The lion's share of foreign tourists get to the resorts of Thailand through the capital 's Suvarnabhumi airport. But Bangkok takes travelers' attention for only one to three days. The main tourists flock to the south of the country or islands - to the white beaches of Thailand. Pattaya resort is also popular. This city is located on the coast of the Gulf of Thailand, just one hundred and fifty kilometers from Bangkok. Many tourists, without hesitation, change to Suvarnabhumi on ground transport - a bus that will deliver them to Pattaya in three hours. Others go to Bangkok and catch the train to the seaside resort. But there are also tourists who are wondering if there is an airport in Pattaya. Immediately satisfy their inexpressible curiosity - yes, there is. And we will talk about him in this article. Perhaps the information below will allow you to pave the optimal route to the resorts on the east coast of the Gulf of Thailand.
The past and future of Pattaya Airport
During the Vietnam War, the Americans built an air base in this place. At the end of the twentieth century, when the ambiguous glory of the Pattaya resort began to boom throughout Thailand, they decided to convert the nearest airport for the needs of civil aviation. So U-Thapao appeared. At first, no one predicted a big future for this small airfield. After all, he was too close to the capital. For a long time, the airport served domestic flights, taking planes from remote provinces (Phuket, Hua Hin and Samui). But, as they say, it would be happiness, so misfortune helped. In 2008, during the political crisis in the country, the protesters blocked all access to the capital's airport. Thousands of tourists could not fly home. The same amount was not able to arrive in Thailand. And then the functions of Suvarnabhumi temporarily began to be performed by the airport in Pattaya. And he coped with his task perfectly. Now the government has announced plans for the conversion of U-Thapao. It should be the second most important airport in the country. Pattaya in the future will accept tourists traveling to the rapidly developing resorts of Trat, Rayong, Chanthaburi, as well as to the islands of Chang and Samet.
U Thapao International Airport (Pattaya)
The photo shows that even today the air harbor is fully consistent with international concepts of comfort. The airport has only one passenger terminal, but it is huge (two and a half thousand square meters). Convenient waiting rooms, a parking lot, left-luggage offices, a post office and bank offices, a first-aid post, a restaurant, and a duty-free shop are far from a complete list of services in this air harbor. Many foreign carrier companies have already paved the way to the international airport. Pattaya receives planes from Siem Reap, Kaohsiung, Taipei, Guangzhou, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Osaka, Seoul and Busan. By the way, some Russian charters also take their tourists not to Bangkok, but directly to the resort. These are flights from Novosibirsk, Omsk, Rostov-on-Don (At Air Aviation), St. Petersburg, Kemerovo, Bratsk (Ikar Airlines), Irkutsk, Perm, Ufa and Khabarovsk (Nordwind). Kazakh air carriers KazAirTrans and SCAT Airlines deliver tourists from Alma-Ata and Astana.
Airport - Pattaya: how to get
The city and its air harbor are separated by a distance of forty-five kilometers. Organized tourists who arrived in Thailand on a package tour are met by their operators, who transport vacationers to hotels. But if you travel on your own, then you need not worry. Around the clock at the airport gate taxi drivers are on duty. The car will cost you a thousand baht, a minivan - 1,500. There is a more budget option. Songteo minibuses take riders for two hundred and fifty baht. The trip on the route "airport - Pattaya" will last about forty-five minutes.
Reviews
Tourists like this air harbor. Everything here is convenient, clean, functional. There is a VAT refund point, jewelry and souvenir shops, a restaurant and cafe, a kindergarten to pass the time in the fresh air. There is no Wi-Fi yet, but you can use the services of an Internet cafe. If you travel on your own, then right at the airport you can book a hotel, as well as rent a car or motorcycle. All procedures before and after the flight, passengers pass quickly, baggage is handled carefully.