Royal Garden Plaza

Come for the air conditioning and Ripley's Believe It or Not, not for the shopping. This is the first mall you hit walking along Pattaya Beach, and that position does most of the work: you stumble in sweaty, there's a Tops and a Starbucks more or less at the door, and suddenly the afternoon has a shape.

The retail itself is mainstream. International chains, footwear, fashion, a supermarket for whatever your hotel room lacks. Some people walk through and find it small and quiet, and they're not wrong. What lifts it is the entertainment side, particularly the horror-themed upper floor, which families and teenagers get more out of than they expect. The restaurants spread over several levels and cover plenty of cuisines, and the upper floors give you a view worth a few minutes. If you want boutiques or bargaining, go elsewhere.

My advice: treat it as a break rather than a destination. An hour of browsing, a coffee, then back out to the beach in the late afternoon when the heat drops.