February 8, 2006
Bangkok: Holy Cow!!!! Singapore was clean, organized and open, Bangkok is dirty, with no discernable downtown and narrow streets that make the daily commutes by car impossible. My impression is that the city was built on a human scale with roads sized for carts, bicycles and pedestrians. With the introduction of the automobile the carts, bicycles and pedestrians were forced from the streets. When we arrived at Hua Lamphong train station it was as if we stepped off of a rocket that had started its’ journey on a nice peaceful planet and arrived on one full of chaos.
Jodi spent 4 days laid up in the guesthouse pumped full of muscle relaxants and Aleve while I ran about the city seeing the sites and running errands. I needed to get our visas for Vietnam, find guide books and maps for the other SE Asia countries and have some repairs done on my bicycle. At first I was intimidated by the traffic on the streets and I was reluctant to ride my bicycle because of the experience of being a pedestrian. It seems in Bangkok that biggest has the right of way, with the pedestrians dashing about to avoid the trucks, buses, taxis and motor scooters. I felt walking in the streets was hard and riding would be impossible. In spite of my trepidation I gave it a go and discovered on my bicycle I had more rights than if I were on my two legs. The motor scooters were nice enough to show me the ropes and if I signaled the cars would slow and let me in. Riding was a joy compared with walking in the city. The pollution was horrendous and I stopped at a pharmacy to buy a dust mask to keep the diesel soot out of my lungs.
On the first afternoon I raced to the Vietnam Embassy to apply for our visas and gave the man at the counter my last 5000baht ($135USD) to process our paper work. When I left and was two blocks away I realized that it was Friday, I had no money and I could not cash any travelers checks because the embassy had my passport and the banks would most likely be closed until Monday. I was screwed so I turned around and talked the guys at the embassy into refunding my money and pulling our paper work. I then went to the bike store (Pro Bike on the back side of Lumpini Park that Eddy recommended) and had my bike re-cabled. My shifter cable housings had rusted from all the salt water riding we had done and were beginning to fail. While waiting I was amazed at all the Europeans who were buying bicycles and equipment to cycle tour around SE Asia. One group of mechanics were putting the final touches on bicycles that a couple from Belgium were going to use to tour northern Laos, another, a Pomme who must have had too much money for his own good, was in the midst of purchasing a folding touring bicycle and was offering the mechanics an extra 1000 baht to do this or that. His behavior ticked me off since the guys working on my bike were enticed by the tips and were helping him instead of finishing the job I was paying them to do. Since I had extra time I started a conversation with a couple of German guys. They had just finished the trip that Jodi and I were planning and were about to ride the same route that we had just completed. We traded beta and had a great time comparing stories about our adventures on the road.
Once my bike was complete I returned to the guesthouse to discover my 34 year old wife was moving about like an 80 year old....Yikes! She was not moving very well but wanted to go down to the local night market for some dinner. One of her hips was two inches higher than the other and watching her walk reminded me of my grandmother and her struggles with osteoporosis. As we walked she seemed to loosen a bit and her pace quickened. The night market was awesome, it was a much larger scale than any we had seen. It had live entertainment, a beer garden and many new foods for us to try. We really enjoyed the non fried spring rolls, drought Chang, cucumber spicy salad and fish ball wantons.
The next morning Jodi was just as crippled so I had to go it alone. My first task was to find a book store to get maps and guide books for Laos and Vietnam. I looked at our Thailand book and they recommended a store that appeared to be nearby. I set off down the busy road of Rama IV and thought I was on the right track but after riding for some time and stopping now and then to look at the map I found I had just done a 1 hour loop of the downtown area without finding the street I was looking for. I returned to my starting point and was looking at my map when a young Thai girl approached me and asked in perfect English "Can I help you?". I explained that I was looking for Sukhumvit so I could go to a book store that sold books in English. She explained that Sukhumvit was close and I handed her my note book and my pencil so she could draw a map. She gave me great directions and because she was going in the same direction grabbed a motor scooter taxi and road along with me for most of the way. She would say turn here and explain where it was on her map. They stopped at her stop and she told me to ride another 300 meters and turn left and I would be on Sukhumvit. It worked but it took me another hour to find the mall where the book store was housed.
Inside the mall the world seemed so ridiculous because the prior week I had ridden through some villages that were so poor and now I was standing in a 5 story air conditioned mall with shops dedicated to designer clothes. On the fourth floor was the book store as described in my guide. The store did not have a very good selection of maps or guide books. I thought about all my troubles in finding this store and wondered how I was going to find another. I walked around the mall and the street below and found three more book stores but none of them had everything I needed. I even found a used book store but none of the books were discounted very much and they did not have the maps or books that suited my needs. I returned to the first store and found a map that would work, and went to another store to purchase guide books. I also found a Boots pharmacy that sold its’ own brand of sun screen (most of the stuff we see is American made and very expensive) and insect repellant. As I was paying I noticed that all the prescription drugs were on display behind the counter and I asked if I could purchase any of those items without a prescription. The pharmacist said "yes" and I asked "What do you have in the way of muscle relaxants and do you have Celebrex?" The prices for each were so cheap I thought I must be getting knock offs but when they gave me the blister packs I saw they were authentic. I was shocked about my ability to buy drugs in this country and recalled all the times I sat in a doctors office just to get the prescriptions for the drugs I already knew I needed (expectorant and antibiotics to clear up my nemesis the bronchial infection). I thought how much time I could save if only I could self medicate like this back home.
I returned to the guesthouse and handed Jodi the drugs and said no alcohol, drink lots of water and take these with food. She gladly accepted my advice and said lets get something to eat so I can start taking them now. We walked to the night market again and tried the things we were too full to try the night before.
The next morning Jodi felt much better but I suggested she stay home and get more rest. I needed her to get as healthy as possible because we had to leave the country in two days before our visas expired. I read about things to do in the guidebook and decide to go to the weekend market. It was too far for travel by bike so I walked to the subway and was pleasantly surprised to learn that it stopped inside the market. The market was one of the craziest things I had ever seen. It had everything, home furnishings, clothing, food, books, shipping agents, rare animals, performers and much more. I had a great time watching the performers and I was able to get several quotes for shipping our bicycles home. As I walked around I thought about my Grandmother and mother and how they love bargains and how they would love the weekend market. I didn’t stay long because I wanted to check out a seedy electronics mall before dark but I did buy a pair of capri pants that I could put over my bicycle shorts to keep the sun off my legs.
Next I went to Panthip Plaza to check out what the bootleggers were selling. I asked the subway information desk how to get to Panthip Plaza and they gave me really bad directions that I discovered required me to walk over a mile in the heat. I could not take a taxi since the street was clogged with buses and cars and taking a taxi would have been an exercise in watching the meter run while we sat still in traffic. I asked one guy how to get to Panthip Plaza and he said follow me. He lead me through a maze of people and sidewalks for over a kilometer until we reached the door. Inside was an electronics extravaganza with kids break dancing, spokes models showing off the latest MP3 players and along the fringes many booths selling the latest pirated software, DVDs and music. Everywhere I walked I would get approached by some young kid wanting to show me his selection of bootlegged copyrighted material. I was amazed that I could buy thousands of dollars in software for just 3USD for each disc. I bought a few things and went out onto the street where I found venders selling nock off watches, belts, purses and electronics.
Next I returned to the guesthouse to check on Jodi. She was feeling much better and when she walked her hip wasn’t higher than the other. It appeared that we might leave the next day as scheduled.
The next morning we loaded up, checked out and went to the train station. We put our bags into the bag storage facility and locked our bikes to the fence outside until we could check them that evening. We then went to the post office to send a few more things home. Somewhere along the way I had my pocket picked and the guy managed to clean my wallet of all my baht. Thank goodness I still had my credit cards and passport. He managed to pinch me for the equivalent of $22.50. I wasn’t carrying much since we were leaving the country. We cashed another travelers check and we returned to the post office to send our package. The remainder of the day we spent in any air conditioned public space we could find. At 8:45PM we boarded the train for a 12 hour ride to Nong Khai on the Laos border.
On the train we met a family that were bringing their daughter home from her year in Japan as an exchange student. The father was a micro biologist and the mother was on the faculty of one of the universities. They were a very impressive family and like so many others we have met in SE Asia they push their children to get educated. They all spoke very good English, something I was embarrassed to learn after I had said some rather unsavory things thinking that nobody would understand what I was saying. When we sat down and they asked where we were from I became mortified and very embarrassed for me, my wife and my country. I apologized to them for anything they may have overheard and I grounded myself from beer for the next week. Sorry America!
Vientiane: On the train I retired to my sleeper for what I thought was a good nights sleep but the longer I was awake the next morning the more I learned how tired I was. I felt as if I had been on an all night bender and the aches and pains in my body from sleeping in the short bed made my body and mind in similar spirits. I was not a happy camper and if someone had offered me the opportunity to go home at that moment I probably would have. It felt so hopeless, my wife was hurt, I was tired,, we still didn’t have our Vietnam visas and the Laos border crossing sounded unpleasant. The 20km ride felt as if it was 200km and all I wanted to do was lay down and call it a day. Jodi gave me a pretty good pep talk which lifted my spirits a bunch and I spent the day leaning on her more than usual. She handled the border crossing while I made sure we had water and food for the 20km ride to the Laos capital called Vientiane. Once we had our visas and paid all our fees we made the 20km trip.
While riding through town we were approached by a Swiss couple on bikes as well and we started talking outside one hotel. We had so much to ask each other and so many stories to tell, Phillip suggested we discuss things over dinner that night. We agreed and went about our accommodation hunt and found an adequate guesthouse. It was nothing special but one of the few rooms we found open because the town is so popular with backpackers. We then had a giant lunch and retired to our room for a nap. I awoke at 6:09PM already late for our dinner date, my mouth tasted awful from the onions in my lunch and in my haste to leave the room forgot to brush my teeth. Since we were late they had already left, but luckily we caught up to them at a book store. We settled into a restaurant on the Mekong and had a lovely dinner all the time swapping stories about our adventures. Phillip and Ursala had just completed our planned route down the Mekong into Vietnam and the beta they provided helped us feel more comfortable about our upcoming rides. I enjoyed the evening so much that I was sad to part ways but I was glad to have had the pleasure of their company nonetheless.
The next day Jodi and I discussed our trip, our Vietnam visa situation and how we were going to overcome fitting everything in this last 6 weeks. We came to the conclusion that we would not go into Vietnam. After talking with Ursala and Phillip, we had the impression the riding in Vietnam wasn’t that enjoyable and we would only end up spending 5 days riding and would have to take an 18hr train ride to get between ride origination points. After going over several proposed plans we decided we will go the less traveled option down through Southern Laos into Cambodia. It is a tougher route than our original plan but it seemed the best one for us. We will reevaluate our situation in Savannakhet where we can cross into Thailand if needed or we can get Vietnam visas at the consulate should we learn that road conditions are too much for us.
Jodi spent 4 days laid up in the guesthouse pumped full of muscle relaxants and Aleve while I ran about the city seeing the sites and running errands. I needed to get our visas for Vietnam, find guide books and maps for the other SE Asia countries and have some repairs done on my bicycle. At first I was intimidated by the traffic on the streets and I was reluctant to ride my bicycle because of the experience of being a pedestrian. It seems in Bangkok that biggest has the right of way, with the pedestrians dashing about to avoid the trucks, buses, taxis and motor scooters. I felt walking in the streets was hard and riding would be impossible. In spite of my trepidation I gave it a go and discovered on my bicycle I had more rights than if I were on my two legs. The motor scooters were nice enough to show me the ropes and if I signaled the cars would slow and let me in. Riding was a joy compared with walking in the city. The pollution was horrendous and I stopped at a pharmacy to buy a dust mask to keep the diesel soot out of my lungs.
On the first afternoon I raced to the Vietnam Embassy to apply for our visas and gave the man at the counter my last 5000baht ($135USD) to process our paper work. When I left and was two blocks away I realized that it was Friday, I had no money and I could not cash any travelers checks because the embassy had my passport and the banks would most likely be closed until Monday. I was screwed so I turned around and talked the guys at the embassy into refunding my money and pulling our paper work. I then went to the bike store (Pro Bike on the back side of Lumpini Park that Eddy recommended) and had my bike re-cabled. My shifter cable housings had rusted from all the salt water riding we had done and were beginning to fail. While waiting I was amazed at all the Europeans who were buying bicycles and equipment to cycle tour around SE Asia. One group of mechanics were putting the final touches on bicycles that a couple from Belgium were going to use to tour northern Laos, another, a Pomme who must have had too much money for his own good, was in the midst of purchasing a folding touring bicycle and was offering the mechanics an extra 1000 baht to do this or that. His behavior ticked me off since the guys working on my bike were enticed by the tips and were helping him instead of finishing the job I was paying them to do. Since I had extra time I started a conversation with a couple of German guys. They had just finished the trip that Jodi and I were planning and were about to ride the same route that we had just completed. We traded beta and had a great time comparing stories about our adventures on the road.
Once my bike was complete I returned to the guesthouse to discover my 34 year old wife was moving about like an 80 year old....Yikes! She was not moving very well but wanted to go down to the local night market for some dinner. One of her hips was two inches higher than the other and watching her walk reminded me of my grandmother and her struggles with osteoporosis. As we walked she seemed to loosen a bit and her pace quickened. The night market was awesome, it was a much larger scale than any we had seen. It had live entertainment, a beer garden and many new foods for us to try. We really enjoyed the non fried spring rolls, drought Chang, cucumber spicy salad and fish ball wantons.
The next morning Jodi was just as crippled so I had to go it alone. My first task was to find a book store to get maps and guide books for Laos and Vietnam. I looked at our Thailand book and they recommended a store that appeared to be nearby. I set off down the busy road of Rama IV and thought I was on the right track but after riding for some time and stopping now and then to look at the map I found I had just done a 1 hour loop of the downtown area without finding the street I was looking for. I returned to my starting point and was looking at my map when a young Thai girl approached me and asked in perfect English "Can I help you?". I explained that I was looking for Sukhumvit so I could go to a book store that sold books in English. She explained that Sukhumvit was close and I handed her my note book and my pencil so she could draw a map. She gave me great directions and because she was going in the same direction grabbed a motor scooter taxi and road along with me for most of the way. She would say turn here and explain where it was on her map. They stopped at her stop and she told me to ride another 300 meters and turn left and I would be on Sukhumvit. It worked but it took me another hour to find the mall where the book store was housed.
Inside the mall the world seemed so ridiculous because the prior week I had ridden through some villages that were so poor and now I was standing in a 5 story air conditioned mall with shops dedicated to designer clothes. On the fourth floor was the book store as described in my guide. The store did not have a very good selection of maps or guide books. I thought about all my troubles in finding this store and wondered how I was going to find another. I walked around the mall and the street below and found three more book stores but none of them had everything I needed. I even found a used book store but none of the books were discounted very much and they did not have the maps or books that suited my needs. I returned to the first store and found a map that would work, and went to another store to purchase guide books. I also found a Boots pharmacy that sold its’ own brand of sun screen (most of the stuff we see is American made and very expensive) and insect repellant. As I was paying I noticed that all the prescription drugs were on display behind the counter and I asked if I could purchase any of those items without a prescription. The pharmacist said "yes" and I asked "What do you have in the way of muscle relaxants and do you have Celebrex?" The prices for each were so cheap I thought I must be getting knock offs but when they gave me the blister packs I saw they were authentic. I was shocked about my ability to buy drugs in this country and recalled all the times I sat in a doctors office just to get the prescriptions for the drugs I already knew I needed (expectorant and antibiotics to clear up my nemesis the bronchial infection). I thought how much time I could save if only I could self medicate like this back home.
I returned to the guesthouse and handed Jodi the drugs and said no alcohol, drink lots of water and take these with food. She gladly accepted my advice and said lets get something to eat so I can start taking them now. We walked to the night market again and tried the things we were too full to try the night before.
The next morning Jodi felt much better but I suggested she stay home and get more rest. I needed her to get as healthy as possible because we had to leave the country in two days before our visas expired. I read about things to do in the guidebook and decide to go to the weekend market. It was too far for travel by bike so I walked to the subway and was pleasantly surprised to learn that it stopped inside the market. The market was one of the craziest things I had ever seen. It had everything, home furnishings, clothing, food, books, shipping agents, rare animals, performers and much more. I had a great time watching the performers and I was able to get several quotes for shipping our bicycles home. As I walked around I thought about my Grandmother and mother and how they love bargains and how they would love the weekend market. I didn’t stay long because I wanted to check out a seedy electronics mall before dark but I did buy a pair of capri pants that I could put over my bicycle shorts to keep the sun off my legs.
Next I went to Panthip Plaza to check out what the bootleggers were selling. I asked the subway information desk how to get to Panthip Plaza and they gave me really bad directions that I discovered required me to walk over a mile in the heat. I could not take a taxi since the street was clogged with buses and cars and taking a taxi would have been an exercise in watching the meter run while we sat still in traffic. I asked one guy how to get to Panthip Plaza and he said follow me. He lead me through a maze of people and sidewalks for over a kilometer until we reached the door. Inside was an electronics extravaganza with kids break dancing, spokes models showing off the latest MP3 players and along the fringes many booths selling the latest pirated software, DVDs and music. Everywhere I walked I would get approached by some young kid wanting to show me his selection of bootlegged copyrighted material. I was amazed that I could buy thousands of dollars in software for just 3USD for each disc. I bought a few things and went out onto the street where I found venders selling nock off watches, belts, purses and electronics.
Next I returned to the guesthouse to check on Jodi. She was feeling much better and when she walked her hip wasn’t higher than the other. It appeared that we might leave the next day as scheduled.
The next morning we loaded up, checked out and went to the train station. We put our bags into the bag storage facility and locked our bikes to the fence outside until we could check them that evening. We then went to the post office to send a few more things home. Somewhere along the way I had my pocket picked and the guy managed to clean my wallet of all my baht. Thank goodness I still had my credit cards and passport. He managed to pinch me for the equivalent of $22.50. I wasn’t carrying much since we were leaving the country. We cashed another travelers check and we returned to the post office to send our package. The remainder of the day we spent in any air conditioned public space we could find. At 8:45PM we boarded the train for a 12 hour ride to Nong Khai on the Laos border.
On the train we met a family that were bringing their daughter home from her year in Japan as an exchange student. The father was a micro biologist and the mother was on the faculty of one of the universities. They were a very impressive family and like so many others we have met in SE Asia they push their children to get educated. They all spoke very good English, something I was embarrassed to learn after I had said some rather unsavory things thinking that nobody would understand what I was saying. When we sat down and they asked where we were from I became mortified and very embarrassed for me, my wife and my country. I apologized to them for anything they may have overheard and I grounded myself from beer for the next week. Sorry America!
Vientiane: On the train I retired to my sleeper for what I thought was a good nights sleep but the longer I was awake the next morning the more I learned how tired I was. I felt as if I had been on an all night bender and the aches and pains in my body from sleeping in the short bed made my body and mind in similar spirits. I was not a happy camper and if someone had offered me the opportunity to go home at that moment I probably would have. It felt so hopeless, my wife was hurt, I was tired,, we still didn’t have our Vietnam visas and the Laos border crossing sounded unpleasant. The 20km ride felt as if it was 200km and all I wanted to do was lay down and call it a day. Jodi gave me a pretty good pep talk which lifted my spirits a bunch and I spent the day leaning on her more than usual. She handled the border crossing while I made sure we had water and food for the 20km ride to the Laos capital called Vientiane. Once we had our visas and paid all our fees we made the 20km trip.
While riding through town we were approached by a Swiss couple on bikes as well and we started talking outside one hotel. We had so much to ask each other and so many stories to tell, Phillip suggested we discuss things over dinner that night. We agreed and went about our accommodation hunt and found an adequate guesthouse. It was nothing special but one of the few rooms we found open because the town is so popular with backpackers. We then had a giant lunch and retired to our room for a nap. I awoke at 6:09PM already late for our dinner date, my mouth tasted awful from the onions in my lunch and in my haste to leave the room forgot to brush my teeth. Since we were late they had already left, but luckily we caught up to them at a book store. We settled into a restaurant on the Mekong and had a lovely dinner all the time swapping stories about our adventures. Phillip and Ursala had just completed our planned route down the Mekong into Vietnam and the beta they provided helped us feel more comfortable about our upcoming rides. I enjoyed the evening so much that I was sad to part ways but I was glad to have had the pleasure of their company nonetheless.
The next day Jodi and I discussed our trip, our Vietnam visa situation and how we were going to overcome fitting everything in this last 6 weeks. We came to the conclusion that we would not go into Vietnam. After talking with Ursala and Phillip, we had the impression the riding in Vietnam wasn’t that enjoyable and we would only end up spending 5 days riding and would have to take an 18hr train ride to get between ride origination points. After going over several proposed plans we decided we will go the less traveled option down through Southern Laos into Cambodia. It is a tougher route than our original plan but it seemed the best one for us. We will reevaluate our situation in Savannakhet where we can cross into Thailand if needed or we can get Vietnam visas at the consulate should we learn that road conditions are too much for us.
posted by Kirk & Jodi Roberts at 2:48 PM
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