Some thots and observations from this tour

Cycling

• Distance means nothing until you know the terrain. We took 6 hours to cycle 40 km!

• Ride at your own pace. Never try to keep up with your buddy in front of you or you’ll never complete your ride.

• You need to get into the rhythm. Keep a constant cadence not matter how slow your speed is.

• Perseverance. Never give up and you’ll make it to the top.

• Patience. Your must not rush and wanting to complete the ride fast.

• If you cannot cycle then you just push. Forget about your ego.

General

• The highway is safe. This is contrary to people’s belief that it is dangerous.

• The condition of the highway is very good . No pot holes and is very clean and no tolls!

• During the whole trip I felt very safe while riding and staying in a big city like Chiang Mai and the small towns. Never for once did I feel threatened.

• The Thai people are very polite and gentle.

• The toilets everywhere are clean and do not have any bad stench. This is so even in the small towns.

• As long as you can eat noodles you’ll be able to survive as there are noodles stalls all over the place.

• They have high speed internet even in the small towns. At MHS, 10Mbs internet goes for RM150.00! So what’s the big deal of our High Speed Broad Band project? We haven’t even started! Go figure.

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Day 15, 12 December 2009, Back home

Hey, it’s good to be back home …. ( John Denver).

Yeah, its good to be back home. It was a great tour, good food, nice people, tough but satisfying cycling and at times a good eye opener as to where we (Malaysia) is as compared to our neighbour like they have high speed internet even in the small towns. 10Mbps for RM150!

Thanks for reading and for your comments.

P.S. The picture gallery will be up once we have sorted out our pictures.

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Day 12 – 14, 9 – 11 December 2009, Chiang Mai

We hung around Chiang Mai. Visited the morning markets, Chinatown, bike stores and did some coffee crawl on Nimmanhamin road. If you like coffee then Nimmanhamin road is a must visit. It probably has the most coffee joints on one road in Chiang Mai. One morning we did a ride to Lumphun which is around 60 km to and fro from Chiang Mai to visit the Royal temple. Here are some random images around Chiang Mai:

Hilkoff – everything you want about coffee you can get it here

Petronas station near Lumphun

Siesta time

Entrance to the Royal temple in Lumphun

The Royal Temple

At the market

China town

Baby eels for sale

Yau Char Kuai with kaya. Yum Yum.

Strawberries galore

Self explanatory, I think.

True! That’s why I love coffee

Mat Salleh trying the Thai food.

Some arty stuff

At the art fair

50% off on him. Any takers?

Mobile Coffee

Owner of the mobile coffee pulling a shot of espresso

Stewed or braised trotters. Best in the world.

Som Tam. Sour and spicy. Good stuff.

At the bazaar. Pretty good drawings.

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Day 11, 8 December 2009, Mae Hong Son – Chiang Mai

We decided to cut short our stay in Mae Hong Son. Some of the side trips planned would be too tough to ride. So we decided to go back to Chiang Mai a day earlier.

Spent 9 hours taking the bus from Mae Hong Son to Chiang Mai. It has been quite a while I have taken such a long trip on a bus. By the end of the trip, our butts and legs were sore and numb. We started the journey at 10.30am from MHS and reached the Chiang Mai bus station at 7.00pm. Assembled our bicycles and rode to our guest house. I think riding as bicycle is easier than sitting on the bus for 9 hours. Haha.

Mae Hong Son bus station

Lim loading his bike

This was the bus we took to Chiang Mai

At one of the stalls we were at during one of the breaks in the journey

At the mid stop

A sleepy ticketing agent at the mid way stop

Notice the slippers. They are meant to be worn by all into the toilets. Extremely clean toilets there.

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Day 10, 7 December 2009: Mae Hong Son

Mae Hong Son, well known as “3 mists town” is covered with morning mist all year round. It is the home to several tribal groups amongst which are the Thai Yai, Hmong, Lisu, Karen, Muser, Lawa and the Chinese. Around MHS there are some villages where the long neck people resides. Most of them have become tourist destinations. Here are some of the pics from MHS:

Petronas in the middle of MHS

Maybe we should take the elephants to the long neck village.

On the way to the long neck village. Lim having fun

Stopped by a road side stall for lunch.

At the food fair by the tribes

Food fair by the tribes around MHS

At the fair

Must be from the pig? No so.

They have roti chanai everywhere

We cycled 2007 of it.

Our guest house in MHS

At the long neck village

Long neck kids playing or cleaning?

Graphics from a tee shirt

Tribal clothes for sale

A successful transaction

Monks collecting alms in the morning

Misty Morning in MHS

Misty Morning in MHS

Morning offering

Misty Morning in MHS

At the Fair

Tribal version of the lion dance

Pretty tribal ladies

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Day 9, 6 December 2009, Pang Mapha – Mae Hong Son

Yes, We Made It! We conquered Highway 1095, 2007 curves, 245 km

We started with some climbs. The terrain was really like a roller coaster with very steep climbs and some nice downhills. Certain stretches were just too steep and we had to resort to pushing our way up. The total distance from Pang Mapha to Mae Hong son was 64 km. This roller coaster continued and continued. Just as we were coasting down into town for the last 15 km we were welcomed with huge climbs. It seemed that every town we went we must be welcomed with some huge hills. Mae Hong Son was the worst of the lot as there was a huge hill right in the middle of the town. It took us 7 hours of hours of hard riding to cover 64 km. When we hit the town, there was a sense of accomplishment and relief after covering 2007 curves of the infamous highway 1095. It is one highway that we will not forget.

Look at the curve (we call bend). Even the motorbike find it tough.

We have to reach the peak!

Need some of the zing from the orange to wake Lim up

Having some refreshing oranges during a break

Notice the curve going up to the left.

Another of the killer curve (bends)

Having a break at the view point. From here its downhill.

Old musician at the view point.

0 KM. Yes!, we finally made it to Mae Hong Son.

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Day 7, 4 December 2009, Pai – Pang Mapha

Mother of all climbs II

After resting for a day in Pai, we were all set to continue. First stop was for breakfast which was Pig’s “spare parts” soup with rice. Need the carbo for the ride. We then stop at Wawee coffee, the local version of Starbucks, for our caffine boost. Rode out of Pai and immediately hit the hills. Intially the inclines were moderate and it was pretty manageable. As the day wore on the gradient became steeper and steeper. The bends were very acute and there was hardly any downhill. Some parts were practically not rideable. We had to push our way up. As we take every bend it continues to go up and up. This lasted for 24 km! Now, if Day 1 was bad, this is even worse. That what I call a really bad day at “work”. I have to remind myself that’s touring. Cannot complain.

Finally, we reached the peak which was 1424 meters above sea level. Rested at the view point. Had some baked sweet potatoes and roast corn. Man, sweet potatoes never tasted so good before. We then descended for about 12 km. It was a really nice descend with huge switch backs and nice sweeping corners. As I was coming down I asked myself whether the blast of coming downhill was worth it? No, I don’t really think so considering the pain I had to go through in the first 24 km.

We reached Pang Mapha around 4.30. As usual, we did our survey of the guest houses. Found Baan Cafe Nature Resort near the edge of town. Pretty cool. It is very cosy and just by the side of the Soppong river. Costs us 600 Bahts a night. Went to town for dinner which was Tom Yum soup, north eastern pork salad and fried basil with pork. The north eastern pork salad was good. It was a bit like our pork fried with cincalok except that there wasn’t any fish smell. It as tangy and salty with the nice flavour of pork. The salad part was mainly onions.

We retired early for the night.

Total distance: 45 km only (took us 6 hours)

Our guest house

Huff and puff

Look carefully the winding road

Struggling up another curve

Taking a deep breath at the peak

Sweet potatoes never tasted so good

Our energy breakfast

Stopped by Wawee coffee for our caffine boost

Pushing our way up

Glutinous rice – our Thai energy food

Gglutinous rice – Up closed

Time for a real energy bar

Up, up up

Northern Thai Salad. Good Stuff

Our guest house

River next to our room

View of our room

Tomorrow: local exploration and semi rest day.

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Day 6 – Pai

Night market in Pai

Weighing station

Strange massage. The guy was knocking the wood with a mallet on his customer's back.

A night market peddler with her laptop

Internet center

Stoned

Chicken and sauages

Glutinous rice and papaya salad

BBQ everywhere

Lim having the pork jerky

Camp huts next ot Pai River

Beautiful Pai river

Elevated tents

Pork Jerky

Where are you going?

Spare parts porridge

Pai misty in the morning

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Day 5, 2 December 2009, Mae Sae – Pai

Riding into beautiful Pai

Yes, we completed 762 curves so far

The day started with a bowl of hot porridge and off we went to Pai. Immediately we climbed 17 km of hills with some challenging sections. We had a blast with 11 km of downhill with some serious switchbacks. I would not want to be a cyclist cycling on the opposite direction. The route was pretty scenic with some views of the hills. It was very cold when descending till we had to put on our jackets half way down. The rest of the route was undulating. The last few kilometers from Pai was hard as we were feeling hungry and the sun was blazing down on us.

Upon reaching Pai, we immediately went for our Pad Thais and papaya salad. We ordered two servings of the salad. The second plate was really a killer. It was so so spicy that it burned my tongue and lips. The sensation lasted for at least 20 mins. Lim was sweating by the bucket loads. But, it was really tasty and good. The papaya was fresh and crispy and the balance of flavours was just right, sweet, sour and spicy.

After lunch, we then went guest house shopping. Checked out a few and finally settled on Tongsa Guest House. Costs us 400 Baht (RM40) per night. It is clean and very adequate for our needs. Did some house keeping (laundry) and then spent the evening walking the night market.

Beautiful start

Going up

23 km to Pai

Banana for energy

Our guest house in Pai

Lim looking for food in Pai

The papaya salad that fried our tounguw and mouth

Pad Thai. Everytime after a ride everything tastes good

Dinner. Noodles with unlimited vegetables and herbs

A shot of whisky to numb the pain

Caffine boost from the Coffee Mobile

Thailand's version of our roti chanai

Tomorrow: Rest Day

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Day 4, 1 December 2009: Pa Pae – Mae Sae

We started off from Mushroom Guest House. This, the name of the guest house, we knew when we asked the owners or caretakers when we had breakfast. It was just too dark to know anything last night. After riding an extra 11km yesterday, it means we have less to cover today. The first 20km wasn’t too bad. There we some hills but nothing we cannot handle especially after yesterday’s climbs. Stopped at a rest stop for lunch. After lunch we had about 10km to Mae Sae. The first 6km was quite testing. A rather uneventful ride. Reached Mae Sae at around 2pm. Checked into the Mae Sae Guest House which was very basic. No hot bath and the toilets were outside the rooms. The water was really cold (Mae Sae is about 960 meters above sea level). Spent the rest of the day walking the town (10mins), writing this blog and recovering for tomorrow.

Our chalet from the Highway

Our chalet, the Mushroom Guest House. It was too dark last night to see much of it.

The infamous 1095 Highway. It is famous for its curves.

Lim doing a jig on highway 1095.

This is the main road of Mae Sae. It is a one road town.

The guest house we stayed in.

Our basic room in Mae Sae Guest House

Best ox tail soup I have ever eaten. The oxtail was braised till it became gelatinous and soft with the flavours enriching the soup.

Friendly women manning the BBQ stall. Chatted with them for a while.

Rice sausage. Seems to be very popular.

Met this china man. He is a tea planter and came to Thailand 30 years ago.

Thai Mulberry Wine (red). It was good. Slightly sweet and fruity.

The reverse side.

Total distance: 45 km

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