Objective review - Very Good

First stay for us at the Orchid Beach Resort. Stayed at the JJ Marriott further up the same beach last year but this was a lot pricier in January than the Orchid Beach Resort. The resort is on quiet Khuk Khak Beach in Khao Lak. Its a long stretch of golden sand with a dozen mostly small resorts on the whole beach. The hotel is located across a quiet service road from the beach with a handful of local bars and restaurants providing an alternative to the hotel's one evening restaurant, Verve 29. The guests when we stayed were mostly Scandinavian, with a few English, German and French, mainly middle aged to older couples, only a small number of children. Guests appear come back to the Orchid Beach Resort years after year, and after staying there we can tell why. The hotel has approx. 80 rooms on three floors, two pools, one main pool with swim up bar, kids pool and Jacuzzi, and another smaller adults-only pool. The hotel is crescent shaped with reception at one end, mini-market and spa, then breakfast area, then rooms around to the adult only pool at the other end. In the middle of the crescent is the main pool, massage huts and gardens. Next to reception is the lunch and evening restaurant. Our room was large and generally well maintained, though it has a damp smell when we arrived. There was an air purifier in the room which dealt with this problem fairly quickly. The room had all the usual comforts and a small balcony overlooking the garden. Housekeeping serviced the room daily, one slight issue being the state of the duvet covers which largely had darned holes in them. A minor issue though, as the linen was always very clean, though something the hotel could improve on. Breakfast was excellent, plenty of choice, eggs cooked to order in any style, a mixture of western and Asian foods, and wonderful service. I have read other reviews on the resort which criticized the service but we couldn't fault it. The staff were all friendly and very helpful. We ate at the hotel