From Chanthaburi we headed back to he coast on a cycle lane! There’s been quite a lot of these recently, though very very few cycles and they’re usually used by the mopeds and motorbikes to pootle along in.
Once we reached the coast though the cycle path was a segregated cycle only lane, with a separate footpath and a moped lane. It had signs every few meters saying bikes only no parking and as cars the world over do, it was totally ignored unless it was physically impossible to get on to it to park due to a big curb.
I have no idea if this is true, but it seems to us that there are tourist hot spots where almost every other person is western, then there’s the rest of the country where we are.. generally on our own.
The western hot spots are often on the beach and are full of nice restaurants and bars and are adjacent to the locals resorts which are full of shacks on a not so well manicured beach.
If you’re a westerner you may form a quite different opinion of the country to a cycle tourer, as 95% of Thailand is nothing like these resort areas. And fortunately for us, this 95% is the bits we prefer. It’s much nicer to sit on a beach on your own, listening to the waves gently lap against the sand under a tree than in the resort areas with bars thumping out music .. But each to their own.
We’ve stayed in some fab hotels and rolled up at Mae Phim to another great little hotel just across the road from the seafront and the first one we could actually get in the pool without frost bite for ages.
They don’t heat the pools and they are often shaded so they are a bit nippy! or possibly we’re just southern softies… This one was on the roof so basked in the sun and was a lovely temperature for a float around.
It had been a surreal days cycling, we stopped at a cafe with an artificial waterfall and cave, compete with dry ice fog, which made thunder mountain at Disney look a bit tame, and then saw a WW2 US destroyer museum where the ship had been given to the Thai navy and served until 2000.
Then we rolled into town and after our pool dip, went to the Irish bar for a sunset drink before going to an Italian for dinner. It really is the Costa Del Thailand at times.
We’ve not seen many cycle tourers, In fact none since we left Laos but we bumped into a Japanese tourer twice the next day and got to say Konichiwa to his wife who phoned while he was with us! I wonder how many more we will see.
The coast here (and I’m sure all the way up to Bangkok probably) is tourist central and we moved on another 50km to a lovely hotel on the beach and had dinner in their car park (!) which they’d laid a bit of AstroTurf in, hung some lights and stuck a speaker on a table to make outdoor dining. Worked for us. Lovely sunset, a few beers and early to bed as always.
We are usually in bed by 9.15 and up by 6am. Sunrise is wonderful here and it’s even a bit nippy so obviously a great time to cycle, but the disadvantage of this is that we arrived at our next stop, the Biodome we planned to visit before it had even opened!
So a quick back track to Amazon coffee (nothing to do with the American Evil Corporation of the same name) for a ‘wait until it opens’ coffee and then back to the Biodome to see the European flower hall, chilled to 13C and full of tulips in blossom. Surreal, especially as it was called a Wonder of Nature and right next to a massive petro chemcal works and run by the petrol chemical company. Green washing, but very well done all the same.
Shortly after that, we both felt a bit of heat stoke as we crossed the hills towards Pattaya, hills as in mole hills, but you know how we feel about hills, we’ll take a diversion to avoid a speed bump! But in our defence it was a dual carriageway and effing hot!
7 Elevens are made for this eventuality and we sat inside with a cool drink to chill for a while before continuing our journey to the tourist hot spot of this coast. Welcome to Russia on sea, Pattaya. I wish I’d brought my Ukraine t shirt…
Our hotel was lovely, right on the beach and south of the main party areas – we’re too old for all that malarkey – so we had dinner on the beach watching all the locals setting fireworks off into the sea – all hand held too.
But after a visit to the floating market, which was interesting, nice to wander around, and try our hand at traditional dancing, we arrived at the main Pattaya central beach.
We are both pretty broad minded and usually never too shocked by anything we see but never in the field of cycle touring have we ever seen so many single, attractively challenged men as there were lining the streets of Pattaya..it’s just full of them. On their own, in twos and groups, some of the sea front bars just had them sitting in rows, like at a theatre, presumably at midday getting a good seat waiting for the notorious Pattaya nightlife sex trade to begin. Linda felt the number of men outnumbered any women by about 50/1 and and it was uncomfortably astonishing…There are hundreds of massage parlours – some stating Health Massage and others not, and we wondered if this distinguished between massage with and without ‘extras’. Ladies sit in chairs outside these places in groups, often in company t shirts and we thought these were probably the more reputable massage parlours, but we have no idea really. You get ladies sitting on the promenade waving their fingers at you and again, we have no idea what that meant, but judging by the single men who approached them, I’m guessing these ladies were freelance. Then there’s the huge number of pot shops, dancing girls establishments etc, even Taco Bell (the place is full of western fast food chains) had an obscene advert for it’s tacos with a lady almost giving the taco a b*** j**. There’s a walking street where dancing girls etc abound, Linda thought they’d spelt it wrong…! Anyway, we totally hated the place and couldn’t wait to leave. I’d rather have a week in Blackpool… In February
We had most certainly made the right decision to stay south of the main town and then again just north so we could visit the Sanctuary of Truth which presumably, is the nemesis of Trump.
This museum was only built in the 1990’s but looks ancient and is wooden built without any metal. It’s hugely impressive and houses pillars carved with lifestyle choices with one side of the pillar showing the good choice and the other the bad one.
It’s a gorgeous place and we sat in the bar (ironically, as there’s a pillar with lots of drunk people on and they’re not on the good side) and had a beer and watched the sunset over it after our visit.
The next day the hotel staff all came outside for photos and to wave us off, which is always fun but I always worry about falling off as they wave and film us – Don’t want that on appearing on their Facebook page! – and then headed inland to cut across the peninsula to the home of the hot sauce Sri Racha and our hotel.. Somerset House.
We couldn’t find any museums or anything about the sauce sadly, so had a rest day (to try to avoid some serious windy weather coming from the north) in our very nice apartment with kitchen. We even watched the Christmas Doctor Who – excellent, but we won’t be staying in any hotels with adjoining room doors anymore ….
Our last day before we hit the outskirts of Bangkok, we set off into the wind. How have we managed to be cycling into the wind both leaving Bangkok and coming back to it? Anyway, we planned short routes and just as well as when we emerged at the coast we managed to pedal up a short sharp hill as the local tourists took photos – you can’t get off when that’s happening can you? But then when we crested the hill the wind was too strong to cycle down safely, so we walked down and round the headland and found a lovely spot to have our picnic lunch watching the monkeys attack the cars.
As cars cruised past us they slowed to take photos of the monkeys who then jumped on to each car and hung on to get fed. One even went in through an open window!
After all the cars had gone though one little fellow ventured over to us to try to have our cheese sannies and Salt and Vinegar crisps away (one of the benefits of shopping in Pattaya) and the car park attendant chased him off with a catapult. Viscious little devil he was too and gave us a right growling face. He wasn’t getting my S&V crisps though !
And then, just like that.. ..we were back on the outskirts of Bangkok…
Superb to see Jon doing his dance koves – a la Strictly Come Dancing Pattaya style!!! 🕺