Surin Islands
The reef at Surin starts at the sand, and a tent on the national-park beach is the cheapest island night in Thailand. Richelieu Rock, the whale-shark site, sits inside the park.
Surin Islands in a nutshell
Surin Islands: what to expect
We hold 1,756,000+ planned stops across Thailand on Stippl, and this is what they say.
The Surin Islands are a national park you sleep in rather than a place with a town on it. The park opens mid-October to mid-May and shuts completely for the rest of the year, boats leave Khura Buri pier in the morning, and the beds are a tent on the beach or a park bungalow. What you come for is the shallow channel between the two islands, a two-hundred-metre corridor of reef that is the reason the park is known at all. Most travellers give it 1 night on Stippl.
Half the people who plan the Surin Islands give them one night, and the night is the entire argument. 50.26% of Surin Islands stops planned on Stippl are a single night and 15.56% are a day trip. The two hours after the day boats leave, and the reef at six the next morning with nobody on it, are what an overnight buys and what a day cannot.
One night is the minimum that works and two is better. Snorkel the channel first, before the day boats land. Walk Ban Moken with a guide from the community's own tourism team, which is a different arrangement from being shown a village off the deck of a boat. Take a longtail across to Mai Ngam, the forested bay on the far side, arranged at headquarters. Divers come in April for Richelieu Rock, Thailand's whale-shark site and the one reason to book a liveaboard rather than a day boat.
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Snorkellers before divers
The selling point is a reef you can swim to from the sand, which is rarer in Thailand than the brochures suggest.
Divers chasing big animals
Richelieu Rock is the Thai whale-shark site, and it sits inside this park.
Campers
A tent on a national-park beach for a few euros is the cheapest way to sleep on a Thai island, and most people give it 1 night.
Anyone wanting no strip at all
No bars, no beach clubs, no shops beyond a park kiosk, and that is the whole offer.
People interested in the Moken
The largest remaining Moken community in Thailand lives here, and the honest version of that visit is a walk through a village, not a show.
Maybe not for you: anyone travelling between mid-May and mid-October, when the park is simply shut; anyone prone to seasickness, because the crossing is a fast open-water run; and anyone who needs a phone signal, a pharmacy or a choice of restaurant.
The best time to visit Surin Islands
Open season
15 October to 15 May
The only time you can go: boats, bungalows and tents all operate. December to April is the peak, with calm sea, the best visibility and the whale-shark window.
Closed
16 May to 14 October
The southwest monsoon. The park shuts to let the reef recover and because the crossing is not safe; the shoulder weeks either side are weather-dependent and boats cancel.
- The park is closed from 16 May to 14 October, every year, and the reopening date is announced only a week or two ahead. Nothing runs in those months; a Surin trip is a dry-season booking or it is not a trip.
- Richelieu Rock's whale sharks are a February to April window. The one reason to book a liveaboard rather than a day boat, and the weeks the dive operators fill first.
- The peak brings up to eight hundred visitors a day, and the tent on the park beach is the way past them. The day boats leave mid-afternoon, and the reef is there at six the next morning with nobody on it.
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Things to do in Surin Islands
The channel between the islands
Snorkel the shallow two-hundred-metre corridor between the two main islands, the reason the park is famous, straight from the longtail or from the beach at headquarters. The coral is within a metre of the surface.
Ban Moken with a village guide
Walk the sea-nomad village with the community's own tourism team, which is a different thing from being shown a village from a boat. About €5, arranged at headquarters, and the money stays in the village.
Richelieu Rock in April
Dive Thailand's whale-shark site from a liveaboard, the only reason to book one rather than a day boat; the sharks pass in March and April. About €400 for three nights from Khao Lak.
A tent on a national-park beach
Sleep in a park tent on the beach at headquarters, about €8 a night, the cheapest island night in Thailand. The reef is there at six in the morning with nobody on it.
The longtail to Mai Ngam
Take the park longtail to the forested bay on the far side of the north island, arranged at headquarters for a few euros. Turtles graze the seagrass off the beach.
The two hours after the day boats leave
Stay the night for the two hours after the day boats go at three, when the beach and the channel empty. The strongest argument for the tent over the speedboat.
The neighbourhoods of Surin Islands
Park headquarters
Bungalows, tents, the channel
Ao Chong Khad on Ko Surin Nuea, where every boat lands: the ranger office, a restaurant, the bungalows, the main campsite, snorkel rental and the channel between the islands. For first visits that want the reef at the door.
The reef off the beach and every boat, and the day-trip crowds at lunchtime.
Mai Ngam Bay
Second campsite, forested, quiet
The forested bay on the west side, reachable only by a park transfer from headquarters, with tents on the sand and the same reef fifteen minutes further from the boats. For campers who want the island to themselves.
The same reef with nobody on it, and a tent as the only option.
Khura Buri
Mainland pier town
The pier town on the Phang Nga coast where the boats leave at half past eight and where you sleep the night before, with plain guesthouses and the tour offices. For the night before the boat, and nothing more.
The first boat without a dawn drive, and a town with nothing in it.
The Moken village
Living community, own guides
Bon Yai Bay on Ko Surin Tai, the Moken village rebuilt after the 2019 fire, a scheduled stop on most tours where the community's own guides walk you through. For a visit on the villagers' terms; no beds here.
The village with its own guides, and a boat back to the campsite by dusk.
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Where to stay in Surin Islands
Sleep at the park headquarters on Ao Chong Khad: it is where every boat lands, the restaurant and the snorkel rental are there, and the bungalows and the main campsite sit behind the beach. 50.26% of Surin stops planned on Stippl are a single night. Expect rustic: shared bathrooms at both sites, and the tents are the more honest expectation than the bungalows.
Park headquarters
The park's own basic bungalows around €50 to €80 and rented tents around €8 a night, shared bathrooms at both.
Mai Ngam Bay
Tents only, around €8 a night on the sand, with a park transfer from headquarters and the same reef.
Khura Buri
Plain guesthouses and the tour operators' own rooms, €12 to €30, for the night before the half past eight boat.
The Moken village
No rooms here; sleeping on Surin means the park's tents at €8 or bungalows from €50 back at headquarters.
What to eat in Surin Islands
Cook-to-order Thai, the park restaurant format
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Surin Islands customs and what not to do
The Moken live on Koh Surin Tai
An indigenous seafaring people of the Thai-Myanmar marine border and the largest such community left in Thailand; many are stateless, which governs their access to healthcare, schooling and work.
The park regulates their life
Much of the sea they used is now national park, so the park authority decides how they fish and where they live; the sea nomads are now largely settled in stilt houses.
The village burned in 2019
Sixty-one houses and most of the boats were lost in one night, and the rebuild to the old design was contested by the villagers themselves; people will talk about it if asked.
The village is a living one
Your tour's stop is somebody's home; the community's own tourism team trains and runs village guides, and taking their walk rather than wandering is the difference between an exchange and an intrusion.
Buy from the village itself
Ask before photographing people and buy the woven pandanus work from the maker; both matter more where the subject is marketed as scenery.
Do
- Book the village walk with a Moken guide rather than treating the village as a viewpoint
- Take everything you brought back off the island
- Ask before photographing anyone in the village
Don't
- Stand on, kick or touch coral; the reef here is the park's reason to exist
- Repeat the Cousteau story about Richelieu Rock; the park's own reference disputes it
- Plan a Surin leg between mid-May and mid-October; the park is closed
What a Surin Islands trip costs
Budget
€25–35
A rented tent with a thin mat, sleeping bag and pillow at one of two campsites.
Mid-range
€90–120
One of the few park bungalows at headquarters, air-conditioned.
High-end
€150–250
A dive boat out of Tap Lamu; you never sleep ashore.
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Fun facts about Surin Islands
The Moken on Surin survived the 2004 tsunami because of an oral tradition. Their stories describe the laboon, a wave that eats people, and a receding sea told them to move to high ground before it arrived.
76% of the national park's 135 square kilometres is water. Five islands sit 55 km off the Phang Nga coast, and apart from a Moken village and the park's own buildings there is nothing built on them.
The park is closed for six months of every year. It opens on 15 October and shuts on 15 May, and can shut earlier if the weather turns; no other Thai destination is unavailable for half the calendar.
The two main islands are 200 metres apart, and the channel is the snorkelling. Ko Surin Nuea and Ko Surin Tai sit either side of a shallow corridor, which is what people mean by snorkelling straight off the beach.
The islands are 18 km from the Myanmar maritime border. That is what kept them undeveloped, and it is why the Moken move between two states that mostly do not claim them.
Jacques Cousteau never dived Richelieu Rock. The claim that he discovered and named it is on almost every dive page, but he never went north of Koh Bon, which lies south of Surin.
Local tips for Surin Islands
The pier is Khura Buri
Getting this wrong is the most common practical error here: the speedboats leave from the National Park office and the pier there, not from Khao Lak, which is where the liveaboards go.
Sleep in Khura Buri first
The town exists for the pier and the transfer is arranged there; the first boat leaves too early to reach from Khao Lak. One night, and a guesthouse near the office.
The speedboat is a hard ride
Fast, noisy and an hour or more across open water; anyone prone to seasickness is warned off it for a reason. Take the tablets before boarding, not after.
Most people stay one night
50.26% of stops here are a single night: the tent or the park bungalow, with the day boats back to Khura Buri the same afternoon. Two nights gets the channel to yourself.
A bay can be shut on the day
The park closes snorkelling sites when the coral bleaches, with no warning that reaches a booking site. Judge the day by what the rangers say at headquarters.
No signal, no clinic
There is no internet and phone reception only around the north of the main island, and no medical care closer than the mainland in daylight. Tell people you will be unreachable.
Surin Islands questions, answered
Around the boat and the season, because both are fixed. The park opens mid-October to mid-May, boats leave Khura Buri pier in the morning, and beds are tents or park bungalows booked ahead. Travellers leave 73 days between planning a Surin Islands stop on Stippl and arriving. Lay it into the route in Stippl.
Yes, in a tent on a national-park beach or in a park bungalow, and it is the cheapest island night in Thailand. There is no resort layer and no village to stay in, so what you get is the park's own accommodation and the reef at six the next morning with nobody else on it.
For some people, though it is the weaker version: 15.56% of Surin Islands stops planned on Stippl carry no night. The day boats arrive and leave together, so a day trip puts you on the reef at exactly the hours everybody else is there, which is the opposite of what the park is good at.
Mid-October to mid-May, and shut completely for the rest of the year, like the other Andaman marine parks. April is the month divers aim at, because that is when whale sharks turn up at Richelieu Rock. Outside the open season there is no way to visit the islands at all.
A sea-nomad community with a village on the islands and a language of their own. Their tourism team runs the walks through Ban Moken themselves, which is a different arrangement from being shown a village off the deck of a day boat, and it is the reason to do the walk rather than photograph it.
One night for half of them: 50.26% of Surin Islands stops planned on Stippl are a single night. Two is better where the boat timings allow, because it buys two early mornings on the reef instead of one, and the mornings are the whole reason to sleep out there.
Every guide is written by the Stippl editors and checked against the trips our travellers actually plan. Spotted something out of date? Let us know.
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