Hat Yai - Thailand’s Southern City
Hat Yai is Thailand’s largest southern city and is chock full of excellent markets, famous fried chicken and gorgeous street art. Read on to see our guide to Hat Yai and why this city should be on your southern Thailand travel itinerary.
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Hat Yai, the largest city in southern Thailand, is often the first or last stop of land travel between Thailand and Malaysia. A large sprawling city, Hat Yai has a mixture of cultures. As it sits close to the Malaysian border there is a strong Malay influence in its cooking and culture as well as a significant Chinese presence. Full of markets, food and temples, Hat Yai capitalises on its cultures and has an interesting feel all of its own. We had passed through Hat Yai on our way to Songkhla but this time we were going to stay for a couple of days.
The colourful exterior of the Chao Por Suea Shrine
Hat Yai Guide Contents Page:
Where to stay in Hat Yai?
What to do in Hat Yai?
Where to eat and drink in Hat Yai?
Getting to and from Hat Yai
Where to stay? Accommodation in Hat Yai
Silla House : ศิลลา เฮ้าส์ โฮเทล - Map Link
We stayed in the Silla House hostel in the centre of Hat Yai. Within walking distance of both Hat Yai's bus and train stations, Silla House, was convenient, quiet and comfortable and for a private room (shared bathroom) pretty cheap! We can't compare it to other hostels in Hat Yai but the beds were comfy, the WiFi good and the location perfect for us. We stayed 3 nights and paid around £11 ($14) per night for the two of us. Book your stay here!
Silla House hostel had the advantage of being a stone's throw away from the Florida Night Market - read more about this excellent night market below.
Other hotels and hostels within Hat Yai
For other places to stay check out the map below:
What to do in Hat Yai?
Lee Garden Plaza Market - Map Link
Hat Yai seems to have an abundance of great markets. On our second evening we explored the Lee Garden night market. Set on the streets around the Lee Garden Plaza hotel, this night market boasted a great selection of treats. From huge rolls of crispy pork belly to sweet coconut pancakes, there was a tasty treat for anyone's appetite. Alongside the market stalls were large seafood restaurants sitting next to jewellery sellers and printed t-shirt vendors.
Dotted in amongst the stalls are a wide variety of stir fry chefs.
We opted for two plates of Pad Krapow which we hungrily devoured on plastic stools on the roadside. Spicy, hearty and yummy, the pork Pad Krapow was everything we wanted it to be. In Thailand, Pad Krapow is one of our favourite staples. Don’t know what to have? Just go for a Pad Krapow. Stir fried meat of choice (we recommend pork), with holy basil, onion and green vegetables depending on region. All stir fried up and served with rice. We recommend being indulgent and asking for the fried egg on top, it will always be an option!
Street Art Hat Yai ถนน ศุภสารรังสรรค์ - Map Link
A few streets away from the Lee Garden night market are a couple of streets that are filled with colourful murals and artworks. Street art seems to be a theme in southern Thailand and northern Malaysia from the alleyways of Ipoh and George town all the way to north to Songkhla and now Hat Yai, each town and city has its own unique street art.
The artists of Hat Yai seem to have focussed on the local wildlife and culture of southern Thailand, with depictions of Malay tea sellers, Chinese dragon dancers sitting alongside paintings of Thai noodle vendors.
If you’re in the area definitely check it out and even if you’re not it serves as a good excuse for a wander!
Wat Chue Chang วัดฉื่อฉาง หาดใหญ่ - Map Link
Close to Hat Yai’s street art towers the Buddhist temple of Wat Chue Chang.
This multi storey Chinese style temple dominates the surrounding area. Set over several storeys, its white and orange tiled exterior is intricately decorated with a colourful dragon and phoenix mural crowning the top.
We randomly encountered this temple when we were wandering around looking for street art. We were too late to visit the inside, but the exterior is extremely impressive and is definitely a place we need to explore more fully on our next visit!
Khlong Hae Floating Market - Map Link
Hat Yai also boasts a weekend floating market. The floating market of Khlong Hae runs from Friday to Sunday and opens in the late afternoon around 4pm. The floating market is around 6km away from central Hat Yai. We attempted to walk to the market, but after walking 40 minutes from our hostel we decided to take a Grab. The market itself was a curious mix of semi-permanent covered structures on the river bank and a row of longtail boats moored in a line to the riverside. Each boat sells something different, from spring rolls to coconut ice cream or even drinks served in sticks of bamboo. They deliver their wares and take their payment via long poles with baskets attached; these baskets are swung out from their boats across to the riverbank. It was a charming place, full of families enjoying an evening out, live music and karaoke performances. We arrived when it opened and had some chicken wings, a basket of quail eggs and some coconut pancakes all for under 100 baht! (£2.40 or $2.89)
The food was good and cheap but not quite up to the excellent fare we had eaten elsewhere in Hat Yai.
The Khlong Hae floating market was definitely touristy. Most of the people there aside from us appeared to be Malaysian families and all of the signs were in Thai, Malaysian and English. We're not criticising it by saying it's touristy as we are tourists ourselves, but if you came expecting a "authentic"* off the beaten track experience you might be a little bit disappointed.
Greenway Night Market - Map Link
On every night of the week (except Mondays) the Greenway night market opens it’s doors. Selling vintage clothes, crafts and other more traditional Thai market wares (endless mobile phone accessories for example) the Greenway Night Market has a little something for all comers. What it also has is a large food court, covered against the elements and selling every kind of food imaginable, ok maybe not caviar but you get our meaning!
ASEAN Night Bazaar - Map Link
Open from 4.30pm everyday (except Monday), this sprawling, covered night market is set over two floors. The ground floor is chock full of market stalls selling clothes, souvenirs and electronics, whilst upstairs there is a small food court offering everything from fruit smoothies to fried noodles. It’s a great place to head too if you’re looking to pick up some trinkets, suspect perfumes or elephant printed pants!
Florida Night Market (Jiranakorn Night Market) - Map Link
Just over the road from our hostel, Silla House is the daily Florida (Jiranakorn) Night Market. Open everyday from 4pm, we ended up eating our dinner here on two out of our three nights in Hat Yai. Three long rows of market stalls are joined by more informal street carts all of which open in the evening and seem to stay open late into the night. Serving all manner of goodies, from fried insects to grilled cheese, the night market was perfect for tapas style grazing. Read all about here - in brief, we loved it!
Songkhla Old Town - Map Link
Located 45 minutes north east of Hat Yai lies the historic coastal town of Songkhla. Full of street art, Buddhist temples, museums, a viewpoint to climb and beaches, theres plenty to keep you occupied. The Old Town of Songkhla is still to this day one of our favourite Thai towns.
Getting to Songkhla is extremely easy from Hat Yai with local buses departing every hour.
You could easily visit Songkhla as a day trip from Hat Yai, however if you do have time, we do feel that Songkhla deserves at least an overnight stay as there’s plenty to see and do.
Read more about visiting here.
Other things to do in Hat Yai
There is plenty of things we didn’t manage to visit in Hat Yai. Unfortunately when we were in Hat Yai the weather wasn’t playing ball with us and rained torrentially leaving us with only brief sunny spells to cram in as many attractions as possible.
Next time we’d love to visit Wat Hat Yai Nai (Mahattamangkalaram Temple), a beautiful Buddhist temple famous for its large reclining Buddha.
If the weather is better we’d like to pack a picnic and take a walk around the Hat Yai Municipal City Park or climb up to the Kho Hong Mountain viewpoint which overlooks the city. Further a field we’d love to escape the city and head to the forest trails and waterfalls of Ton Nga Chang Wildlife Sanctuary.
If you’re unlucky like us and you’re faced with heavy rain, then the Central Shopping Mall is a great place to refresh your travel wardrobe or to get your Western food fix.
What to eat and drink in Hat Yai?
Hat Yai Fried Chicken
Kai-Tod Decha (Chee Uthit Branch) ไก่ทอดเดชา (สาขาชีอุทิศ) - Map Link
No visit to Hat Yai would be complete without sampling its famous fried chicken. We go into more detail about this amazing food here on our £5 market challenge. But for a more formal sit down meal, we followed Gary Butler’s recommendation from his YouTube video and headed to Kai-Tod Decha.
We ordered two meal sets consisting of fried chicken drumsticks, sticky rice and sweet chilli sauce all washed down with their signature iced Thai tea. The chicken was crunchy yet juicy and made for a fantastic breakfast brunch! Two plates plus two teas cost us 200 baht (£4.91 or $5.91).
Pork Tom Yum noodle soup with intestines
ก๋วยเตี๋ยวเรืออนุสาวรีย์พี่ฝน - Map Link
Over the course of our recent travels we have found our way of getting over choice paralysis when it comes to food. There are always too many tasty looking places with menus we can’t translate. It’s so easy just to keep walking and say we’ll just have a look at the next one. This indecision can last for hours so our new tactic is that the third time we see somewhere and think to move on, we pivot and enter the restaurant. This leads us to trying some unexpectedly great things!
This time we sat down in a lovely shop house restaurant. As the menu was entirely in Thai we ordered by pointing at a bowl another patron was devouring. A delicious Tom Yum style noodle soup quickly appeared with the unexpected additions of heart, tongue and intestines. We’ve never had tongue or intestines before and can report that although the textures are odd (not in a bad way just different) the flavours were amazing!
The soup was spicy and rich, having taken on the flavours of the offal from the stock. The tongue and heart were hearty (excuse the pun) and not at all tough or gamey. The intestines were the most unique texture, snappy like a hot dog skin on the outside and almost creamy on the inside. The whole bowl sat together excellently with the ground pork and lime rounding out the flavours. Two bowls and a large bottle of water set us back 150 baht (£3.68 or $4.43).
Wanton Mee noodles with pork and crab - บะหมี่หงส์ทอง(ดั้งเดิม) - Map Link
This was one of those little food gems you find yourself eating at completely by accident. After checking in to our hostel, we picked up our dirty washing and headed to the nearest Otteri.
If you’re in Thailand, Otteri launderettes can be found all over the country.
Look out for their cute otter logo!
Just look for the cute Otter logo and head on in. Sometimes there will be ladies to help you, other times you’re left to your own devices. Although not the cheapest, they’re great places to chill out in and wait for your washing as they all usually have wifi, fans, tables and chairs.
Hungry and waiting for our washing to finish its spin dry, we headed to the nearest restaurant and weren’t disappointed. Presented to us were two large steaming bowls of Wonton Mee topped with char siu pork, sweet crab meat and greens. It was delicious. Sweet and salty, the crab paired perfectly with the soft char siu pork. The dumplings were expertly cooked with perfectly thin wrappers and delicious fillings.
A trip here is worth it even if you’re not heading to the nearby launderette!
Coffee
Lorem Ipsum Space - Map Link
There comes a point in any day’s exploring where you begin to run out of power. If you’ve already eaten two out of the three meals of the day and it’s only 2pm, you can’t really justify another snack stop. This is where coffee comes in.
Lorem Ipsum is an achingly cool modern coffee shop located inside a historic shop house. Its modern minimalist interior of brushed concrete, green plants and eclectic furniture signalled its true hipster credentials. We ordered two hot lattes and they were the best coffees we’ve had in months. The two coffees set us back 130 baht (£3.19 or $3.84).
Thai favourites - street eats in Hat Yai
Wherever you are in Hat Yai and at whatever time of day, you’ll never be far from the sound of a wok firing up. Serving all the popular Thai dishes of Pad Krapao, Pad Thai and fried rice, there are plenty of street side stalls to choose from. If you’re hungry, we’d recommend heading up to explore the streets east of Hat Yai’s railway station right next to the Lee Plaza market.
We had an excellent spicy pork Pad Krapao at a stall located on a crossroad junction of Thanon Niphathuthit 3. Piping hot, slightly charred and topped with a perfectly cooked still runny fried egg, it was the perfect dish to devour as we sheltered underneath canvas from the rain.
Getting to and from Hat Yai
Being the largest city in southern Thailand, Hat Yai is extremely well connected.
By train - Hat Yai Railway Station:
Hat Yai’s railway station sits on Thailand’s southern railway line and connects the city all the way to Bangkok in the north as well as south to the border of Malaysia at Padang Besar.
If you’re heading to one of the Thai islands on either the west or eastern coast of Thailand, the train station can connect you to the station at Surat Thani.
To book tickets, either head to the railway station or book them online in advance via 12Go.
Getting to Koh Lipe from Hat Yai:
Hat Yai is the most logical stop on the mainland to get to the tiny paradise island of Koh Lipe. If you haven’t heard of this lush little island check out our article (actually check out our article anyway!). Transport to the island is easy to arrange and most guesthouses will have options available. We arranged transport through our hostel and the journey took us around 4 hours and cost us 800 baht per person.
Going to Malaysia from Hat Yai:
Hat Yai is the last major town before the Thai/Malaysian border and makes an ideal jumping off point into Thailands southern neighbour. We have actually done this crossing both ways, from Malaysia into Thailand and visa versa. The most logical stop on the Malaysian side is the amazing city of Georgetown Penang, which we cannot recommend enough, but you can get transport all the way down to Kuala Lumpur or even right through to Singapore!
Both times we crossed the border we had arranged our transport in advance via 12Go. The border crossing at Sadao Checkpoint itself was painless and efficient, with our minivan/bus waiting for us at either side whilst we checked out of and into both countries. As with all land crossings you will need to take your own baggage (physical and emotional) across the border with you. There are many pick up points in town for the border crossing busses, so check when you book!
You can check out our full article on the border crossing here!
If you’re crossing in or out of Malaysia from Thailand, make sure to check your departure times.
Thailand (GMT +7) is an hour behind Malaysia (GMT +8).
Hat Yai to be continued….
Hat Yai is a city we just have to return to. The poor weather meant that there were a lot of things we didn’t get to see and do. The city had such a different feel to other Thai towns and cities we’ve visited and we absolutely love its laid back atmosphere and incredible food.
The city, (at least when we visited), seemed to be more popular with tourists from Malaysia rather than the West and luckily for us, the Malaysians are just as food obsessed as their Thai counterparts. Unlike the Thai islands, and areas of Thailand that are more popular with tourists from the West, the food we ate in Hat Yai wasn’t watered down for the ‘Farang palette’.
Hat Yai is one of those cities we will visit again. Not only because it's a convenient border stop between Thailand and Malaysia or because we’re still dreaming of breakfast fried chicken, but because it was a genuine, laid back, little gem of a city.
Thanks for reading,
John & Ellie
#adventuresofjellie x
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The southern Thai city of Hat Yai is full of night markets. Following inspiration from YouTube we set ourselves the food challenge - The £5 market munching feast! What Thai foods can we get for £5? Can two people really get dinner for £5 in Thailand? How much chilli can one Som Tam contain? Is Hat Yai Fried Chicken really worth the hype? Read on to find out!