Well, that wasn’t expected! The first two days of cycling I found really hard. I mean stupid hot, overheating feeling faint, knackered hard.
Naturally being a complete idiot I did the British Stiff Upper Lip and Keep Calm and Carry on and on the third day I felt fine. Completely back to normal – it’s still very very hot from about 11am, but I didn’t literally crawl from 7-eleven to 7-eleven dreaming of cold drinks and Aircon.
I said to Linda I feel I’ve adapted quite quickly, even though I’d felt the last two days were hard going. She replied “Well, that will be because you were obviously unwell and have looked very yellow” …. oh, well thanks for telling me! In her defence I’d have probably dismissed it, had she told me and done exactly the same as I did…wasted breath I think would be Lindas words as to why she said nothing …
Anyway, we’ve settled down now to around 5am alarms and on the road between 6 and 6.30am with sunrise at around 6.15.
The sun here doesn’t rise, it leaps out of bed and hurtles up into the sky before you’ve blinked, but even so it’s heavenly cycling up until about 10:30 and we’ve thoroughly enjoyed being up at that time for the scenery and to see the people start their day.
The whole countryside is cultivated, every square inch, and not in small holdings, but large areas of rubber and sugar plantations, corn (🌽 ) fields and Cassava (which we thought was pot at first!). It’s all really well maintained. The rice is being harvested in places by teams of Dinky toy combine harvesters, which are almost too small for the driver! But as the rice fields are usually small, it all makes sense. Locals stop to watch all the harvest activity, as did we.
There is also lots of marijuana growing as it’s a big legal industry here and along with that, we’ve smelt lots of Ginger – which is a much more pleasant odour to cycle through than the pot! There’s an occasional cow and water buffalo and of course a billion and one temples.
As tourists we all headed to the Grand Palace in Bangkok, but some of the small village temples we’ve passed seem more impressive to us. They are immaculately kept – the paint looks like it was done yesterday on every single temple you see, and the fact that it’s a village temple somehow makes it more special. No tourists (apart from us!) and locals coming and going, with stalls of BBQ’s smoking away from sunrise to nightfall.
The big roads are very quiet and all have a shoulder (and the occasional giant lizard). Even so, vehicles will still pull out a little way when passing us and they are patient if they need to turn off, sitting a good distance behind and waiting for us to pass the junction they need. They don’t mind either when we cycle the wrong way down the motorways! Which we often have to do to get to our destination which is all normal for Thailand driving.
The small roads have very few cars and numerous mopeds and mopeds with Heath Robinson sidecars that can accommodate a dozen kids. They are like a park bench attached to face the moped with a nice little patio between them. Some have full canopy roofs and they all heave with kids at school times. We’ve even seen babies sit up with their bottles to “Look at the crazy foreigners” and then lie down again.
The tracks are great too, very well maintained and almost devoid of any traffic. We love these as they wind their way through all the crops and homes. The other advantage of them is that as the day heats up they stay relatively cool. The big 6 lane motorways are like infernos after about noon as the heat from the tarmac and the vehicles builds up. Awful to be on them after that time!
Everywhere the people are just so friendly and lovely. They all beam and smile and wave and many shout hello, often from inside some small dilapidated bungalow as you pass.
When we’ve asked for directions people have tried hard to help us, even grabbing other passers by to ask them for help. They are such a nice people and just like India we already feel right at home among them.
Glad to hear you are no longer yellow!