LUANG PRABANG

The group has gone out to look at a waterfall this afternoon. After seeing Iguacu Falls in Brazil, I have no need to ever see another waterfall, I'll only be disappointed! So I went for a wander in the vicinity of our hotel, the Mekong Sunset View Hotel. Things are very quiet here in the afternoon because it's so hot and sticky. Lots of activity in the cooler parts of the day though, particularly at night. I guess we are in an area that could be described as touristy, its probably in the most desirable area overlooking the Mekong. Up close though, there is a lot of trash lining the riverbank. The Mekong itself is a giant sewer. After passing through China, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam I shudder to think what's in it. Its enough to put me off eating fish, I'll tell you that for nothing.

Many of the older houses here are built of timber, even some newer buildings have facades made from heavy timber slabs, and just about all buildings have heavy timber shutters on the windows. I have also noticed that a lot of furniture like tables and chairs are made from solid timber, very thick and heavy, probably teak, but almost certainly local rainforest timber. Its bloody uncomfortable, and you can take that to the bank! Our hotel has exquisite teak floors though, the boards being about 15 inches wide, and as solid as rock. I guess you use what you've got, but I hope its sustainable. There appears to still be a logging industry that employs elephants, certainly it is possible to visit elephants at work and play. I need to find out more about this.

Our hotel, my bike on the right no. 7788

 Typical architecture in the street facing the Mekong, where there are outdoor cafes and restaurants lining the river side, and French colonial style buildings on the other. Some of these are a bit faded, others have been beautifully restored. Enjoy!

 But you do have to watch where you walk. This thing was the size of a saucer.

A bit of France in the tropics.

 Don't get too comfortable in there, you're dinner. That'll teach you to wake me up at 4 am.

I don't know how old this stupa is, but its ancient.

 This is the biggest frangipani I've ever seen. It might be as old as the temple.

 Steps leading to the temple. I guess the lesson here is that it doesn't matter how big and ugly you are, there is always someone or something bigger and uglier. A thought worthy of contemplation.

 Laundry day, for this monk anyway.

 The best preserved temple I could find. The detail is exquisite.

 A more typical street scene.

Temples are everywhere, even in the side streets.


So there you have it. We head off tomorrow for Van Vieng, suitably rested, freshly laundered, blog updated and ready to rock and roll. See you next time.

GOODBYE THAILAND, HELLO LAOS.

Greetings readers, here are some photos taken as we left the hotel in Chiang Mai and finally hit the road. We headed out to the north east, towards Chiag Rai, then into the mountains towards Laos. We stayed just short of the border, at a quite new hotel about 70 km north of Nan. This gave us a return bout with Highway 1148, one of the most exhiliarating roads I've ever been on anywhere. No time to look at scenery on this stretch, not that it matters much. The smoke is just atrocious this time. worse than last year. After a few hours I was coughing, and my eyes stung. Speaking of stung, I got hit in the face by some kind of insect, pointy end first, and now I have a lump under my right eye. Its no improvement!

We arrived at the Laotian border, and started the paperwork bunfight. The Thai side was professional and pretty straightforward, the Lao side was not. We had to go through 4 or 5 stages of bureaucracy, fill out multiple forms, every one of which wanted to know my name, address, date of birth, shirt size, the name of my kindergarten teacher, etc, etc. We had to fork over some cash for a visa, then get insurance. At one point two guards (dressed in khaki with Russian style insignia) decided the bikes were too noisy to enter Laos. There was much revving, shaking of heads and jabbering. This was nothing more than a ruse to extract some cash, and it was only my second experience of official corruption. (The other was crossing into Spain from France in 1977. That cost a carton of cigarettes for one of our group to get her passport back from the Guardia de la Frontera.) Anyway, Kay went off his nut, and showed the guy his passport which proved he had brought groups in to the country regularly with the same bikes, then demanded to know the guard's name, and his superior's name. Pretty soon the guy realised it was not going to be easy to intimidate this particular white devil, and through we went. Fight fire with fire !! Kay was actually raised in East Germany, and he knows all about this kind of weaseling. He's actually pretty good at it himself !

Ok, my first impression of Laos is that its a dirt poor, busted-ass communist relic, although it must be said we did come in through the back door. Nothing has yet convinced me to change my opinion, but I will keep an open mind. The Lao flag is displayed prominently along with the old Soviet flag, hammers and sickles everywhere. I do detect that the good old mushroom treatment is rampant around here. The roads in Laos so far are pretty awful, apart from a section built by the Thai government to service a Thai financed power station under construction near Hong Sa, where we stayed the first night in Laos. Big potholes, some of which look more like bomb craters, lots of patches, loose gravel, broken edges and big drop offs make for interesting and challenging riding. I would say typical of what I have ridden on in many parts of South America. Traffic so far is light, but you never know what might be around the next bend, so the level of concentration required is still high.

 Words of wisdom indeed. Lao border guards, please take note.

 The two tour groups getting ready to leave Chiang Mai. That guy is a big bastard, isn't he?

Me with my friend Noah. Getting him to stand still long enough for a photo (or for anything else) is tricky at the best of times ! He was born to ride motorcycles, fast.

Coffee AND a foot soak?  Well, ok then.

 Same, same, but slightly different kind of foot soaking.

After Highway 1148. This time on dual sport tyres, and NO chicken strips. I must be improving!

 Hwy 1148, still as smooth as a baby's bum, and virtually no traffic. Told ya!

Ditto. Damn, the power just went off and sent my laptop into a death dive.

 That feeble dot is actually the sun, obscured by smoke.

Killing some time at the Lao border. That's Kay and Yai (our support vehicle driver) at the back arguing about the "noisy bikes" with a guard who evidently doesn't earn enough. Paul and Deb in the front.

We Civil Engineers are just suckers for a nice, new, prestressed concrete box girder bridge. This one is a real whopper and will span the Mekong. Meantime, we get a ferry, but not just any ferry.

 Our ferry has power steering !

An Indian restaurant in Laos? OK then. His wife was indeed a very good cook. Chicken Tikka Masala was excellent. And I'm still alive!

 More of our low-tech ferry across the Mekong.

 Typical Hmong village.

I wonder what it looks like without the smoke? Nice twisty road though.

 Another Hmong village, complete with open sewer. Photo ironically taken outside the Sanitation Project Office, circa 2002/3. Another successful project delivered on time by a caring government.

A Hmong lady in Hmong dress.

This proved a bit tricky to get through. The truck was bogged and had just been hauled out backwards. We had to wait while a bit more fill was piled on top with a crawler excavator. The tank tracks then gave us a bit of a path to follow. No casualties.

So there you have it. After two fairly tough days of riding in Laos, we are now in Luang Prabang, where we get a rest day. This is the largest place we have seen since Chiang Mai. First impressions are that it is an interesting looking place. Architecturally it looks very French Colonial, not unlike parts of Hanoi. No surprises there, as La Belle France colonized both Laos and Vietnam until they wore out their welcome. More photos to follow.

BIKES AND TEMPLES

Well, wadda y'know, talk about lucky. There is an annual bike show in Chiang Mai, and yesterday was the day, and it was held just down the road from the hotel. There were bikes of all sizes, types and ages on display. Contrary to popular opinion, there are plenty of big bikes in Thailand, and plenty of good roads to ride them on. This aint Vietnam, where there are more scooters than blades of grass. In fact, there were some full-on outlaw bike gangs (Hells Angels, Bandidos, Diablos and more) represented, as well as vintage BMW's, lots of Harley cruisers, and then the just plain bizzare. Even various types of cars, including some I hadn't seen in years. You just never know what you are going to see in Thailand! Funny thing to see all the bikie gangs parked next to each other, shaking hands, drinking beer and checking out all the other bikes. They didn't look too intimidating to me. The biggest, baddest-assed SOB I saw was about 5ft 6in and about 90 lbs, and was buckling under the weight of his tattoos. Time for less talk and more pictures.

Some mint condition BMW's

750 Honda 4 engine, no suspension, no front brake, no mufflers, no mirrors, no indicators (and no engineer's certification on the frame, I'm guessing)

Da bad boys

Honda 350 scrambler, circa 1971, with a top box, using a real box!

A couple of customised scooters. Everything here has to make noise.

A Clockwork Orange mini

Outa my way, sonny!

Its amazing what you can put on the road here, where there don't seem to be any rules at all. Unlike our regulated to death environment, where you can't do anything because you might enjoy yourself, or worse still, you might hurt someone. This is what you get when universities pump out lawyers instead of useful people. You drown in a sea of bullshit. But I digress.

This a.m. I went  out walking in the old part of town before it got too hot. The Lonely Planet (usually a source of reliable info) told me a "must see" is the Wat Phra Singh, the most revered temple in town. Well, it was certainly infested with busloads of tourists who had clearly been told the same thing, but I reckon there are heaps more interesting Wats (temples) around, and I found plenty of them and had most of them to myself. I make no claims as to being able to understand what the heck is going on in any of them, but I enjoy the architecture, the timelessness, the calmness and the serenity. Walking through the manicured leafy gardens is quite refreshing and gives one an opportunity to reflect. There were a few well placed cue cards to help that process in the Wat Phra Singh, but I did prefer the other temples, one of which was about 700 years old.

So rotate your head.......... do I have to do everything?? Goddam computers.

BE YOUR CONFIDENT

"Be Your Confident. Smile with Your." That's what it said, emblazoned on the kid's tshirt at breakfast in the Amora Hotel in Chiang Mai this morning. No idea what it means! Aaah Thailand. The Land of Smiles, and mangled Engrish. I started to get the feel of the place as soon as I got to the airport in Bangkok. The hot, humid air hit me in the face like a straight left from Mike Tyson as I exited the plane. After a walk of over 1 km through the gigantic terminal, I located the Bangkok Airways desk to check in for my flight north. There was a guy on the desk serving a small group, so I got on the end of the line. Alongside him, there was another busy airline guy sitting behind a sign that said Closed. No point waiting there, I thought. Wrong! A sizeable group of Aussie bogans walked right up to the guy and he started processing their boarding arrangements immediately. Maybe he was intimidated, I don't know. What's more, he had nearly finished processing this mob while my guy was still stuffing around. Closed obviously means Open for Business around here, and I'll pick the wrong queue every time. Through Immigration easily and into the domestic terminal. I quickly located the eating area for another green chicken curry in an exact replay of what I did last year. And it was every bit as good as it was last time. Things soon took a turn for the worse however  when I fed my credit card into an ATM to get some folding, and it didn't come out again. It took 30 minutes to sort that out while I was seriously running out of time to make the flight. All for nought, as it turned out, because the plane was late arriving and the flight was delayed, fortunately for me in this case.

Not my day really. After getting up at 3 am to get to the airport at home, the flight out of Sydney was delayed by a lazy two hours due to congestion, and the place was a zoo. Anyway it was a long day, I was up for just over 25 hours before I got to hit the sack again. But I was pleased to see Kay and Noah from Big Bike Tours, both at the airport waiting to collect me. We greeted each other like long lost family and caught up with what had happened in our respective lives over the last 12 months. I dropped my bags in my room, and not wanting to appear unsociable, thought it would be a good idea to have a coldie with the guys. Next minute all three of us (and me helmetless) are on a tiny little scooter heading through the warm, balmy night air for their local bike haunt, an open air bar in the backstreets of a very non touristy part of town.  All sorts of bikes, mostly big, dotted the scene, live music, meat grilling, cold beer and bikers doing what bikers do everywhere, lying to each other. I was introduced to a big bunch of their mates, and I was treated like an esteemed guest, I even got bowed at a couple of times. Yep, I'm back in Thailand! But I declined Noah's offer of a bowl of blood soup just like the one he was tucking into. It looked as gruesome as it sounds. There are limits, you know. After a gallon or two of beer, I got a tuk tuk back to the hotel - actually, the bar manager sent a junior lackey out on a scooter to find a tuk tuk for me, and you don't get service like that where I live - and man oh man, was I glad to see a pillow.

Right, we're up to speed. A couple of days to acclimatise, have a look around, meet the rest of the group, sort the paperwork out then we are out of here on Monday morning. As I expected, its warm here, the forecast is for 37-40 degrees, but Kay reckons it should be cooler in Laos. Again, the air is full of smoke from the burning rice stubble in the paddy fields, just as it was last year. That is a bit of a downer, but hardly a surprise. The word is that we hit Highway 1148 on day 1. Its a great ride, one of the highlights of last years trip, but then I had about 800 km of local riding under the belt by the time we got to that fabulous stretch last year. Am I ready for it again? I haven't done too much riding lately, so I hope I'm up to it, but I better not succumb to "first day fever" and get sucked in too deep when the pace quickens. Nevertheless, I will BE MY CONFIDENT, like the kid's tshirt said.

PS. One thing I did find out is that motorcycles are no longer allowed in the Khao Yai National Park which we rode through last year, with some trepidation I might add. Apparently the noise can upset the elephants, and our bikes were particularly noisy. I was a bit apprehensive at the time and hoped that we didn't run into any prickly pachyderms on or near the road. Recently a carload of tourists was not so lucky. If you haven't already seen it, click on this link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYHcMc748Uc

Hilarious when it happens to somebody else, isn't it?

ZEN AND THE ART OF MOTORCYCLE MAINTENANCE MEETS JIHADISM

Hello once again readers, fellow adventurers and armchair travelers. After lying dormant for about a year blogwise, I have dusted off the old keyboard and decided to get back to work, ie traveling, observing and writing about it for posterity. Let me say up front that rumors of my demise since last April have been greatly exaggerated. Oh sure I've been out on the bike, even done a few trips interstate, and as per usual I enjoy every minute when I'm out riding. But for most of 2014, I have been busy being a homebody, content to grow vegetables, watch the footy and follow the exploits of  friends like Chris Phillips, riding across the vast steppes of Russia and Mongolia, from the safety of my lounge room. I guess ever since my proposed 16,000 km trip from Cairo to Cape Town with Compass Expeditions, scheduled for late 2014, was cancelled due to security concerns in several African countries thanks to radical islam, I have been a bit listless. I even sold my KLR 650 which I had all prepped for the trip, and that was quite a downer. Yet ironically, one of the main problems with staying home in safety and watching television is that you are likely to  become even more depressed, and pretty soon jump to the conclusion that the whole world is rapidly turning to shit, what with the relentless march of ISIS and all the other murderous islamic nut cases killing innocent people for no good reason here, there and every bloody where. So I'm pretty dark about what radical islam is doing for us. Note that I said radical islam. I have nothing against Islam per se, and I have ridden in several islamic countries and received nothing but unconditional hospitality. People can worship the sun if they like, I don't care, just extend me the same courtesy.

That said, its as good a subject as any for getting back into my stride blogwise, a bit like pre-season training for bloggers. You know what? Here's something I'm really getting sick of hearing. "God is Great!", usually followed by an explosion or the plop of a severed head hitting the floor. Think about that. God is great. Yeah, well so was Gatsby, and so are Vili's pies and pasties, and so is Port Power, but you don't see me beheading vegetarians and Crows supporters to prove it, nor to appease any deity. If God is great, surely he can do his own killing. What I want to know is this. Where are the defenders of the so called "religion of peace", the assumed vast majority of ordinary folk, the religious and community leaders and the government spokespeople, here and around the world, who represent the religion as it is alleged to be? Where is the groundswell of condemnation from those who should be outraged that their religion and their culture have been hijacked by the loons and taken straight back to the year 700 AD? Good to see them standing up for what they believe. The spineless bastards. Or maybe they think its all ok. Either way, the silence is deafening, and that should concern a lot more people than just me.

Normal people must never let the crackpots and evil doers think they have a chance of winning. I believe it was Benjamin Franklin who said "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."  I don't know about you, but if my house was overrun by cockroaches, I would definitely not: (a) Ignore them and hope they went away, (b) Try to reason with them, nor (c) Try to see the world from a cockroach's point of view. I'd call in the pest exterminators while I still had a house worth living in. I know what a cockroach is, and the vermin don't get to call the shots. Not yet, but time's a wasting, people. But realistically, I guess its cheaper to let the muslims kill each other and behead the occasional unlucky westerner, or lose the odd airliner or building than it is to go at them all out. However, its good to see the Australian government has a good grip on the jihadist terror threat situation though. We're building more submarines! Just wait till we get those babies in 2035. Oh, and its illegal to insult anybody, or hurt their feelings. Feel safer now?

What's all this blah doing in a motorcycle blog anyway? Hang on, I'm getting to that. There was a time when the only audience for my astute identification of the world's more serious problems was the poor unfortunate sod on the adjacent bar stool, but thanks to the Internet, I can now go global! (And I can bang on about whatever the hell I like too, its just terrific). So anyway, it occurred to me that I'm well overdue for a new adventure, as much just to get out there and exercise my own essential liberty as a paid up, card carrying infidel as for any other reason. But if I needed another reason, it would be to escape from Adelaide in what has become known as Mad March. Where we get all our culture for the year - good and bad - delivered in one insane month. Then we don't have to bother with any culture again until the same time next year. Very popular with everybody except the people who live here. But what to do? Where to go?

Then out of the blue, I get an email from Kay at Big Bike Tours informing me that all the crew who did the trip around northern Thailand last year have signed up to do an adventure ride into Laos this year. All except me, that is. Hmmm. Yeah well nobody calls me chicken, so I signed up for a re-run. And as luck would have it, it will be in March. I guess I'm just a motorcycle jihadist. A not so holy road warrior who wants to conquer even more roads, just because they are there. Maybe that should be unholy, which is the way I prefer my roads. And besides, anywhere with good - yet dirt cheap - beer presses all my buttons. As I recall, in Laos all you need to be able to say is "Beer Lao !!" with a certain authority in your voice, and you're in business. If you notice your lights flicker a bit over the next couple of weeks, relax, that will just be the beer vendors of Laos stacking their fridges. Suck on that, ISIS. Or whatever acronym you've changed your name into in the last five minutes. Scumbags like you don't decide when and how I have my fun, so up yours. (F-U-N, an English word that has no equivalent in any squiggly language - but in the present context, a close approximation might be.....let's just say that being an animal handler doesn't necessarily mean you work in a circus.) Anyway readers, enough about all that stuff, its time for some much more agreeable Buddhist tolerance. Some Zen to counteract my aggressive motorcycle jihadist tendencies, if you will. My personal challenge will be to moderate my own intolerance and lessen my attachment to material things (excluding motorcycles, oh and beer). And I will abandon Adelaide to the infuriating chaos that is Mad March. I may or may not succeed, but as usual, I will keep striving for my own contentment in the face of all that gets right up my nose, I promise. Seeking enlightenment surely generates better karma than any kind of conquest anyway. So here we go again !!

The itinerary this time has a little overlap with last year's ride. We start in Chiang Mai once more, and go straight onto Highway 1148 again (woo hoo!!), finishing up in Nan again. This stretch is worth the money just on its own, the rest of the trip is just a bonus as far as I'm concerned. Then over the border into Laos as far as Xayaboury, down through Luang Prabang, Vang Vieng, the Lao capital of Vientiane then back into Thailand to Chiang Khan. We then revisit Khao Kho, onto Uttaradit, then back to Chiang Mai. Ten days of riding, covering some 2,200 km. There are some tricky bits, the first being that in Laos, traffic drives on the right, so we have to switch sides for a while. My experience has been that while I have covered plenty of distance on the "other" side, it takes a while to get used to it, and I find that if you have to switch from one side to the other, then back again, it can be quite dangerous. One really has to concentrate, and maintain a high level of situational awareness, which can be very draining. I expect that like last year, it will be hot, it will be smoky from the burning of the rice crop stubble, and again, we will coincide to some extent with good old Songkran, so we can expect to get very wet and to be dodging even more loonies (but happy loonies) on the roads and footpaths. Don't know about you, but I can't wait. I leave on 13th of March. Until then, think Zen- I am already. I have awoken. I am the bike, the bike is me, we are one and the same, we belong, nothing else matters.

PATTAYA - HEAVEN OR HELL?

Well, there I was, 11 am on a Sunday morning, sitting in a bar in some sleazy alley in Pattaya. OK, so it was across the street from my hotel and I couldn't be stuffed walking any further because its too bloody hot. This is not something I would normally be doing at that time. But I was only nursing a relatively harmless can of Coke Zero, unlike most others around who were still hard at it from the night before. And my hotel room does have to get cleaned sometime. Anyway, on the three giant screen TV's, there was good old AC/DC, all hot'n'sweaty, belting out Highway to Hell at a volume that was setting off car alarms. Go Angus, and take that you Euro wusses! That's classic Oz Rock, that is. Then I thought, well, that's probably a pretty appropriate description of Pattaya generally. Highway to Hell. No speed limits and toll free-perhaps-until you actually get there.

In fact I did already opine to some of you that one gets an uneasy feeling around here that pretty soon, God will lose patience with all the sinning going on in this town to the point where he will wreak his divine vengeance upon it, and smite it from existence in a pillar of righteous fire. You know what, yesterday morning there was a thunderstorm here that convinced me that was exactly what was happening! Holy shit it was terrifying, I can't recall a louder one. But it turned out to be a false alarm, vis a vis Armageddon. Just a routine meteorological event, but highly memorable all the same.

Blind Freddy could tell you that Pattaya is the world's largest knock shop. Whatever your particular bent, you can get it here. Its the mega-mall of carnal desire, normal, abnormal and just plain freaked right out, and let me tell you, I've seen freaky over the last 40 years. Probably the crassest part is called Walking Street, down near the beach, which just goes off like a bomb every night. Freak central, with busloads of unsuspecting and soon-to-be traumatised tourists dumped there just so they can say they've been there. I reckon that's just a distraction. The less spectacular but more insidious underbelly of the place is right next to where I'm staying. You can't say Big Bike Tours doesn't look after their customers!

Anyway, I'm not going to elaborate too much, call me if you want the details. Nothing I can say or do is going to change anything here, and I certainly have no right to occupy the moral high ground, (Hell, I've just had so much oil rubbed into my skin I feel like a Drizabone raincoat--but I do look years younger!) but the truth is that this town is all about sex for sale on an industrial scale, and that, as always, some people are making a heap of money from it at the expense of a lot of others. Ok, nothing new about that, and you can argue over the morality or even the necessity and practicality of it all till you're blue in the face. But I think that underneath all the partying-and there is no shortage of punters wanting to play-Pattaya is not really Fantasyland, the happiest kingdom of them all. I actually think it's a sad place. If people are willing participants, ok fine, that's their business, but I do get the feeling that a lot of people who work here have no choice but to do what they do. And yet even that is unbelievably well disguised most of the time, such is the enigma that is Thailand. I guess if you see and do the same thing all the time, then that is by definition, normal. And then you just try to be as positive as you can. The Buddhists' high level of tolerance and acceptance probably helps, though I'm not sure the Buddha would actually approve. If he does, I might consider switching. I reckon the Christian God might be taking notes though. And of course Allah would definitely be outraged, but apparently it doesn't take much to upset him, and this is not in his electorate anyway. Just as well, because you would find Lord Lucan and Jimmy Hoffa having a beer together before you found a virgin around here.

Moving right along, the annual week of madness that is Songkran (Thai New Year) has just erupted on the streets of Pattaya. Have a look at my earlier blog entry for Songkran in Phuket in 2008 for the squelchy and saturated details. Suffice to say it is in fact impossible to walk down the street without getting (at least) soaking wet. I don't begrudge the Thai kids a bit of fun, they really love it. But inevitably of course, there are squillions of idiot tourists -mostly British lager louts in this area (ie tattooed boofheads in shorts and singlets) -who want to get right into it, and are armed with humungous water cannons and bags of coloured flour to prove it. Well, I suppose a Pom having a wash is a good thing. I carefully timed this trip to avoid most of Songkran, but a day or two overlap was necessary. So, basically I'm a refugee in the hotel until I can sneak out for a feed later tonight, and hopefully I can dry my stuff before heading up to Bangkok tomorrow afternoon for my flight home tomorrow (Monday) night. But there's always a few people on the ball. This year's big seller on the streets is a waterproof pouch that you can sling around your neck to keep your important documents safe and dry.

Did I mention the food?? Sure, I did! That's one thing I will seriously miss when I leave Thailand this time. Half the things I've eaten on this trip I've never even seen before, and the textures and taste combinations are beyond mere words. I'll have some work to do when I get back to replicate this fantastic gastronomic experience. Till next time, thanks for coming. Did I really say that?