The southern loop, built around being at Maya Bay and Bamboo Island at the hours the day boats are not.
This is the postcard itinerary and it is also the one that is easiest to get wrong. Phi Phi is genuinely spectacular and genuinely overrun, and the entire value of doing it from a yacht is control over the clock. A day boat from Phuket arrives at Maya Bay at 11:00 with forty other day boats. A yacht that slept at Phi Phi Leh is there at 08:00.
The crossing from Phuket to Phi Phi is around thirty miles of open water and it is the first real passage on most Andaman itineraries. In the northeast season it is usually a comfortable reach. In a fresh northeasterly it can be a lumpy two hours, and a crew that suggests moving the Racha leg forward to wait a day is giving you good advice rather than cutting the itinerary short.
The Rachas at the end pull the route back towards Phuket through the clearest water within reach of the island.
Depart Phuket in the morning for the crossing to Phi Phi. Anchor on the northeast coast at Loh Bagao or Laem Tong rather than in the ferry harbour at Tonsai, and run the tender to town in the evening if the group wants it.
Move to Phi Phi Leh at first light. Access to Maya Bay is from the pontoon at Loh Samah and through the boardwalk, and the daily visitor cap makes the early slot worth the alarm. Bamboo Island in the late morning for the shallow hard-coral reef, then back to the northeast coast for the night.
A last swim at Ao Bungalow before the run north up the east coast of Phuket. Disembark at Ao Po in the early afternoon.
The value of doing this route on a yacht rather than on a day boat is control over the clock and the tide. Most of it comes down to these.
Do not plan to anchor overnight in Tonsai. It is a working ferry harbour with a hard bottom in places, heavy traffic until late and a swell that wraps in from the southwest. Yacht crews use Loh Bagao or Laem Tong and run the tender the ten minutes to town if guests want the evening ashore.
Every rule here exists because the previous version of this bay was loved to death. A crew that tells you it can take the tender straight onto the beach is either not going to Maya Bay or is planning to break park rules with your names on the manifest. The right question to ask before booking is what the operator does when the daily cap is already full.
This is the stop to schedule around the light rather than the crowd. The reef reads best between about 10:00 and 14:00 when the sun is high enough to get through the shallow water, which is unfortunately also when the day boats come. On a yacht the compromise is to arrive at 09:30 and be gone by 11:30.
Racha Yai works as a first or last night on almost any itinerary, and it is the standard answer when weather closes the crossing to Phi Phi. Racha Noi, four miles further south, has better diving and worse shelter, so the pattern is to dive Noi in the morning and sleep at Yai.
If mantas are the reason you picked this itinerary, February to April is the window and it is still a lottery. Any operator who promises them is selling you something they cannot deliver.
No two operators run an identical itinerary. The variant is the useful part: a shorter version has dropped a destination, and it is almost always the furthest one.
Four-night crewed, Phi Phi and Racha, Chalong departure
Superyacht charter, itinerary set with the captain
Skippered catamaran, five-night version including Koh Haa
Crewed monohull or catamaran, seven-night version
Brokered across the Phuket crewed fleet
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Sanlorenzo, 2018
A 37 metre Sanlorenzo from 2018 with five cabins and seven crew, one of the larger hulls that stays in Thai waters through the season rather than visiting for a few weeks.
from $14,900
per day
Ao Po Grand Marina
Not published, 2022
A 42 metre, six-cabin superyacht delivered in 2022 and listed for Thai charter, at the size where twelve guests is the legal ceiling rather than a design choice.
Rate on application
Ao Po Grand Marina
Sunreef Yachts
The luxury catamaran answer to a superyacht: twenty-four metres of beam-heavy platform with superyacht volume, shallow draught for the limestone anchorages, and the 24 metre length that puts it exactly on the Thai charter licence threshold.
from $90,000
per week
Ao Po Grand Marina
Source: Operator itineraries, Mu Ko Phi Phi National Park rules. Checked 6 September 2026. Distances are planning figures and the coastlines on the chart are simplified. Neither is for navigation.