Pattaya Sightseeing
Pattaya comprises three separate bays. At the centre is the four-kilometer Pattaya Beach, the noisiest, most unsightly zone of the resort, crowded with yachts and tour boats and fringed by a silver of sand and a paved beachfront walkway. Known by its English name, and signed as such, Pattaya Beach Road (Thanon Hat Pattaya) runs the length of the beach and is connected to the parallel Pattaya 2 Road (Thanon Pattaya Sawng) by a string of Soi’s numbered from 1 in the north to 17 in the south. The core of this block, between soi’s 6 and 13, is referred to as Central Pattaya and is packet with hotels, restaurants, bars, fast-food joints souvenir shops and tour operators.
During the day this is the busiest part of the resort, but after dark the neon zone south of soi 13/2 – South Pattaya – takes over. Known locally as “The Strip”, this is what Pattaya’s really about, with sex for sale in go-go bars, disco’s, massage parlors and open-sided “bar-beers”. The town’s enclave of gay sex bars is here too, focused mainly on the interlinked network of small lanes known as Pattayaland soi’s 1, 2 and 3, but actually signed as soi 13/3, 13/4 and 13/4, between the Royal Garden Plaza and soi 14. Pattaya Beach Road continues south from its junction with South Pattaya Road (Thanon Pattaya Tai) all the way down to the Siam Bay shore Hotel; this stretch of road is also known as Walking Street because it’s pedestrianized every evening from 7 PM though proposed development may put a stop to that. North Pattaya, between Central Pattaya Road (Thanon Pattaya Klang) and North Pattaya Road (Thanon Hat Pattaya Neua), also has its “bar-beers”, but is a more sedate, up market district.
The southerly bay, Jomtien Beach is also fronted by enormous high-rises, many of which are condominiums, though there are some low-rise mid priced hotels along the beachfront road, Jomtien Beach Road (Thanon Hat Jomtien), as well, Fourteen kilometers long, it is safer and a little cleaner than Pattaya Beach, and is considered Thailand’s number-one windsurfer spot. Trees provide shade in some stretches and in other parts there are sun loungers with parasols for rent. The far northern tip of Jomtien, beyond the end of the road, is mainly a gay cruising beach. The atmosphere in Jomtien is almost sleepy in comparison to Pattaya, with just a handful of restaurant-shacks, the occasional mini market, and half-a-dozen bar-beers between the hotels and condos.
Naklua Bay, around the northerly headland from Pattaya Beach, is the quietest of the three enclaves, and has managed to retain its fishing harbor and indigenous population despite the onslaught of condominiums, holiday apartments and expat homes. Most of the accommodation here is in time-shared condos, and there’s no decent beach
