazing hospitality!

We bought tickets at the station and took the old local train (you need to show the ticket counter your passport; it was less than 2 USD for two of us for a 1.5 hour ride), we did not reserved seating but the train was not full. There are other trains that you can reserve seating in air conditioned cars with more comfortable seats for more money. The train we took did not have air conditioning, only fans in the ceiling and wooden seats. But it ran at a good speed so there was wind and it was cheap. Local vendors come down the aisle and sell drinks and snacks. It was fun to ride with the locals.

We arrived in Hat Yai station in good time; there are tuk tuks that can take you to your accommodation outside the train station. We walked the 7 minutes to our hotel called The Lantern Hatyai Hotel which is a clean modern hip hotel with a great price. It was less than US$50 a night for a very nice room at a convenient location.

We were in Hat Yai for just one night. Regretfully, we didn’t have enough time to explore the city. The city reminded me a bit of Bangkok 30 years ago. Early next morning we were headed to Koh Lipe (see next post).

Tips for visiting Thale Noi:

Options for getting to Thale Noi and taking the boat tour:

Stay in Hat Yai city and do a day trip to the lagoon with a car or chartered taxi service. There is a boat pier area on Thale Noi where the long tail boats are parked for touring the lagoon. These boats maybe cheaper than our tour boat at the resort and can provide tours at other times of the day.
Travel by taxi or train to Phatthalung town, stay there overnight and have your accommodation call you an early tuk tuk to take you to Thale Noi boat pier so you can do the early morning boat tour.
Drive to an accommodation near Thale Noi and drive to the boat pier. Driving can give you more options of accommodations around the area.
You can also travel from Trang.

The best way to explore the area would be to rent a car in Hat Yai if you are flying in from Bangkok. The road to Thale Noi from Hat Yai city is not complicated. It would have been good to spend a few days around Thale Noi area to see more of the local sights. There is a village market in bamboo forest that looked interesting, other stops to see village handicrafts, and more viewpoints around Thale Noi.

Baan Tonlamphu Pakpra was a great stay because we could just step out of our room and get on the boat tour and the price for the resort was a great value. My original plan was to take the train from Hat Yai station to Phatthalung station and then take a minibus from the station to our resort. This is the cheapest way to travel there. The resort hostess can tell you which minibus to take and where to stop. It is easier to take the minibus to the resort than from the resort due to the scheduling of the bus route so keep that in mind.

When we initially arrived at Hat Yai airport intending to take the taxi to Hat Yai train station, the taxi driver offered to give us a discounted ride directly to our Thale Noi accommodation (for 1200 baht) which I decided to accept as I did not get a bad vibe from him and it saves us a bit of travel hassle (side note: I can speak and understand Thai). However, especially if you are a single female traveler, I would advise that you ask your accommodation to book a reliable taxi for you instead. Our resort hostess told me she can ask a taxi driver that she trusts for the same price to get us to and from Hat Yai. So ask her if you are going there without your own vehicle.