I recently made the trip from Bangkok to Koh Phangan. I stayed one night in Bangkok and then took the Air Asia flight from Don Muang Airport to Suratthani Airport.
The biggest city in the south of Thailand is Suratthani. It is a travel hub. It has an airport, a train station and a port. However, none of these travel options are close to the city part of Suratthani. This means you always have to factor in the time and money needed to get between the city, the port, the bus station, the train station and the airport.
Suratthani is on the main north-south train line. The station is actually in the nearby town of Punpin. It is about an hour away by minibus.
The biggest city in the south of Thailand is Suratthani. It is a travel hub. It has an airport, a train station and a port. However, none of these travel options are close to the city part of Suratthani. This means you always have to factor in the time and money needed to get between the city, the port, the bus station, the train station and the airport.
Suratthani is on the main north-south train line. The station is actually in the nearby town of Punpin. It is about an hour away by minibus.
Songserm has a pier in Suratthani; however, the other ferry companies use piers in the Donsak region that is about an hour away by minibus.
All of this means that the Bangkok Airways flight between Suvarnabhumi and Koh Samui remains an attractive, if more expensive, option. It also involves less moving from one form of transport to another.
I took the Air Asia flight to Suratthani and then the Raja Car Ferry from Donsak to Thongsala in Koh Phangan. It takes a few hours more but it saves nearly 2,000 Thai Baht, and makes the journey possible in a day rather than the over-night options of train and boat or bus and boat.
At the airport
I arrived at Suvarnabhumi Airport on Saturday 27th April.2013 at 7.30 pm. I had to wait 1 hour in an immigration queue. Most obvious were large groups of Chinese people on tours. None of them were filling the arrival/departure cards in correctly and this slowed the process down even though 95% of the police immigration desks were open. Queues reached down the ramp into the main concourse. In fairness to the airport staff they set up a snaking queue system that made the process slightly less chaotic.Prices
Surat Thani Airport to Koh Phangan by bus/raja ferry = 445 THB per personSuvarnabhumi airport to Central Bangkok by taxi from Kiosk: 400 THB fare, 50 THB service charge, 70 THB toll (total cost 520 THB).
Suvarnabhumi airport to Central Bangkok by meter taxi: Approximately 220 THB fare, 50 THB service charge, 70 toll THB (total cost 340THB). I got the taxi at the kiosk but the guy decided to do it by the meter anyway.
