The Tarna Align Resort, Koh Tao - the hotel we enjoyed most, and still not sure we would go back

The Tarna Align Resort on Koh Tao is one of the hotels we enjoyed most in Thailand, and yet one of the hardest for us to decide whether we would go back to.

The room was beautiful, the bed was the most comfortable we slept in on the whole trip, and the upper pool was, for us, a dream come true. We spent hours there with an e-reader and a cocktail, enjoying pleasant music and lovely service from the pool staff.

On the other hand, breakfast was one of the most disappointing we had at any hotel in Thailand, the lobby struck us as cold and ugly, and the hillside location turned every trip into central Sairee into quite an effort.

And still, the more we think about this hotel, the more we realise there is something very special about it. It gave us a quiet, intimate, romantic holiday of a kind we struggled to find at other hotels on Koh Tao.

So who is The Tarna Align Resort right for, who is it less right for, and do its exceptional strengths outweigh its weaknesses? Here is our experience.

A terraced hotel on the hill above Sairee

The Tarna Align Resort sits on a hill above Sairee, one of Koh Tao's main tourist hubs.

Even on the way there you realise this place is different from most of the hotels along the beach.

The road climbs steeply, and the hotel drive winds uphill until you reach reception. Inside the compound, too, the buildings are arranged on terraced levels, each area a little higher than the last.

Architecturally, there is something very impressive about the layout.

As you climb, more of the hotel comes into view - pools, rooms and scenery. From the stairs and walkways between the levels you can look down on other parts of the compound.

We really liked the way the room area fits into the terraced structure. It feels like a resort built along the hillside rather than an ordinary hotel building.

But this is where one of the place's biggest contrasts begins: while the room and pool areas were beautiful in our eyes, the lower public areas felt as if they belonged to a completely different hotel.

The room - one of the most beautiful and comfortable we had in Thailand

We will start with the room, because it was one of the highlights of our stay.

We stayed in many hotels on this trip, some of them grander and more expensive, and yet our room at The Tarna was one of the rooms we liked most.

It was beautiful, pleasant and tastefully designed.

It had a sense of indulgence, the kind that makes you want to come back to the room and not just turn up to sleep.

But what impressed us most was the bed.

It was the most comfortable bed we slept in on our whole trip to Thailand.

Not just a good bed for a hotel, but a bed that stood out for us even compared with every other hotel we stayed in.

After long days of trips, walks and activities, few things affect a stay as much as a good night's sleep.

And here we really felt the room gave us everything we expect from one.

For us, the room and the bed get 10 out of 10.

Note that this score refers to the room we stayed in. The hotel has several room categories, so check the photos, size and position of the specific room you book.

The upper pool - the best pool experience of our trip

If the room was excellent, the upper pool was, for us, the hotel's crowning glory.

Even before we set off on the trip, we pictured ourselves sitting in a pool with a book and a cocktail, enjoying the sun, the water and the quiet, in no hurry to go anywhere.

It sounds simple, but in practice not every pool allows for that.

Some pools are beautiful but not really comfortable to sit in for long. Some are packed with guests, some have music that is too loud, and some have nowhere comfortable to sit in the water.

At The Tarna we found exactly what we were looking for.

The steps that made the pool perfect for us

One of the best things about the pool's design is its built-in steps.

The steps are wide, so you can sit on one of them in the water, lean back against the step above and find a really comfortable position.

It may sound like a small detail, but for us it completely changed the experience.

We could sit like that for hours, reading on our e-reader and enjoying the water without having to hold ourselves in an awkward position.

Every now and then we ordered a cocktail from the nearby bar and carried on enjoying ourselves.

We didn't feel any need to leave the hotel or look for something else to do.

We were simply happy there.

Great cocktails, pleasant music and lovely staff

There is a bar by the pool that made our time there even more enjoyable.

The cocktails we ordered were excellent, the music was pleasant and suited the mood perfectly, and the staff were smiley, kind and welcoming.

We felt completely at home.

There was no sense of a crowded hotel where you have to fight for a spot or compete for the staff's attention.

The atmosphere was calm, pleasant and intimate.

We spent a great many hours in this pool and enjoyed almost every moment.

For us, it wasn't just the most beautiful or visually impressive pool. It was the pool we most enjoyed being in.

And that is a big difference.

We give the upper pool 10 out of 10, without hesitation.

Two pools, two different experiences

One of the interesting things about The Tarna is that it has more than one pool area.

On a lower level there is a pool that is also used for dive training. Koh Tao is one of Thailand's best-known places to learn to dive, so a dedicated training pool fits the island's character well.

The upper pool, by contrast, was for us a place of rest and indulgence.

These are two completely different experiences.

While the lower pool is also meant for activity, the upper pool was where we could sit back, read, have a drink and enjoy the quiet.

Check in advance how each pool is currently used and its opening hours, especially if the pool is your reason for coming.

Beautiful architecture - so why is the lobby so disappointing?

This is one of the hardest things for us to explain about this hotel.

The room area is very nicely built.

The buildings step down the hillside, the walkways and stairs create an interesting feel, and from the upper levels you can look out over the lower parts of the compound.

In our eyes, the architectural planning here is very successful.

But when you reach the lobby, it feels completely different.

The lobby was one of the least attractive spaces we saw on the whole trip.

The design felt cold, characterless and uninviting to us. It even had a slightly abandoned feel.

We didn't feel we were walking into the reception area of a romantic, indulgent resort, but into a space that hadn't been given the same design thought we felt in the rooms and the pools.

For us, the gap was almost hard to believe.

The dining room didn't improve the impression either.

It was very plain, with minimalist design in wood tones, as far as we remember, and no particular atmosphere.

Instead of a pleasant space to start the morning, it felt like a functional, uninspiring dining room.

The surprising thing is that this is not a hotel without a design direction.

In the rooms and around the pool you can clearly see it is capable of offering a polished, beautiful stay.

That made the disappointment with the lobby and the dining room all the greater.

We give the hotel's overall design 5 out of 10.

Not because the whole hotel is averagely designed, but because of the extreme contrast between the stunning areas and the disappointing ones.

Breakfast - 3 out of 10

If there were one thing we would change at the hotel straight away, it would be breakfast.

It was very sparse, and we felt the selection simply didn't suit us.

One of us tries to avoid gluten, so when we go down to breakfast at a hotel we look for options beyond bread and pastries.

We don't expect a particularly lavish spread, but we do expect enough choice to put together a good, filling breakfast.

At The Tarna we struggled to find enough options that suited us.

The selection was limited, and the whole experience was disappointing.

So much so that we decided simply to skip breakfast at the hotel.

And that, to us, is the most telling part: even though breakfast was already included in the price we paid, we preferred to go out and eat elsewhere every morning.

In other words, we were willing to pay a second time for a meal we had already paid for, just to enjoy a better breakfast.

Luckily, we found excellent cafés nearby, so the decision to eat out turned into a pleasant experience in the end.

Instead of at the hotel, we had breakfast at Summer Cafe, a colourful café on the way from the hotel to Sairee. A great café.

Only on the last morning did we have to eat at the hotel, because of our early departure for the ferry.

But that doesn't change our opinion of the hotel breakfast.

Our score: 3 out of 10.

This review refers to the breakfast we had during our stay, and in particular to how well it suited our needs and preferences. Menus and selection may change.

The location - the biggest drawback for us

This brings us to the issue that most affected whether we would go back.

We love exploring on foot.

We love leaving the hotel in the morning, picking a café, popping into shops, wandering the streets and soaking up the atmosphere.

And on Koh Tao we especially loved the tourist area of Sairee, with its shops, restaurants, cafés and the life that goes on there throughout the day and evening.

The Tarna is a long way from that part of Sairee.

It sits on a hill, and the way there involves a significant climb.

How long does it take to walk from the hotel to central Sairee?

Based on our experience, the route splits into three areas:

The street near the hotel: right along the road climbing up to the hotel there are excellent restaurants and cafés, some of them a short, easy walk away.

The street with the Thai restaurants and the 7-Eleven: about ten minutes' walk downhill from the hotel. This area has a large choice of Thai restaurants and places to eat.

Sairee's main tourist area: about twenty minutes' walk to the nearer parts, and sometimes up to half an hour to the further parts, depending on where you are going.

These times are based on our own walks during the visit, not on precise route measurements.

The main difficulty was getting back.

After time on the beach, in the shops or at Sairee's restaurants, we had a long walk back that ended with the steep climb up to the hotel.

It wasn't a walk we wanted to repeat again and again during the day.

For us, it limited our freedom to come and go whenever we felt like it.

What about the hotel shuttle?

During our stay the hotel ran a shuttle service to Sairee.

The shuttle ran several times a day, and on some mornings we were able to use it to get to the centre.

But getting back was much less convenient.

The pick-up point was on the lower street with the restaurants, not anywhere along the tourist area.

We found it hard to coordinate the return and catch the shuttle at the right time.

In practice, we hardly ever managed to use it on the way back to the hotel.

We remember at least one time we came across it by chance while walking up, but we couldn't rely on it as a regular way of getting around.

So although the hotel offered a shuttle, for us it didn't solve the location problem.

Check the shuttle route, pick-up points and current timetable with the hotel before you book.

We give location and accessibility 2 out of 10, based on the kind of holiday we enjoy and how hard we found it to walk into the centre and back.

But here comes a very important detail that changes our recommendation for anyone looking for a different kind of holiday.

Excellent restaurants and cafés - right on the way to the hotel

Although the location was one of the biggest drawbacks for us, we have to tell you about a surprising upside of the area.

You don't have to go all the way to Sairee's tourist centre to find great food.

In fact, it was on the road climbing up to The Tarna that we found some of our favourite places to eat and sit on Koh Tao.

Along the way there are wonderful restaurants and cafés, some of them a short walk from the hotel.

We found special cafés there with a lovely atmosphere, where it is a pleasure to sit back over breakfast or a coffee.

But our warmest personal recommendation is a Thai restaurant called Kanya Kitchen.

Kanya Kitchen - one of our favourite Thai restaurants on Koh Tao

This was one of our biggest surprises in the area.

Kanya Kitchen is a Thai restaurant where the food was simply excellent.

Not just good for a small restaurant on the way to a hotel, but one of the Thai restaurants we enjoyed most on Koh Tao.

We also really liked the atmosphere.

It was a pleasant place to sit, the kind that makes you want to linger rather than just turn up, eat and leave.

We recommend it warmly.

In our view, being able to walk out of the hotel to a wonderful Thai meal without going into central Sairee is a real advantage.

Great cafés along the climb

Kanya Kitchen wasn't the only place we loved nearby.

Along the same road we also found several excellent cafés.

They were pleasant, special places that we really enjoyed sitting in.

We like cafés with atmosphere, where sitting there is part of the outing and not just a stop for a coffee.

And that is exactly what we found in this area.

You don't always need to head to the beach or the tourist centre to find a place where it is a real pleasure to spend the morning.

Ten more minutes' walk - and a whole street of Thai restaurants

If you carry on downhill from the hotel, after about ten minutes, in our experience, you reach the street with the 7-Eleven.

It is a very different area from Sairee's tourist streets.

Along the street there is a large choice of Thai restaurants, including simpler, more local places.

If you love Thai food and would rather sit in a local restaurant than a touristy one on the beach, you will find plenty of options here.

For us, this is an advantage not to be overlooked.

A couple who come to The Tarna to enjoy the quiet and the pool don't have to go into central Sairee every evening. You can eat at the restaurants near the hotel, sit in the cafés along the climb and, if you want more choice, walk down to the restaurant street.

Bear in mind that the way back from the lower street involves a climb, but it is a much shorter distance than the walk to the main tourist area.

So even if the location didn't suit our style of holiday, we can certainly see how it could suit other travellers very well.

Quiet and romance - an advantage that is hard to find in central Sairee

This brings us to what made us so torn about this hotel.

Many of Koh Tao's most popular hotels are in central Sairee, but the area is busy and lively.

Even at some of the hotels considered more upmarket, we came across crowded pools and a noisy atmosphere.

In parts of the tourist area there is music at night too, and a constant flow of travellers between the bars, restaurants and hotels.

At The Tarna the experience was completely different.

The hotel was quiet and calm, and the atmosphere felt intimate and romantic.

We could sit in the pool for hours without feeling surrounded by crowds of guests. The music was pleasant, the staff were lovely, and the whole compound let us enjoy our holiday at a slower pace.

It was one of the most romantic stays we had as a couple in Thailand.

And that is exactly the paradox of the location.

Being far from central Sairee was one of the things that bothered us most, but that same distance may also have contributed to the quiet and privacy we loved so much.

In other words, the hotel's biggest drawback is also part of the reason it can offer such a special experience.

Who is The Tarna Align Resort best for?

Couples looking for a quiet, romantic holiday

In our view, this is the audience that can enjoy the hotel most.

A couple who come to Koh Tao to rest, spend time together and enjoy a beautiful room, an indulgent pool and an intimate atmosphere may find exactly what they are looking for here.

Add a convenient way of getting around, for example a scooter if you are licensed and an experienced rider, and the distance from central Sairee becomes much less of a drawback.

We can picture a couple spending most of the day in the pool, going out in the evening for a good meal at Kanya Kitchen or one of the nearby restaurants, and coming back to the hotel for a relaxed evening.

For that kind of holiday, The Tarna could be a wonderful fit.

Anyone who wants to enjoy the hotel itself

On some holidays the hotel is mainly somewhere to sleep.

On others the hotel is a central part of the experience.

The Tarna is much better suited to the second kind.

The room, the pool, the bar and the quiet are the main reasons to choose it.

If you plan to spend many hours away from the hotel, you may not get to enjoy its biggest strengths.

But if you are looking for a place that is a pleasure to stay in, there is a lot to love here.

Anyone who doesn't need to be in the middle of things

If you prefer local Thai restaurants to a crowded tourist area, and aren't particularly interested in Sairee's shops and nightlife, the location may suit you better than it suited us.

The restaurants and cafés along the road, together with the restaurant street down the hill, let you enjoy the area without going to Sairee Beach every day.

Who would we recommend choose a different hotel?

Anyone who likes wandering around central Sairee on foot

If you like leaving the hotel several times a day, moving between shops, sitting in beach cafés and going back to your room whenever you feel like it, the location may weigh on you.

That was the case for us.

We loved central Sairee and wanted to be there much more than the hotel's location comfortably allowed.

Anyone who doesn't want to deal with hills

The road up to the hotel is steep, and the hotel compound itself is built on several levels.

If you find walking uphill or on stairs difficult, take this into account and ask in advance about access to the room, lifts and walkways in the compound.

Anyone for whom a generous breakfast matters

If breakfast is an important part of your hotel experience, our review should definitely ring alarm bells.

During our stay the selection was sparse and didn't suit our needs.

Check recent reviews and photos of the breakfast before booking a package that includes it.

Our personal rating of The Tarna Align Resort

We find it hard to give this hotel an overall score.

Not because we can't decide whether it is good or bad, but because the gaps between the different areas are so large.

These are the scores we gave after our stay:

Category	Our score
The room and the bed	10/10
The upper pool	10/10
Overall hotel design	5/10
Breakfast	3/10
Location and access to the centre	2/10

Alongside these scores, we want to stress that the romantic, quiet atmosphere was wonderful, and the service we got at the pool bar was excellent too.

We prefer not to work out an average of the scores, because it wouldn't reflect the experience.

After all, in terms of room comfort and enjoying the pool, this is one of the best hotels we stayed in in Thailand.

But in terms of access to the centre and being able to wander freely on foot, it was one of the least successful for us.

So in our view the important question is not what the hotel's overall score is, but what matters to you on holiday.

Would we go back to The Tarna Align Resort?

This is still one of the hardest questions for us to answer.

If we had to choose a hotel on the room and the bed alone, we would happily go back.

If the choice were based on the pool, the cocktails, the service and the romantic atmosphere, we would also choose it without hesitation.

But when we think about our holiday on Koh Tao, we also remember all the times we wanted to head into central Sairee, browse the shops, sit in cafés and enjoy the tourist area, and the distance from the hotel made that less convenient.

So for a holiday where we want to spend a lot of time in central Sairee, we would probably choose a different hotel.

On the other hand, if we come back to Koh Tao for a calm, romantic holiday, and know we have a convenient way of getting around, The Tarna will definitely be one of the first hotels we consider.

Because it is hard to ignore the fact that it was there we found the pool we had always dreamed of, the most comfortable bed of the trip and the quiet we were looking for.

And perhaps that is our most accurate conclusion about this place.

The Tarna is not a hotel for everyone, but for a couple looking for privacy, quiet, an indulgent room and a wonderful pool, it can be an exceptional choice.

If you want to spend most of the day at the hotel, enjoy the romantic atmosphere and head out now and then to the excellent restaurants and cafés nearby, you may well fall in love with it.

If you are looking for a hotel from which you can walk to Sairee Beach, the shops and the nightlife at any moment, we would recommend a more central location.