Cape Panwa Hotel

We love this hotel and come back each year. The location is unique, it’s a tropical peaceful paradise with its own private beach and a gorgeous Sino-Portuguese atmospheric house on the beachfront (Panwa House) which is just one of the many restaurants. It’s secluded and as the rooms are on the hillside the beach is accessed by a mini tram. The views from our room are spectacular over the sea at sunrise as we choose high floor rooms. We are always treated as honoured guests and the staff are so friendly and helpful. The food is also wonderful and the range and variety keeps it a food adventure every day. We have no complaints only compliments. Read less

Buckle up - this is a long one. We spent 10 days here in a family suite at the beginning of April on a full board basis. This is meant to provide a choice of dining at Cafe Andaman, Panwa House or Top of the Reef in the hotel. You can also get the bus to the sister 3 star hotel and dine at the Italian restaurant there. Cafe Andaman was disappointing and is in desperate need of renovation. We only ate here twice and one of those was because it was the only restaurant open in the hotel. Top of the Reef was very good and Amp provides excellent service but only European food is served here. Panwa House is the Thai restaurant and is beautifully situated on the beach. We were very much looking forward to having most of our evening meals here. Indeed it was the main reason we booked this hotel. When we arrived we booked the only 3 nights with tables available. However the hotel then proceeded to cancel each of these due to wedding bookings. In total there were 5 weddings and one corporate function during our 10 day stay which meant that the best areas of the hotel were not accessible to hotel guests. All of the weddings used Otters Bar for the ceremony and Panwa House for the reception. On one of the wedding nights Top of the Reef and Panwa House were closed which meant I was told as a vegetarian that the only food available in the hotel was the steak buffet at Cafe Andaman. I had to involve management in order to be able to eat a vegetarian meal. The weddings were noisy and disruptive and certainly didn’t fit with the idea of a tropical relaxing holiday. Our room was some distance away but still facing the beach and it was impossible to sleep before the wedding party left Panwa House. One wedding had almost a hundred guests which meant the large group monopolised areas of the resort even when not attending the actual wedding. In short the fact that there were so many weddings here spoiled our holiday and makes us reluctant to return. This is a shame as the hotel has a lot going for it. It isn’t 5 star by any means ( in parts it’s not even 4 star) but it has a wonderful location and mostly friendly staff. Our room was brilliant for a family with 2 teenagers, plenty of space and everything worked. It was kept spotlessly clean. The food we had was good quality, it was just strange not being able to eat Thai food in Thailand. On our beach days we had lunch at Bamboo Bar on the beach where we were looked after by the very capable Sandi. All our meals and drinks here were great. We also used the spa on several occasions and were well looked after. Leaving aside the many weddings the downsides are the pool and Cafe Andaman. For a hotel with 400 odd guests a pool with less than 40 sunbeds is not fit for purpose. They were all gone when we arrived for breakfast at 9 am. There are plenty of sunbeds on the beach but there were lots of jellyfish in the sea, so a sunbed by the pool would have been preferable. We also found reception to be less than helpful, save for the wonderful Maggie who sorted out our many dining problems. The customer care just isn’t there. You are largely made to feel like an inconvenience. We asked to speak to the manager twice but it never happened. The best we got was the Restaurant manager who did arrange a bottle of wine as an apology for cancelling our Panwa House reservations. She also arranged for us to attend the seafood buffet at Panwa House without eating seafood, as this was the only night it was actually open during our stay. To conclude Cape Panwa needs to decide whether it’s a hotel or a wedding venue. The two are not compatible in this setting. An occasional small wedding wouldn’t be a problem but there are too many and some of them are too large. This could be an amazing hotel if it was renovated and cut down on the weddings. Read less

Wonderful experience at this fantastic hotel! The room was very special as was the king bed and the array of pillows from which to choose. The four restaurants had variety, ambience and attentive staff. Was able to visit the Cape Spa for two Thai massages. The first with Yuwadi (English name Tar) & Sriwan (English name Pony). Make sure to visit the Spa for the massage of your choice when you stay here! Thoroughly recommend. Thank you to all the wonderful staff at this special establishment. Read less

We had a wonderful 7 night stay at Cape Panwa Hotel. We upgraded to a larger room with a beautiful view of the sea. The room was spacious, very clean and the beds were super comfortable. We had one complimentary massage at the spa as part of our package and enjoyed it so much that we had another one the next day. Being beach people, we really appreciated the beach area and were grateful for the tide guidelines that we found in our room. The food was good - there was never a problem finding something we liked. The main swimming pool was large with a variety of depths and was never too busy. Overall, we found our stay very enjoyable! Read less

I just stayed 7 nights in Cape Panwa Hotel. With mixed feelings. Let me start with the positive. The hotel is old style Thai and very nice surroundings. They have a very nice small beach only for hotel guests. The room was very big with a huge balcony where spend a lot of time. There are several restaurants belonging to the hotel. I tried 3 of them. Panwa House on the beach is amongst the best Thai restaurants I’ve tried thru my 11 years in Thailand. Unfortunately there are quite a few things that brings my rating of this hotel down. First is their waiters in general have extremely poor service mind and some have no clue what they are doing. One elder guy at breakfast was so negative and only smiled to elder women. I tried several times to great good morning and in Thai. He was also the only one who just pointed at the coffee Maschine when people asking for coffee. Even though it was not busy there. At bamboo bar most of the staff didn’t know what they were doing. I invited my friends for dinner and we wanted a couple of drinks first in the bar. One of us ordered a Margarita and when served it looked wrong. We asked the server (in Thai) if this was Margarita… He didn’t know, color and taste was off. But my friend still accepted as the taste was still good, just not tasting of Margarita haha. We ordered one more and now it was served with some kind of apricot liquor to give the right color. The taste as awful. We left! The main restaurant the food had nothing to do with Thai food. It was tasteless and poorly prepared. Even though the room was nice there were ants everywhere in there. Even in my bed, horrible… This is supposed to be a 5 star hotel and the price is definitely high enough. Which I don’t mind if all is good. Will I recommend this hotel. No, and I will not return Read less