Thailand

Thailand

Back in Bangkok we started to slip into bike mode again. I collected the Bee-Em from Barcelona BMW (work that one out) where we had left it in storage. I then had the new tyres fitted - which we had brought back with us from the UK - while Lucy packed all our stuff back into panniers and roll-bags.

We met up again with George who had just taken his bike on a fairly hair-raising trip through a flooded and bandit-ridden Cambodia. Dave, who had originally set off with him, had unfortunately had an accident and had sent his bike back to the UK. He was currently in Kuala Lumpur and was planning to leave for home shortly. George too was heading back to Europe just in time for the Munich Beer Festival so we spent a couple of nights saying our farewells before heading south to Phuket.

Bikers and beaches

The roads in Thailand are good and relatively clear once you are outside the city. We made good time and stopped for lunch in a small fishing town, Bang Saphan, with about 400 k's chomped out of our journey.

Back on the road my attention was drawn to something quite unusual in my rear-view mirror, several solo headlamps - and they were catching up with us! This was unusual firstly because a lot of the time headlamps aren't used at night, let alone in the day, and secondly because we were doing 120kmh. Within a couple of minutes three GS's and a Kawasaki ZX6R of all things, came cruising passed us. Further down the road we pulled over and introduced ourselves to Richard, Ken, Frank and Matt. They were Brits, on a three-month round the world ride as part of the Nick Sanders charity organisation (www.nicksanders.com). We chatted for a while before heading off again, Matt riding, quite spectacularly, with his video camera in one hand to film us all as we rode down the road!

As the afternoon wore on we realised that we would not make it to Phuket in one hit so I took my 'got-to-get-there' head off and we settled back to enjoy the rest of the journey. On our right-hand side, the beginning of Myanmor (formally Burma) came into view and we allowed ourselves time to do a short detour to check out the border. We were several kilometres down a dirt track when the GPS indicated we were actually in Burma. The crossing was another couple of k's down the road but the actual line between Thailand and Burma seems to be a little hazy. Knowing that foreign vehicles are forbidden from entering the country we felt it was prudent not to push our luck and headed back to the main road.

We finished the day in Ranong, a fairly uneventful coast town with a port and some (exceptionally) hot springs. The town sits on the edge of some lovely countryside complete with rainforest and picturesque waterfalls. The following morning we set off on the narrow hillside road and 'rollercoasted' our way through the tropical vegetation.

Early afternoon we turned down a small side road and found ourselves on a deserted sandy bay complete with coconut trees - not a sole in sight. Further down the coast we discovered a small resort, the sea dotted with fishing boats, where we stopped for lunch. This too sat on a fairly deserted beach, but construction work was well underway. The restaurant looked out on an area of untouched woodland leading down to the sea. We wondered how long it would be before this lovely view was replaced with beach huts and bars.

Phuk it!

Phuket has been a popular island for many years and is accessed by a bridge from the mainland. We headed for Patong Beach, knowing full well it was going to be 'tourist central' - we weren't disappointed. Hotels, tourist shops and restaurants come right up to the seafront with bright billboards and neon lights to attract passing business. The beachside of the road is a parade of jeeps, 4x4s, mopeds and garishly painted Japanese sports bikes - all for hire. We were quite conspicuous in our full bike gear surrounded by hoards of 'holiday riders' in shorts and flip-flops - "just think gravel-rash" I thought to myself. To be quite honest, I enjoy the attention our UK registered bike receives.

We found ourselves a hotel with the most enormous swimming pool known to mankind! This was going to be a good place to relax for a few days! That evening we headed into the main strip - which is certainly not short on nightlife. Open-fronted bars sit shoulder to shoulder, music blaring, big screens broadcasting European footie, while gaggles of 'hostesses', with tentacle-like arms, reach out to every passing man. However, Patong has as many family holiday-makers as single men. Subsequently, the 'jiggy-jiggy' scene is more 'rent-a-girlfriend' - unlike Bangkok's blatant 'in your face' prostitution - you're just as likely to end up playing Connect Four with one of the girls as you are taking her home for the night! It's all part of the 'Thailand' experience!

Heading for the border

Several days later we were back on the road and heading for Malaysia. We broke the journey up at Songkhla - a large beach resort town where you are more likely to meet Thai tourists than Europeans. Sod's Law dictated that a beautiful sunny day turned to torrential rain just as we were reaching our destination. Any earlier in the day and we would have been able to 'blow dry' ourselves riding. Instead we reached our hotel dripping wet - a sure guarantee for an uncomfortable, damp start to our ride the next morning!

As we left town the following day, we found ourselves in the middle of a Thaipusam march. This is a yearly Hindu festival when Thaipusam devotees perform certain masochistic rituals and then parade themselves through the streets. We drove through throngs of men with needles, metal poles and saw blades through their cheeks, tongues and ear-lobes. One man even had his moped handle-bars through his cheeks with two friends on either side helping him to carry the moped along, another had done a similar thing with his lawn-mower! But for all the pain they must be feeling, these men looked happy enough, some even waved at us as we drove passed - probably a good job they couldn't see the horrified expressions underneath our crash hats!

Photographs

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