Hat Yai – Accommodation and Halal Food

Where did we stayed and ate while we were in Hat Yai in less than 24 hours?

Accommodation – Tune Hotel
This is definitely our first time staying at Tune Hotel and its mainly situated at Niphat Uthit 2 Road. Tune Hotel can be easily accessible by walking either from Hat Yai Railway Station or Lee Garden Plaza. If you’re taking a Konsortium Bas Ekspres all the way from Kuala Lumpur, there will be two option of drop off area which is the Hat Yai Bus Terminal or in front of Lee Garden Plaza. In our case, we opt for the 2nd option which is nearer to the hotel and other local attractions. Travel agencies can be easily found near to the hotel which is along jalan Niphat Uthid 1, 2 and 3 Rd and also Sanehanusorn Rd.

As mentioned in our previous entries, we managed to book everything just a few days before we departed. The price of the hotel is ‘still’ within our limited budget.  But frankly, it’s expensive than our hotel in Phuket, Koh Samui and Surat Thani. The check in time will be at 2.00pm meanwhile check out is at 11.00am. Additional charges of 120 baht will be imposed for early check in. We decided to drop our luggage and explore Hat Yai in between time.

Niphat Uthit 2 Road. This is exactly in front of Tune Hotel.

The friendly and attentive receptionist.

Our room.

Oh ya, they even have this interactive camera via LCD TV just in front of the hotel lift and the copy will be directly sent to our mail.

Halal Food
Klong Hae Floating Market
90% of the food here are HALAL. As we reached the canal, we can actually see the vendors busy preparing the food from fried rice, som tam and others local Thai traditional foods with the range of 20 baht to 40 baht for each serving.

Yellow Chicken Rice near Night Market area
This stall is not something new to all Malaysian out there. It’s like a phenomena. So, we definitely not gonna miss this stall since we only have 24 hours in Hat Yai. We headed to the location making assumption that the stall is open at that point of time. We reached the stall somewhere at 10.30am for brunch and the owner is still busy preparing and setting up the stall. We could smell the crispy fried chicken.

If you’re wondering where is this stall, it is located in Niphat Uthid 3 Rd off Supasarnrangsan Rd (Night Market area). Another landmarks is definitely the Kim Yong Market or Talad Kimyong Market.

Sulaiman Restaurant
We opt to have our dinner and breakfast here. They offered delicious Thai food in a very reasonable price. Furthermore, it’s only a block away from Tune Hotel. It’s located in Niphat Uthid 2 Rd.

Our delicious dinner.

Breakfast menu – Gruel chicken with hot tea. Way tooo delicious. They even have local traditional kuih and roti canai too.

Not to worry much as it is not difficult to get Halal food and good accommodation around Hat Yai. Just pick your restaurant / stall and hotel as preferable within budget. Prices can be high because of Malaysian and Singaporean tourist around as this is one of the most popular tourist spot among both countries.

Simply us,
Zara AB & FF
The Province of Chroma

Hat Yai – Hat Yai Railway Station

Right after our visit to Klong Hae Floating Market, we requested the driver to drop us at the railway station just to satisfy our self since we didn’t get a chance to travel to Hat Yai via train. Furthermore, our next route and destination doesn’t permit us to travel by train as well. Thinking of that, a short visit to the Hat Yai Railway Station wouldn’t make any harm right? In fact, we could just walk back to hotel and catch up our dinner along the way.

The railway station is officially managed by the State Railway of Thailand and this is the largest station in the southern part of Thailand. The station is strategically and conveniently located in the middle of Hatyai City Center. It is also centrally located for the ease of transfer either by bus or van (minibus) services from nearby travel agencies. There are several trains passing through the station daily coming all the way from Bangkok, Sungai Kolok, Yala and even Malaysia (via Keretapi Tanah Melayu Berhad – KTMB).

Once we entered the station, we saw a bunch of security guards or maybe a local police at the station staring at us. So, we made a quick conversation by asking whether is it ok for us to walk, look or maybe photograph and they said OK. 😀

The overall view of the station.

Just right on time. A train all the way from Bangkok just arrived heading to Sungai Kolok (Golok).

Oh ya, we even hopped into an open air train car just to see and feel the condition of the local trains. Just a quick one. Very vintage and clean.

And, some cliché post by both of us. Without fails, of course! 😀

If you are an adventurous person, you might want to discover Thailand via train just like locals especially using the Bangkok Line from Hatyai which goes via Nakhon Pathom, Ratchaburi, Petchaburi, Hua Hin, Chumphon, Surat Thani, Nakhon Si Thammarat and Phattalung.  It will be sooo much fun.

Simply us,
Zara AB & FF
The Province of Chroma

Hat Yai – Klong Hae Floating Market

Assalammualaikum and Hi there!

Klong Hae Floating Market which located in Klong Hae, Hat Yai is definitely not something new among Malaysian. During our recent trip, we managed to catch a short visit to the floating market since we were there on Friday just before we depart to Phuket on the next day.

The floating market is only open on Friday to Sunday from 3.00pm to 9.00pm with 20 to 25 minutes drive from Hat Yai town (depending on the traffic condition).  We managed to get an offer of 300 baht (return trip) with a 2400 cc car from a tour agent at the Tune Hotel Lobby. Pretty deal to us. Initially, we were hanging around at the hotel lobby just to catch others who might interested to go to the floating market and the idea is to pool in the same tuk tuk. Just for one reason, to reduce the cost. Unfortunately, we couldn’t find any. As mentioned in the web and travel blog, the normal charges of a return tuk tuk trip is approximately from 500 baht to 700 baht which it can accommodate up to 7 pax. Anyone can advise further on this?

We were told that 90% of the food here are HALAL. As we reached the canal, we can actually see the vendors busy preparing the food from fried rice, som tam and others local Thai traditional foods. Construction of new bridge across the canal are still in progress. It will take some times since it’s only in the foundation stage. We regret since we couldn’t manage to photograph the whole view of the ‘sampan’ lining up along the canal. That is definitely the best spot to get an overall view of the floating market.

This is how the transaction were made. The vendors will put the food in a basket and handed it over to the customer.

We observed that most of the vendors will used banana leaves, coconut shells and bamboo as a serving plates and cups. Unique! These are some of the food offered at the floating market. We even tried them out.

Fish cake with Thai sauce.

Klong Hae Floating is not all about foods, but there’s a few stalls selling shirts,  bags, crystal and many others at a very reasonable price.

In overall, it’s a must go place once you’re in Hat Yai. It’s very much different from the famous Damnoen Saduak Floating Market in Bangkok that we have visited recently.

Simply us,
Zara AB & FF
The Province of Chroma

Discovering Southern Thailand

Assalammualaikum and Hi there!

We’re back! Yes! Back to reality. We just completed our 7 days and 7 nights amazing race discovering Southern of Thailand. It was such an experience for us crossing our neighboring country via land. We never thought of doing it before this. As usual, the idea came just a few weeks before the journey started.

And our very first challenges is that we couldn’t secure any train tickets as it was a school holiday back here in Malaysia. So, there goes our dream of having a train trip to Thailand. Next time i guess? At the other hand, we were lucky that we managed to secured our flight tickets a few days before our journey and guess what? The fees reduced average to 40% from the original price that we checked through earlier. Phew! Another addition to the pocket-money. Alhamdulillah.

Since we were in Bangkok last March, we decided to continue discovering Thailand more since then. So this is it! We travel all the way to Hatyai, Phuket, Koh Samui and ended up in Surat Thani town before we flew back to Kuala Lumpur using various kinds of transportation from a normal bus, a double-decker bus, a 2.4cc luxurious car, a minibus (van), tuk tuk, ‘Songthaews’, ferry, speedboat, a motorbike or anything that could fit into our little budget. Not to forget our most valuable pair of feet.

So, this is the photo teaser. 😀

To those who might be wondering on our previous route, this is it. It’s all the way from KL – Hat Yai – Phuket – Koh Samui – Surat Thani – KL. How we wish we could go further up and complete up to the Northern of Thailand as well. But we have to give it up due to our work commitment.

As for us, that 7 days really taught us a lots of things. And there’s always new things to be discovered. We’ll write more on every each places that we’ve visited. Insya Allah as we don’t have any trip coming up. Need to save some of our annual leave for the upcoming Raya Celebration.

Till then!

Simply us,
Zara AB & FF
The Province of Chroma