Bangkok Chiang Mai Krabi flights
 

Would appreciate some help on our travel arrangements. We are going to Thailand in November and would like to spend the first 3 days in Bangkok, then 3 days in Chiang Mai and on to Krabi for 7 days with the last day in Bangkok before flying home.

Looking for some help with internal flights. Is it possible to fly from Chiang Mai to Krabi direct and if so which airline. Don't really want to have to spend a full day in transit if we have to do Chiang Mai to Krabi via Bangkok.

If this is not possible would we be better to fly straight to Chiang Mai after landing (arriving from UK). I know this would make for a very long journey but at least we would not have to spend a full day getting from Chiang Mai to Krabi. We could do Chiang Mai first then have 3 days Bangkok and go from there to Krabi.

Any advice re options and airlines would be greatly appreciated. I have to sort this before we look at booking hotels.

Thanks a lot

You can't fly direct from Chiang Mai to Krabi.
Thai Airways does these routes plus Thai Air Asia.
Thai Air Asia is a budget airline ( 15 kg baggage allowance ). The problem with using the budget service is that each sector is separate, so if say you got in late from Chiang Mai to Bangkok and missed the connection that sadly would be bad luck.

What I would suggest for smoothness and stress-free would be to us Thai. Now if you are going BKK-CM-BKK-Krabi-BKK that is 4 sectors, contact Thai Airways in your home country and get the price for their Pass ticket fare, you will get it cheaper that way.

Now I would not stress about wasting a day, Air travel within Thailand is efficient and easy, you will get good service.

using Thai from CM to krabi they will check you and your baggage all the way. Flight time between BKK and CM is 1 hr 10 max, from BKK to Krabi is 1 hr 20 max.

Here is the best connection from CM to Krabi ( based on current schedules ) for the easiest connections. No rush in the morning, time to check out easy, you arrive Krabi just after 2 which means your room will be available, you'll get a snack on the plane and BKK domestic transfer is relaxed.

Depart Chiang mai, arr BKK, dep BKK arr Krabi:

1015-1125 / 1250-1410 ( Total 3 hrs 55, both flights on nice 'wide body' Airbus A330/300 )
I don't think you can better that connection, add to that Thai has around 10 flights up to CM per day, easy.
This gives you simple info and links for all the domestic airlines:
http://www.beachsiam.com/thailand.html

Not possible to fly directly from CM. You could catch the Thai Airlines 10.15 flight to Bangkok and then connect to the flight to Krabi at 12.50. Not long in transit and you will be there early afternoon.

Sorry James for repeating what you said. Both posting about the same time

Just had another thought, you could take the daily Thai Airways non stop flight from Chiang Mai to Phuket, that is wide-body flight too, it takes 2 hours, and then you can either get your krabi hotel / resort to pick you up from Phuket Airport or arrange a taxi there, from Phuket Airport to krabi takes about 2 hrs 30 mins though it depends on exactly where in the krabi area you are staying.
Now that would be 3 sectors on Thai, BKK-CM-Phuket(HKT) and then Krabi-BKK

That flight I 'think' goes around midday, you actualy will not save any time than going via BKK but it does mean just the one flight, you see a bit of the countryside, would no doubt work out cheaper though.

Hope that helps.

Scotters, what are you doing up? It's 4.30 am here now!

Hi James - It is just late afernoon here in the great white north- Canada. Beautiful day here with temp around 28C and high humidity. Best regards

i thought of the flight to phuket from CM as well and just transfer by land from there to krabi...

not sure how the air pass from bkk air might work for you as well...

how about starting in krabi as you will have plenty of rest there to adjust to jet lague and humidity in thailand, then move on to the other places and save bkk for last....

Thanks a lot, really appreciate the information. Once we can confirm the internal flights we can start to look at the accommodation.

I am sure I will be back to ask for more advice on various other topics. Have had a lot of useful and interesting info for my first visit Jan 05 so needless to say I am really looking forward to this one