​My dearest lovely friend, who had recommended me to go to Railay Beach: what the fuck?
I mean, thank you for your tip and your stories about your most appreciated and enjoyed beach in southern Thailand – but I´m not gonna listen to you as a travel guide again lol.
True,  the beach itself at Railay west is nice, but definitively nothing special, honey! It´s sand with a few restaurants and kinda unclear water, due to the many boats from and to Ao Nang.
Let´s not even talk about Railay east, because there´s not even a real sand area, only a pier where the boats from Krabi or Ao Nammang stop.
Anyway, the whole beach is mostly ruined, due to hundreds of tourists, trying to get the best tanning place at the beach. If you’re into that, go for Railay. If you´re dreaming of peaceful and untouched nature, stay away from it. As far as possible.
The only nice thing that´s really worth going there, is the “Princess Lagoon” and maybe the Viewpoint close to it.
It´s quite a hike getting to the lagoon, 10 Minutes from Railay east in the direction of Phra Nang beach. Then it´s about 20 minutes of climbing up and then 30 down – and when I say climbing, I don´t mean walking! You really gotta make your own way over rocks and sharp stones.
Since I got a cool and hella fit mom, she was able of doing it. But we saw other people struggling and failing. Which was fun for us. Definitively not for them lol.
If the only sports activity you´re doing is an hourly hike from the couch to the fridge, you might think about going to the lagoon again. Just saying.
And prepare for getting dirty – there´s mud everywhere, and you´re for sure not gonna look like a princess when arriving at the Princess Lagoon :D
But whatever strains you had to go through for getting there, it´s more than worth it.
It´s like a huge, turquois bathtub in the middle of the jungle, surrounded by guarding rocks and trees.
I guess there´s loads of animals inside the water, but since we didn´t see any, we didn´t really care :D
Yeah there´s tourists as well, but it´s very chill anyway and soo much better than at the beaches!
The Viewpoint can be reached on the way back from the lagoon. Or you might go to the VP before. Completely up to you, guess there´s no rule here.
I had expected more of it, but once you made your way up to the Lagoon, it´s not really making a difference whether you go there or not, so you might as well just use the chance to take some nice pics.
Since we went to the Lagoon spontaneously and directly after arriving at Railayas, we of course didn´t have a place to sleep yet.
We started looking around and were shocked – there were no places under 1000 Baht! That´s about 30€, and that´s a lot for us cheap Swabians :D
After over one hour of searching and asking, we found an affordable place at the end of Railiay east. The only thing we had was a bed on the floor and no own bathroom (I love sleeping easy like that, but usually it´s a fifth of what we payed. Whatever.)
The second day we checked out Phra Nang beach and Railay west, but both were disappointing: nothing like the stories one has heard about Thailand’s paradise beaches.
The connection street between Railay east and west is kinda nice tho, there´s some super expensive restaurants and shops. At least they´re selling Happy Cookies 😊