• Paulina Grabara
• On January 1, 2020

Imagine palm trees that lean towards the water. Gentle wind blowing from the sea, soft sand on a private beach. Maybe you’re swimming in the Olympic size pool or relaxing under the umbrella when you’re lying in the hot tub? You’re admiring views of the sea and the mountains or you’re having a moment of relax in the spa center. The Emerald Cove Koh Chang is an elegant pearl of the tropical Koh Chang Island.

Text: Paulina Grabara-Król, Photos: Paulina Grabara-Król, Maciej Król

Translation: Maja Zalewska, Paulina Grabara-Król

If you book the hotel through booking.com, we get a little money from them, and thanks to that we can travel and develop our travel projects. So please BOOK clicking HERE.

FOLLOW US: FB intopassion, IG into_passion

Be part of STYLISH PAPER and intopassion – our travel projects and support us: patronite.pl/intopassion.

Architecture and design of the hotel

Just after the entry to the lobby the hotel makes a big impression on me – doesn’t matter if we arrived for the first or for the second time. First impression: chic and elegance in the tropical garden. I look outside, where delights the space planning: the hotel is located in 3 buildings, between which there are 3 pools.

All the zones are connected by stylish wooden alleys, along which water flows. We can find here the typical small Asian house with the roofing, where we can take rest from the hot sun, and armchairs with the table, at which we can seat at with the family and friends.

The flora is beautiful and well-kept, the grass green, but nothing compares to the spectacular coconut palms which proudly leaves theirs shadow in the whole garden. Main pool is separated from the beach by the sun beds and the table with comfortable seats – here or on the beach guests spend the main part of their day.

Light color of the hotel buildings beautifully contrasts with the ubiquitous wood and green. Rooms are spacious and a wooden furnitures, wide bed and marble in the bathroom determinate their stylish character.

Rooms and suits

We enter the room and we stand enraptured: our suite has 2 beautiful rooms, between which we can open not only doors, but also the wooden wall over the bed, what means fun for our daughter. We have a wooden table with 4 chairs, where I can sit at comfortably and edit the photos. Additionally two toilets and a beautiful bathroom with marble alike on the floor and the walls, bath, shower and the window, through which we can admire the beautiful Island.

We have about 100m2 available space, which gives an amazing comfort while the family holidays. Now everyone have their own place and Natalie can freely place her toys and do her puzzles, without disturbing a walk through the room.

The interior is very elegant: wooden floors, beige walls, wooden furnitures. We can admire the view of the sea and 3 hotel pools from the 2 terraces in our suit.

In the hotel offer we can find also deluxe rooms, deluxe premium rooms, deluxe with the sea view. On the hotel area I saw also view beach villas, but I can’t find them in the hotel offer.

Food

In Thailand, my world goes around the food. I can’t imagine writing a good hotel review of the place, wherein I didn’t like what I ate. While my journey in Thailand we check local restaurants, but while reviewing the hotel I always try their food. And I always choose Thai dishes.

But let’s start from the beginning. Breakfast in The Cove Terrace restaurant was the perfect start, that I like the most – beautifully aesthetic dishes presentation, large selection (starting from the cheeses, trough the meats, veggies, egg-station, where the cook makes for us any egg dishes, Asian section and the ‘sweet one’ of course), by the look of the restaurant by itself to the tables outside with the sea and pool view.

That kind of start of the day, with the waffle with bananas (not mine) or the rice noodle soup with fish cake and coffee (mine), I really liked.

In the same restaurant through the whole day are also served Thai and international dishes, so we order here our lunch a few times.

The food was delicious and the prices for the 5-star hotel are very affordable. The reason for that is easy: to convince guests to eat in the hotel, not in many local, cheap restaurants, that we can find in the area.

Thailand is famous for its delicious street food at low prices, however street restaurants often are located next to the hustle and bustle of Thai streets and are lacking of the nice interior and beautiful view. But for a lot of people the environment and atmosphere, in which they eat and the way of serving dishes do matter. If we add just a little bit higher prices than the ones in the local restaurant, many guests will stay in the hotel.

What to try in The Emerald Cove? The pomelo salad! It’s amazing! We were looking for it all over the island, and the one we later ordered differed from our favorite dish. Curries, chicken with cashew nuts, I always try everywhere I am, are also delicious. Or pineapple filled with rice, chicken, nuts and aromatic spices.

In The Emerald Cove in the lobby is located an elegant restaurant called Just Thai, which seems to be perfect for a romantic dinner. Unfortunately, I cannot describe the cuisine, because we haven’t tried the food.

But it’s not the end of the culinary options, which the hotel has prepared for their guests: in the pool bar we can eat light snacks (they looked very tempting) or we can drink delicious cocktail – 180 baht in the Happy Hour. They have also mango smoothie and fresh coconuts.

We also booked a table for the seafood BBQ on the beach. The cost was 700baht per person if I remember well and it was a real feast – beautifully prepared space, live music and above all delicious food. Shrimps and calamari melted in the mouth, and in addition to grilled dishes, you could try duck in red curry or crab in yellow curry. Heaven in your mouth.

You can eat a romantic dinner on the beach, at the special table prepared for this occasion or on the balcony of your room – white tablecloth and just us – no one will look into our plates or make photos, because we create beautiful background on the beach while the sunset.

Relax and attractions

This kind of view, when the coconut palms create a shadow and some of them bends as if they wanted to reach the water, is priceless for me. Soft sand on the private beach. Besides the sunbeds we can find here tables with chairs (I like seating at a table, and you know this great feeling, when your feet lay freely in the sand?) and the swings by the sea.

This part of the beach is located slightly higher than the sea – in the morning because of the tide we have to take the stairs to go down to the water, but at the sunset we already could go for a walk on the seashore. Who likes to swim, will certainly appreciate the Olympic-size pool with wonderfully warm water. And the one who wants to read a book in the water can choose a relaxation pool with seats and umbrellas.

People willing can benefit from the rich offer of treatments in the hotel spa – scents, aromas and Thai touch is a recipe for the relaxing time.

Lazy day we can interrupted at any time by renting a kayak – a little bit of sport and variety. When we are back it’s obvious that the every effort will be rewarded – it’s worth to go to the bar or wait on the comfortable chair and order a cocktail – because beach and cocktails create a perfect combination, and prices are very tempting. On the sunset you can listen to the live music.

Holidays with a child

The more hotels I visit, the more I appreciate the whole creativity that hotels put into making the pleasant time for children. Because busy kid means a rest for their parents. And the holidays are for everyone. The Emerald Cove Hotel Koch Chang took care of Natalia from the morning till the evening, thanks to it I could have some relax.

Firstly the pool for children, I guess 60cm deep, is a great solution for all small kids. You put a lifebuoy or water sleeves on them and lay peacefully, enjoying the sun or reading the book (near the pool there was a typical Asian house with the roofing and pillows, on which I could stretch out). Another attraction is a playground at the beach – it’s amazing to ride on the kids’ slide straight to the soft sand.

Another point, similar to the one we had in Away Koh Kood, is a basket filled with toys – children can take out beach molds, buckets, balls and have fun as long as they want to. Parents know that a new toy is always better, than the old one. New toys are a great entertainment.

And there is another one I will honestly say that I saw for the first time in the hotel and it’s an genius. Painting! Who told us that we can only paint at home, not at the beach. I think that all children love paints. Here for the 100 bahts we can buy a figure of any animal with the small paints (Natalie chose bear and lion) or for 200 bahts (or maybe 300?) paint a t-shirt.

What we liked:

• Suites – perfect choice for families, spacious, stylish, with a beautiful view
• Restaurant by the pool: very tasty Thai food in the affordable places – I had more pleasure eating with a view in the elegant hotel than just a little bit cheaper sitting in the street
• Pools – it is difficult to choose wich pool was best – the biggest one with warm water (Olympic size) and nice sculpture, relaxing pool (I called it that way because it had some beds for relaxing) and the smallest one, for kids, thanks to which I could spend some time reading and looking at my happy kid
• Playground and activities for children, among many our favourite figures for painting
• Hotel architecture: stylish alleys, water and beautiful greenery, spectacular swimming pools, divided by the beach from the warm sea