How We Planned Our 2-Week Thailand Family Trip: Route, Hotels, Costs & What Worked

If you're planning a family trip to Thailand and wondering how to choose the right route, find family-friendly hotels, organise transport and keep costs under control, this is exactly how we approached it.

Quick answer: how did we plan our 2-week Thailand family trip?

We built our itinerary around four destinations: Bangkok, Chiang Rai, Chiang Mai and Phuket. We used internal flights to reduce travel time, prioritised well-located family hotels with pools, booked a handful of key experiences in advance and focused on creating a route that balanced culture, adventure, beaches and activities our 8-year-old son, Joshua, would genuinely enjoy.

Rather than focusing on the day-by-day itinerary, this guide explains how we planned the trip, including the route, budget, flights, hotels, activities, transport, travel insurance, packing and the practical lessons we learnt along the way.

We approached it in eight simple steps:

1. Choose the right Thailand route

2. Decide your budget

3. Find your international flights

4. Choose the right family hotels

5. Decide which activities to prioritise

6. Understand your internal travel

7. Get the pre-travel essentials sorted

8. Create a practical packing list

Following this framework helped us create a two-week family itinerary that combined city sightseeing, cultural experiences, beaches, island tours, adventure activities and downtime without ever feeling rushed.

If you're looking for our exact route and day-by-day itinerary, see Thailand With Kids: A 2-Week Family Itinerary (Bangkok, Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai & Phuket).

Throughout this guide I've also included the booking platforms, travel tools and services we personally used to organise the trip. Some links may be affiliate links, but we only recommend products and providers that we genuinely used ourselves or would happily book again.

Quick Reference: The Booking Tools We Used

Throughout this guide, I'll reference the platforms and apps we used to plan and book our Thailand trip. These are the ones that worked best for us:

• Trip.com – International flights, internal flights and flight comparisons.

• Booking.com – Airport transfers and some hotel bookings.

• Hotels.com – Alternative hotel pricing and accommodation comparisons.

• GetYourGuide – Activity research and tour bookings.

• Viator – Tour comparisons and flexible activity bookings.

• Trip.com – Rental car booking in Northern Thailand.

• Airalo eSIM – Mobile data and internet access from the moment we landed.

• Klook – Travel insurance comparison and cover options.

We often compared prices across multiple platforms because the same flight, hotel or tour could vary significantly in price, inclusions and cancellation terms.

The eight steps below are the exact process we followed to turn a Thailand family holiday from an idea into a fully planned trip.

Step 1: Decide Your Route

When planning Thailand, it's tempting to start searching for hotels immediately. Before looking at accommodation, flights or specific attractions, we spent time working out what we actually wanted the holiday to feel like. We knew we wanted a mix of:

• Culture and famous sights

• Food and local markets

• Beaches and island tours

• Adventure activities

• Family downtime

That ultimately led us to the route of: Bangkok → Chiang Rai → Chiang Mai → Phuket

This sequence worked really well because every destination offered something different. Bangkok gave us the iconic sights and introduction to Thailand, Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai provided the culture, markets and temples that felt like the "real Thailand", while Phuket gave us the beaches, island tours and family-friendly activities that rounded off the trip perfectly.

One of the biggest mistakes I see families make is treating Thailand as a single destination rather than a collection of very different experiences. Before booking anything, I'd strongly recommend deciding what type of holiday you're looking for and then building your route around that.

For example, if you're trying to decide whether you need all of Bangkok, Chiang Mai and Phuket, or whether one destination would suit your family better than another, Bangkok vs Chiang Mai vs Phuket: Which Area of Thailand Is Best for Families? will help you understand the strengths of each.

Likewise, the right route can vary significantly depending on your child's age. Travelling with toddlers, primary-school children and teenagers often requires very different priorities, which is why we put together Thailand With Kids: What Age Is Best? Toddlers vs Teens vs School-Age Kids to help families decide what type of itinerary is most realistic.

Once we'd settled on the destinations, everything else became much easier. Hotels, flights, activities and transport were all chosen to support the route rather than drive it. In fact, the final itinerary changed several times before we booked anything because we wanted to get the overall flow right first.

Step 2: Decide Your Budget

Before getting too deep into hotels, flights and activities, I'd recommend deciding on a realistic budget.

We weren't trying to do Thailand as cheaply as possible, but we also weren't looking for a luxury trip. Instead, we aimed for a comfortable mid-range family holiday, prioritising things that would genuinely improve the experience, such as good locations, family-friendly hotels, internal flights and activities we thought were worth the money.

Having a rough budget from the start made planning much easier because it helped us make decisions quickly. For example, we chose indirect flights to save money, but were happy to pay slightly more for hotels with pools, breakfast included and locations that reduced travel time.

The good news is that Thailand works well across a wide range of budgets. Whether you're looking for a value-focused family holiday or a more premium experience, there are usually options available.

For a complete breakdown of what we spent on flights, hotels, transport, food and activities, see How Much Does a Family Trip to Thailand Cost? Real Budget Breakdown & Money-Saving Tips.

Step 3: Find Your International Flights

For most families, international flights will be one of the biggest expenses of the trip, so it's worth spending time comparing options before you book.

We compared routes, airlines and flight times, eventually booking Swiss Air via Zurich rather than a direct flight from London. The journey was a little longer, but the cost saving was significant and allowed us to put more of our budget towards hotels, activities and internal flights once we arrived in Thailand.

This became a recurring theme throughout our planning. We weren't trying to build the cheapest possible Thailand itinerary, but we were constantly asking ourselves whether spending more would genuinely improve the experience. In this case, saving money on the international flights felt like an easy decision because the extra stopover didn't have a major impact on the overall journey.

When comparing flights, I'd look at:

• Total cost, including luggage

• Flight duration and connections

• Arrival times in Thailand

• Airline reputation and reviews

• Flexibility and cancellation policies

We found that a little flexibility on departure dates and routing opened up some surprisingly large savings.

Tip: Before booking, use Trip.com to compare multiple airlines and routes side-by-side. We found it one of the easiest ways to see whether a stopover could save enough money to make it worthwhile.

Step 4: Choose the Right Family Hotels

When choosing hotels, we focused on practicality rather than luxury.

Our priorities were:

• Good location

• Swimming pool

• Family-friendly facilities

• Breakfast included

• Restaurant access

• Strong reviews

• Gym facilities where possible

• Good overall value

We deliberately chose a mix of accommodation styles across the trip and spent slightly more in Phuket because we knew we'd spend more time enjoying the hotel itself rather than simply using it as a base for sightseeing.

One thing that surprised us was how important pools became. During Thailand's heat and humidity, a pool isn't just a nice extra. It becomes a genuine part of the daily itinerary and somewhere to cool off between activities. Looking back, some of our favourite family moments happened back at the hotel rather than out sightseeing.

We also found it was worth comparing accommodation across multiple booking platforms. We used a combination of Hotels.com and Booking.com, as the same hotel often had different prices, room types, cancellation policies or promotions depending on the platform. Spending a little extra time comparing options saved money on several bookings.

Where I've linked to a specific hotel review throughout this site, it's always because that's the platform we personally used and found offered the best combination of room choice, price and booking conditions at the time.

If you're currently deciding where to stay, see Best Thailand Family Hotels: Where We Stayed & Would Book Again (Bangkok, Chiang Mai & Chiang Rai, Phuket Route), where I compare every hotel we used, explain why we chose them and share which ones we'd happily book again.

Step 5: Decide Which Activities Matter Most

This was probably the biggest planning lesson from the entire trip.

Thailand has far more attractions, tours and experiences than you can realistically fit into a two-week holiday. Before travelling, it's easy to create a list of everything you want to do. Once we started looking properly, we quickly realised there was no way we could fit it all in.

Instead, we focused on building a balanced trip around:

• Culture and history

• Nature and scenery

• Beaches and island experiences

• Adventure activities

• Things Joshua would genuinely enjoy

Rather than trying to tick off every famous attraction.

Some of our favourite experiences ended up being the ones that felt like adventures rather than traditional sightseeing. Highlights included exploring Ayutthaya independently by Grab and tuk tuk, spending a day island hopping in Phuket, travelling around Bangkok by river boat, wandering through Chiang Mai's night markets and heading into the jungle for bamboo rafting and ATV adventures.

What surprised us most was that many of the activities we spent the longest researching weren't necessarily the experiences we enjoyed most. For example, our Bangkok Hop-On Hop-Off River Boat turned out to be one of the easiest and most enjoyable ways to see the city, while our James Bond Island and Phi Phi Island tours delivered exactly the kind of scenery we'd imagined when planning Thailand.

If you're trying to decide what deserves a place in your own itinerary, I'd start with:

• 12 Bangkok Attractions Worth Visiting With Kids if you're planning Bangkok.

• Best Things to Do in Chiang Mai With Kids for Northern Thailand.

• Best Things to Do in Phuket With Kids if you're deciding between the huge number of tours and attractions available in Phuket.

One thing that helped us enormously during the planning stage was using GetYourGuide and Viator to research activities. Even if we didn't book straight away, both platforms provided a great overview of what was available in each destination, typical prices and real traveller reviews.

We also liked that many activities offered:

• Free cancellation up to 24 hours before departure

• Payment in GBP

• Mobile tickets

• Clear family suitability information

That flexibility was particularly useful because we were travelling during August and knew weather could occasionally affect plans.

My advice would be to build your itinerary around a handful of standout experiences rather than trying to do everything. Thailand rewards quality over quantity, and some of our best family memories came from a few carefully chosen activities rather than attempting to tick off every attraction on the map.

Bamboo Rafting in North Phuket

Exploring the Islands in South Phuket

Step 6: Understand Your Internal Travel

One of the things that made our Thailand itinerary work so well was understanding the logistics before we arrived.

Thailand is relatively easy to travel around, but distances are larger than many people expect. Spending a bit of time planning how you'll move between destinations can save a huge amount of holiday time and reduce stress once you're there.

Internal Flights

For our route, internal flights were an easy decision.

We booked all of our domestic flights through Trip.com and flew:

• Bangkok → Chiang Mai

• Chiang Mai → Phuket

• Phuket → Bangkok

Using flights rather than trains or long overland transfers saved us a huge amount of time and meant we could spend more of the trip actually enjoying the destinations rather than travelling between them.

One thing we did deliberately was book flights around lunchtime. This worked really well because it aligned nicely with hotel check-out and check-in times, avoiding very early starts or long waits for rooms to become available.

Driving in Northern Thailand

One of the biggest decisions we debated was whether to hire a car in Northern Thailand. After quite a bit of research, we decided to go ahead and book one through Trip.com and it ended up being one of the best decisions we made.

The roads were easy to navigate, traffic was much quieter than we expected and having our own transport gave us complete flexibility when exploring Chiang Rai, Doi Inthanon and the surrounding countryside.

It also allowed us to:

• Arrive at attractions before the tour buses

• Adjust plans when the weather changed

• Stop for food and breaks wherever we wanted

• Travel completely at our own pace

If you're considering doing the same, read Driving in Chiang Mai: Is It Safe, Easy and Worth It for Families?, where I share exactly what the experience was like and whether I'd recommend it to other families.

Grab Was Brilliant

Outside of the rental car, Grab became our main form of transport once we were in Thailand. Make sure you download the app before you travel.

We used it constantly for:

• Local journeys

• Trips to restaurants and attractions

• Our DIY day trip to Ayutthaya

• Moving between areas within destinations

For families, it was incredibly convenient. You can see the price upfront, avoid negotiating fares, track the driver through the app and pay directly from your phone. The cars were generally modern, air-conditioned and much easier than trying to figure out local transport after a long day of sightseeing.

The only exception was airport transfers. For arrivals after international flights, we preferred the certainty of having transport arranged in advance, so we pre-booked airport transfers through Booking.com. The cost was surprisingly low, the driver was waiting when we arrived and it removed the stress of navigating a new country with luggage after a long-haul flight.

Looking back, having a simple plan for transport made a huge difference to the trip. Between pre-booked airport transfers, Grab and our rental car in Northern Thailand, getting around was far easier than we expected.

If you're still deciding between flights, trains, taxis, self-driving and Grab, see Getting Around Thailand With Kids: Flights, Trains, Taxis, Grab & Driving Explained, where I compare all the transport options we considered and explain what worked best for our family.

One final tip: I'd strongly recommend sorting out an eSIM before you travel. Having mobile data from the moment we landed meant Google Maps, Grab, hotel bookings and flight information were always available, which made navigating Thailand significantly easier.

Step 7: Get the Pre-Travel Essentials Sorted

Before we booked a single activity, there were a few practical things we wanted to understand. None of them are particularly exciting, but getting them sorted early made the trip much smoother.

Visas and Entry Requirements

Entry requirements can change, so this was one of the first things we checked before booking.

When we travelled, UK passport holders could enter Thailand visa-free for tourism for up to 60 days, which is more than enough for a typical family holiday. Your passport should have at least 6 months' validity remaining from the date you arrive, and all visitors must complete the Thailand Digital Arrival Card (TDAC) before arrival. Typically you should do this 3 days before travelling. Best to set a reminder so you do not forget.

For us, the process was straightforward, but it was one of the first planning tasks we completed because it's much easier to deal with before booking flights and accommodation.

Vaccinations

We also spent some time researching recommended vaccinations for both adults and children well in advance of the trip.

For most UK families visiting Thailand, the starting point is making sure routine vaccinations are up to date, particularly MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) and diphtheria, tetanus and polio boosters. Travel health advice also commonly recommends considering Hepatitis A, we had recently had this for a trip to India do didn't need anything additional.

Because recommendations vary based on where you're going and what you'll be doing, we checked the latest guidance well before travelling rather than leaving it until the last minute. If you're planning a Thailand trip, I'd suggest speaking to your GP surgery or a travel vaccination clinic as early as possible, ideally several weeks before departure.

Thankfully, there was nothing particularly complicated for our route through Bangkok, Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai and Phuket, but it gave us peace of mind knowing we'd done the research and were properly prepared before travelling.

Don't Skip Travel Insurance

This is one thing I would never cut from a family travel budget. Travel insurance feels like one of those expenses you hope you never need, but when you're travelling long-haul with children it becomes much more important.

In our case, our flight home was cancelled. Thankfully we had cover in place, but it reinforced how quickly plans can change and why it's important to know you're protected if something goes wrong.

Whether it's flight disruption, medical issues, lost luggage or unexpected cancellations, travel insurance is one of those purchases that feels expensive until the moment you need it.

We personally like Klook.com because it allows you to compare policies from multiple providers, tailor cover to your specific trip.. We found it a quick and easy way to compare different levels of cover and make sure the whole family was properly protected before travelling.

Step 8: Packing

Before travelling, I spent far too much time worrying about packing. In reality, Thailand turned out to be one of the easiest destinations we've visited to pack for.

The biggest mistake most families make is overpacking. We certainly did. Once we arrived, we quickly realised that Thailand is casual, hot and humid

and you simply don't need as many clothes as you think.

What mattered far more than the number of outfits was packing the right things. Throughout the trip, we found ourselves repeatedly reaching for:

• Sun cream and hats

• Comfortable footwear

• Swimwear

• Lightweight clothing

• Rain jackets

• Reusable water bottles

• Power banks

One thing worth remembering is that even during the rainy season, Thailand is still very warm. We experienced a couple of days of heavy rain, but far more time dealing with heat, humidity and strong sunshine. As a result, we used sunscreen and swimwear far more often than our waterproofs.

Another surprise was how easy it is to buy things locally. Convenience stores, pharmacies and supermarkets are everywhere, so there's no need to pack for every possible scenario.

If I was giving one piece of advice, it would be this: pack for comfort and practicality, not for lots of different outfits.

For a complete packing guide, including what we used most, what we didn't need and the items we'd definitely bring again, see Thailand Packing List for Families During Rainy Season: What We Used, What We Didn't Need & What We'd Bring Again.

Final Thoughts

Planning a Thailand family holiday can feel overwhelming at first because there are so many destinations, hotels and activities to choose from. What helped us was focusing on the big decisions first:

• Route

• Flights

• Hotels

• Transport

• Headline experiences

Everything else became much easier once those decisions were made.

Looking back, the decisions that paid off most were choosing a multi-destination route, using internal flights to cover large distances, hiring a car in Northern Thailand, prioritising hotel location, building in pool time, booking key tours before travelling, using an eSIM and leaving some flexibility in the itinerary. None of these were complicated decisions individually, but together they made the trip far smoother and more enjoyable.

For our family, the planning was absolutely worth it. The route worked, the hotels suited us, the logistics were far easier than expected and Thailand delivered exactly the balance of adventure, culture and relaxation we were looking for.

If you're currently planning a similar trip, don't get lost trying to create the perfect itinerary. Focus on building a route that matches your family's interests and travel style, then make sensible decisions around transport, accommodation and experiences. Thailand is an incredibly easy country to travel around and rewards good planning far more than over-planning.

plan your TRIP TO thailand

If you’re planning your family trip to Bangkok, Chiang Mai & Phuket, these guides will help you pull everything together:

About Plan Family Escapes

We’re a UK-based family sharing real, experience-led travel guides based on trips we’ve taken with our school-age son Joshua across destinations like Lapland, Turkey and India.

Everything we share is based on what we’ve personally experienced — with honest advice on what actually works when travelling with kids, focusing on making family travel easier, more comfortable and genuinely enjoyable.