Pimalai Resort & Spa

We stayed here last year and still dream of it. The resort is beautiful and so relaxing. The service was excellent, the food was excellent, the room was excellent. We loved the pools, we loved the arrival. There’s not a single thing I could fault. We’re currently at the Banyan Tree in Phuket and can’t help compare it to Pimalai. Pimalai wins in every comparison we’ve made.

Fabulous resort. Everything was perfect. The staff incredibly friendly and helpful. Special thanks to Kwang at breakfast for being extra attentive. The pool, beach and restaurant were all fantastic. The room also, very private. The only slight gripe we had was the price of the food in the restaurants. We realise they would have to be more expensive than local restaurants, however they were often 3 times more expensive plus 17% then added. This encouraged us to eat in the local village much more. But apart from that this is a wonderful experience.

I have conflicting feelings – there’s resort is absolutely beautiful – the rooms are nice and incredibly clean. I think the problem is that if you are going to charge premium prices for a hotel, then there needs to be a premium experience. The services offered by the spa were subpar, but mostly I felt very conflicted about the language barriers. I’ve traveled all over the world, to many different kinds of hotels and motels and hostels, and I’ve never had so much trouble communicating with a staff. If I was paying $100, $200 a night, I really wouldn’t mind. But if you were going to charge people for a luxurious experience — then you cannot have language barriers get in the way of luxury. My stay at this hotel was rife either miscommunications, staff running off to get a second third or fourth person to do a translation for me. Often times, I just gave up on my request because it seemed impossible for us to be able to communicate, nobody ever staying long enough for me to pull out Google translate. I don’t want to seem like I am a close minded Westerner, who expects the world to bend to her linguistic whims, but I think that when you are charging over $500 a night, you are appealing to a certain clientele who have expectations.

We loved our stay here. We had a 2 bed villa with pool and it was fantastic. We were only a couple of minutes walk down to the beach. The resort is set in lovely gardens and the staff were very friendly. Our rooms were spacious and very comfortable. And we enjoyed the different dining options. The Seafood restaurant was excellent and the buffet was super value. The Thai restaurant was also very good but their spicy dishes were extremely spicy (so be warned!). And the Hillside bar and restaurant were outstanding too.

My husband and i first stayed at Pimalai 8 years ago. We had a wonderful stay then and just as good stay in November. Its a stunning resort and staff are a credit to the hotel. We stayed in a pool villa high on the hillside with sweeping sea views. The villa was well maintained and beautifully clean. We ate breakfast at Seven Seas everyday, the view was amazing and the food and service were excellent. We had excellent meals at Spice & Rice and Rak Talay, unfortunately the Steak & Wine night at Seven Seas was a big let down. The steak had not been rested so there was a lot of juice on the plate, this was served with soggy frozen chips. We did mention it to our waiter and although he apologised we still had to pay the full price. The App works well for some things but 3 out of 5 of our restaurant bookings were not correct or not made at all. Everytime we turned up for dinner, the restaurant did not have us on their lists, meaning we ended up on emergency tables. Not great. We used the buggies when going to the beach and they were always on time and plenty of them. The beach is beautiful and we loved spending time down there. We did the Ko Rok tour which was excellent, the crew were very experienced and were patient with people who were not confident at snorkelling. We also did a half day tour to "Following Giants" 20 minutes from Pimalai. Its an ethical elephant rescue program and well worth a visit. They pick you up and drop off back at Pimalai. All in all another wonderful holiday, will be back for sure. I must finish my review by giving a big shout out to Wee at the airport, we've met him before and he is still as wonderful as ever. What an incredible Ambassador for Pimalai he is.