Although I had been reading very good reviews about Hotel Bayfront I was quite worried before my arrival. But - the hotel was really as good as the reviews had stated. In fact, it was more beautiful in reality than in pictures. The best thing about the hotel is its beautiful gardens and pools. The pools are well kept and clean. The garden is filled with palm trees which practically hides the small buildings with the rooms. And the views - the sea and the beach on one side and the green hills with the rain forest on the other side. Fantastic!
My room was spacious with two big beds (the second floor with pool view), clean and fine. One little exception though. The beautiful dark wooden floor would have needed to be washed and vaxed before the arrival of new customers. The bathroom was ok and was well cleaned after I tipped the cleaning ladies a couple of times.
The young ladies working in the reception were really professional and helpful. The personnel in the breakfast room had some difficulties in serving the customers tea and coffee some mornings, but this problem was dealt with soon. The same personnel served also in the pool bar. Some problems arrived due to their bad knowledge of English, but - this is not a five star hotel, so some minor disadvantages must be accepted.
The hotel has only one restaurant, that also workes as the breakfast room and a pool bar. What I missed was at least one restaurant by the beach with a differing menu from the pool bar's (did not have a meal in the restaurant, so cannot comment about that, it was also closed the last few evenings when I would have liked to have my evening meal in the hotel). Probably more restaurants and a gym would give the hotel a four star status, which it would deserve.
There is a about 20 minutes walk from the hotel to the Khao Lak center. In the evening the road is quite dark, but has a pavement. Just before the Khao Lak center is a couple of nice restaurants, the Gold Elephant and Sand and Sea. And a really nice coctktail bar, with extremely friendly service and good drinks.
Before I found Tripadvisor I had one very bad hotel experience in Ao Nang in 2009. The hotel Pavillion Queen's Bay was marketed by the time by Tjareborg as a fours star hotel (now as a three star, but it is not worth a singel star). It was not well kept and dirty all over, as well in the rooms as by the pool and the service was awfully bad. This i why I now try write reviews, because if I would have read one of the above hotel I would never have chosen it, although I still not write reviews every time I travel.
But now I can recommend Hotel Bayfront as a hotel that is beautiful, well kept and has a very relaxed atmosphere. If you are searching for hotel with luxury - I would recommend that you find some five star hotel.
This review is the subjective opinion of a TripAdvisor member and not of TripAdvisor LLC