Route from Terminal 21
Terminal 21 to Pattaya 13 Alley: catching the loop at its start
3.2 km from Terminal 21 Pattaya
Terminal 21 stands at the top of the strip, at the junction where the shared-transport loop begins its run south. That is a genuine advantage — you can board the loop before anyone else has filled it — but only if you leave the building on the correct side. The mall has entrances on more than one street, and the two streets involved here run in opposite directions, so the exit you pick is the whole of the navigation problem. Which of those two streets runs which way, and how to tell them apart from the pavement, is set out on the Central Pattaya route rather than told again here; this page starts from the consequence of it.
How people actually make this trip
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By baht bus
The mall stands at the corner of North Pattaya Road and Second Road, beside the roundabout where the beachfront loop begins. That is convenient in one direction only: you want the loop at the start of its run, which means getting across to the beachfront rather than boarding on Second Road.
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On foot
The walk from the mall doors across to the beachfront is the part nobody plans for, and it is the part that decides whether the rest of the trip is one vehicle or two.
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By car
From the mall rank a car runs the beachfront line like everything else and hits the same evening queue; the alley at the far end is where it earns its place.
What you pass, in order
- The roundabout at the top of Second Road
- North Pattaya Road down to the beachfront
- The beachfront run south past the malls
- The Walking Street corner, where the traffic turns inland
Where this goes wrong
Boarding on Second Road outside the mall. Second Road is one-way northbound, so that vehicle leaves the city centre behind — the correct start is on the beachfront, one street over.
Daytime and evening are not the same trip
By day the mall is the coolest place on the route and the trip is worth breaking there. In the evening the roundabout is the busiest junction in the north of town, and the loop moves better than anything trying to cross it.
Why breaking the trip here is worth doing on purpose
The mall is air-conditioned and the rest of this route is not. In the middle of the day the sensible order of operations is to do the indoor part of your day first and the road part afterwards, rather than arriving hot and then queueing outside. That is not a scenic recommendation — it is that the whole southbound run happens in the open, and the seafront has less shade than the inland street it parallels.
The other reason to plan the break here is that this is the last indoor point on the route. Everything after it — the boarding, the ride, the alley at the far end — happens outdoors and cannot be paused; whatever you were going to sort out sitting down is sorted out here or not at all.
Coming back is a different street, not the same one reversed
Getting back to the mall from the shop is not the outbound trip played backwards, and this catches out almost everyone once. The seafront road will not carry you north, so the return leg runs on the inland street, and it approaches the mall from the other side of the block. It is the same building, reached by a different frontage.
This matters more than it sounds, because people plan the return by memory of the outbound view. If you memorised the sea on your right, you will look for the sea on your left going back and never find it — the return leg does not touch the water at all.
Questions people ask about this route
Can I stay on one vehicle the whole way?
Yes, provided you board on the seafront side. The loop that starts at this junction runs south along the water and turns inland at the far end without a change. Boarding on the inland street instead means a vehicle going the opposite way and a second one afterwards to correct it.
Is the mall a landmark a driver will recognise?
As a starting point, yes — it is one of the most recognisable buildings in the north of the city. As a destination it is no help at all: give the alley address and let the map pin finish the job, because the shop name is not something a driver here will know.
Does the route change after dark?
The road does not, but the junction does. In the evening it is the slowest point of the whole trip, and the loop moving through it does better than anything attempting to cross it. Nothing about the direction changes — only how long the first part takes.
Get in touch
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- 4.8★ · 104 reviews on Google · checked 27 August 2026
- 800 m from Walking Street · 10–13 min on foot