Hat Yai Songkhla Songkhla hotel...

- Thailand's deep south is the area Hat Yai Songkhla and southwards to the Malaysian border.

Hat Yai is the biggest city in Songkhla province and the third biggest in Thailand after Bangkok and Chiang Mai. The Hat Yai Songkhla area is not much integrated into Thailand tourism, there is a entertainment tourism to Hat Yai mainly fueled by tourist from Malaysia and Singapore, Tiger airways is the only international airline serving Hat Yai Airport out of Changi Airport Singapore.

A Songkhla hotel is found very easy since in the city center are plenty of hotels big and small, they are not on a scale as Hat Yai Hotels but quite ok. The bigger Songkhla hotels have some bars, karaoke, girls and nightlife in coffee shops at entrance level, there are also several so called cafe in the vicinity of the bigger hotel. Songkhla province is dominated by farm and fishing communities and was until recently the hub for the gas drilling platforms out in the Gulf of Thailand, with a good business for any Songkhla hotel which functioned as accommodations for the people shuttled by helicopter to the drilling and production platforms.

The city is partly squeezed between the Gulf of Thailand and the Songkhla Lake. the province has plenty of attractions like empty beaches, waterfalls, hill forest, parks, a interesting fishing port. Some old heritage is still visible such as parts of the city wall and plenty of artifacts in the Museum. The city is also known as 'great city on two seas'. Its over 1000km south of Bangkok but easily reachable either by bus Bangkok to Songkhla and from most other provincial capitals of southern Thailand. Railway is available via Hat Yai railway station and flights to Songkhla touch down at Hat Yai airport.

Markets are plenty as everywhere in Thailand a major market is in front

around 100km and more to the south. Aside of farming fishing is big business in the province.

- Songkhla port

is the home of a huge fishing fleet, but over fishing is rampant and every year less fishes are catched in the Gulf of Thailand off the Songkhla province. Thailand tourism is not very developed here and only few people do some Thailand travel into this southern Thailand area. Most travel bypasses Hat Yai Songkhla at the west side to the Thai Malaysian border at Sadao and Padang Besar which are the two border crossings into Malaysia. Sadao and Hat Yai have some of the hottest nightlife in Thailand, fueled by travelers from Malaysia and Singapore. The west side of Songkhla province is almost totally covered by rubber plantations, the raw latex is also processed in huge factories built along the Hat Yao - Sadao highway into various latex products thousands of people are working in the rubber plantations and the latex factories.  

Fragments of a very long history are still visible, among other artifacts a a stone axe, around three thousand years old was found at Ban Phli Khwai , Sathing Phra, and a very old bronze drum was found drum was found near Chana. The very old quarter of Songkhla is located at Sathing Pra.

As many other places in southern Thailand the city has experienced plenty of people from different nations passing through since ancient times, Indians, Arabs, Malay, Chinese, Persians, Europeans and more. The old name of the place was “Singhla” which morphed into the present day name over time, it identifies two islands looking like crouching lions at the entrance to the lagoon, a part of the city wall is still visible. This city wall is close to the Songkhla National Museum

In the first 2 centuries A.D. communities of Hindu traders emerged on the Sathing Phra peninsular, the peninsular was a agriculture area and transformed into Songkhla port afterwards. In the sixth century some Indian traders brought Buddhist culture, created Buddhist temples and placed Buddhist statues there. In the seventh century Sathing Phra emerged as an international harbor and plenty of Chinese Junks came in from the south China Sea. In the second half of the seventeen century the Chinese took over commercial activities in this area. There are several museums to show what was going long times ago.

The premier museum is the Songkhla National Museum, this museum is located in an old Chinese mansion at down town. Aside of folk arts and crafts, ancient Chinese ceramics plus Buddhist and Hindu objects are shown. A visit to the Thaksin Khadi Sueksa Institute makes some sense to understand the past better. Songkhla port is mainly used by fishing boats and vessels since ancient times.

Some years ago the city has become a center of the offshore oil and gas business and exploration in the west side of the gulf of Thailand, all the big US companies are here such as Unocal, Halliburton etc. since they are the one who have the expertise, the hotels make good business with the professionals who shuttle everyday from the local heliport to the offshore platforms. It looks like not much from the money created through this business find the way into the local environment.

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