OUTSIDE BANGKOK: THE HARD ROCK CAFE HOTEL IN PATTAYA

Located on the Gulf of Thailand, the resort town of Pattaya has a notorious reputation as an adult playground. I've heard a lot of stories about this place and have kind been wanting to check it out stictly for the freakshow that supposedly goes on there every night. These kinds of activities are not something that really appeals to me, but as someone who enjoys people watching it seemed like it would be good for a few laughs. That being said, I was not about to drag my wife and three kids two hours away to Pattaya strictly for this reason.

But then we started hearing about the Hard Rock Cafe Hotel in Pattaya and how much it appeal it has for families. After talking it over for a bit, we made plans with some friends (and their two young girls) to go check it out.

Indeed, Hard Rock Pattaya did have a lot of things for kids to do. The main attraction there for youngsters is the massive pool complete with an inflatable trampoline and water slide. There are also a lot of poolside activities including water volleyball, basketball and a band to liven things up with their brand of Smashmouth and Black Eyed Peas covers.


A man-made beach is connected to the pool for children to frolick in. It really beats going to the actual Pattaya beach that is over-flowing with high-mileage hookers and old, shirtless, European men.


Like any Hard Rock Cafe restaurant, there is plenty of other rock and roll memorbilia on display in Pattaya, making this hotel is the ideal place to go if you want to get a picture of your kid with Frank Zappa's guitar:


George Harrison's clothes:

Or Weird Al Yankovic's accordian:


Other items on display here included Mick Jagger's cape:

Onstage suits from James Brown and Madonna:

Guitars from Prince, Eric Clapton, Sting and members of KISS and the Stray Cats:

And even a pair of blue suede shoes once worn by Carl Perkins:


The rock decor theme kind of carried over to the rooms, where each one had either a large portrait of Sting, Tina Turner, or David Bowie with Diana Ross:


Unfortunately, the halls of the hotel were bland, with nothing adorning them at all. You would think that they could slap some pictures, posters or gold records on every wall to really jazz the place up.


Each floor does have a huge mural of either the Beach Boys or the Beatles that greets you when you get off of the elevator, but they are kind of done up in a cheesy style that this combination rock music/art snob found a bit unappealing.


One great things for kids at Hard Rock Pattaya is the 'Lil Rock Kid's Club. For Baht 600 a day, you can drop of a kid for 8 hours and they get lunch, two snacks and can participate in a bunch of activities like painting and jewelry making. They also have a Playstation and tons of DVDs and books to keep the little ones occupied. This whole set up is pretty convenient for parents who want to drop their kids off for awhile to explore seedy Pattaya and it really is a good deal, especially coming from a place that doesn't even offer free wireless Internet service to their guests and grossly overcharges for beers.


The restaurant here is like every other Hard Rock Cafe I've ever been to (Bangkok, Detroit, Chicago, Orlando, Paris, and Tokyo) in both in style and food selection. It's loud and laid back, which makes it the perfect place for families with hordes of obnoxious kids to descend on.

The one activity that the folks at Hard Rock Pattaya real hangs their hats is their Beach Foam X parties on Saturdays. The first one takes place at 5:00 - 6:30 and is only open to hotel guests and really geared towards kids.

Basically what they do during this event is section off an area by the pool and start to fill it up with bubble bath foam while blasting loud techno music.


The kids really loved it as it was something weird and different for them and they got to yell and scream as much as they wanted during the whole experience.


There's another version of the Beach Foam X Party for adults at 9:30 in the evening, but the concept of foaming up with the huge mobs of Russian clientele at the hotel wasn't really that appealing. Instead, we managed to take that stroll down the main Pattaya drag for about an hour. It pretty much lived up to its reputation in a depressing way, but it didn't put a damper on the good times we had the rest of the weekend. At the very least we can say we treated our family to some good, clean fun (literally) in down and dirty Pattaya.