1. Nasty weather ahead
2. The road through Nam Nao national park
3. ?
4. The spectaclar views from highway 12
5. Caffine break
6. The Thais know how to do toilet freshners
7. & 8. Highway 11 between Lampang and Uttaradit
9.Sala at Way palace
Chiang Mai to Phitsanulok and onto Udon Thani
A very contentious issues and I have ridden had some good ones in the past. Australia certainly can claim to have some corkers along the East coast & Tasmania, I have fond memories of Norway and let’s face it some of the roads in the mountains of North Wales are pretty good (if it’s not raining) plus you can always be sure of a regal welsh welcome at every stop ( I am with Bill Bailey on this one, there is no such thing as a Welsh language, they just make silly noises to annoy the English).Also I must admit I haven’t ridden a bike through central Europe I.E. Switzerland, Australia and Northern Italy which has been mused as ‘the best driving roads in the world’ by the lager based life forms which are the ‘Top Gear’ crew. To be honest I didn’t know what to expect touring through Thailand. The research I did before arriving suggested that there are some good roads but I did have mental images of suspension challenging pot holes, stray fauna, and random acts of driving. Don’t get me wrong, they do exist but I was not expecting the standard of roads I have encountered in the last two days.
My plan was to ride from Chiang Mai in the North West right through to Udon Thani in the east and just shy of the Laotian border. I was figuring that it was about 800km and therefore doable in a day, a long day admittedly, but a day all the same. The hotel staff said it was impossible but in all honesty according to the Thai people I spoke to, anything over 20km on a motorbike was impossible. It wasn’t until I talked to some English ex pats who said it would be very difficult to do in a day did I start to take notice.
OK, if I set of early I’ll just see how the road and time would pan out, after all I wasn’t a courier and the idea was to enjoy the journey rather than race through the country. I would head down highway 11 again back the way I came into Chaing Mai but this time head straight on at Lampang towards Uttaradit & Phitsanulok. Studying the map Phitsanulok seemed a logical place to make a decision whether to carry on or get a hotel for the night. The road between Phitsanulok and Khon Kaen was not blessed with sizable towns and therefore unlikely to have any decent hotels or any hotels at all for that matter. And once I was through Phitsanulok my bridges were burnt it was all the way to Khon Kaen which looked at least another four hour ride.
It was a Sunday morning when I set off, not to humid and traffic very light looking forward to the ride and in good spirits, I just wished the road a little more interesting. At 90 km I hit the town of Lampang and continued on highway 11 and the road really opened up and I made real good progress through some very hilly country side. A quick stop for a bite to eat and to check directions, something with rice and chicken again but very spicy. Interesting little restaurant which had very neat and tidy tables each with their own little gazebo, but the whole thing blended seamlessly into the families house. When I went to use the bathroom I had to walk through their open plan living room/ bedrooms complete with dogs and chickens. In the middle of the restaurant one of the family was repairing his motorbike.
The road to Uttaradit was glorious, very hilly and twisty which was heaps of fun but my kph was dropping, never mind. A quick caffeine stop outside Uttaradit and a text from Handle telling me the Tigers had thumped the Hawks by 40 points, OK I didn’t get it in the tipping but I’ll still count it as a result.
After Uttaradit the highway was under constant repair and some very scary driving. By the time I was reaching the outskirts of Phitsanulok I was tired and in need of a shower. I thought I’d try and find a decent hotel. Being Sunday I was hoping that the TV might have the bike racing from Brno if I was lucky. To be honest Phitsanulok didn’t look like much of a town, There were a number of signs to hotels on the right turn into town so it seemed the logical place to head, oddly enough there was a road sign for Kuala Lumpur at no less than 1800 Km’s. It is odd because an annoying convention they seemed to have is to only show signs to local villages and not major towns and cities. The villages were too small to be shown on my map which made navigating pretty difficult. If you get lost it is pointless asking directions.
Found a hotel which had a good view of an unremarkable looking city, the Pailyn Hotel for 900 Bht a night ( AUD$30 )including what is called an ‘ American Breakfast’ which is a badly made, tasteless and uncultured version of and English breakfast. Best news was as soon as I got into my room turned the Air-conditioning and TV on, the 125 race from Brno had just started - top result.
Next day after a cold American breakfast and dubious coffee I set out looking for highway 12 to Khon Kaen, this proved more problematic than I thought. I headed off in what I thought was probably the right direction but soon got the feeling I was going the wrong way. I stopped and asked directions (I know I break my own rules) and they confirmed I was on the right road, still not convinced I stopped to refuel and again confirmed I was heading in the right direction. I continued for another 15 Km until I reached a signed which confirmed my suspicion that I was heading in the wrong direction. I did bring a compass with me, but did not have the good sense to have it within easy reach, I fact I will rectify on the next leg. I have found that going with my own gut instincts in direction and checking the map against place names at junctions has served me much better than asking directions. I am not too sure what the problem is, I am sure they don’t do it deliberately, perhaps if I am mispronouncing the place name they could be thinking I asking directions to somewhere else, I sincerely think they just don’t know where anything is.
I had lost about an hour’s riding by the time I got back to the junction where the error was made which to be honest was not well signposted. But I was finally on highway 12 towards Khon Kaen and then route 228 Udon Thani. Udon Thani by nightfall was a shoe in. Outside the city highway 12 turned into one of the best biking roads in the world. Good surface, and a combinations of all variations of bends, undulations and straights in a constantly changing sequence, combine this with warm sunny weather, virtually no traffic worth mentioning and someone incredibly spectacular scenery , it doesn’t come any better. The road includes a blat through the Nam Nao national park which was just beautiful, there were numerous sings warning of elephants crossing, I think it was a bit of tourism BS ( i.e. beware of Leprechauns)
A caffeine break in the hills with and interesting urinal layout (see photo) and then onto Khon Kaen and a bite to eat. Khon Kaen didn’t strike me as much of a town either but it would be unfair to judge a place by such a short flying visit. A different variation on Tuk Tuks, these are the slowest of them all.
Another mix up in directions to Udon Thani highway 228, although I admit this time I was at fault. The road that I was directed on would have got me to Udon Thani but by a different route, I decided to turn back and take the road I wanted which was very well hidden. The road surface deteriorated quite badly especially through the numerous small towns which seemed to consist mainly of pot holes. As the timing coincided with school throwing out time which meant the roads would be crawling with the Thai version of the Dolmus ( a pick up converted with two bench seats running length ways designed to carry about 8 people but will happily carry over 20) I will attempt to find the Thai name for them. They are everywhere at school and factory knocking off time and come complete with myopic drivers.
The country side changed again, much flatter and back to paddy fields and some very heavy rain storms in the distance. I reckoned if I was lucky was heading in a slightly different direction and would end the day without getting monsooned.
By this time I realised that I was clocking up to 600 Km for the day, adding the 400 Km from yesterday makes Chaing Mai around 1000 Km, I am so glad I chose to take it over 2 days, I day would have been too much and I get to enjoy 2 days riding rather than not enjoying 1.
Next report Udon Thani
A very contentious issues and I have ridden had some good ones in the past. Australia certainly can claim to have some corkers along the East coast & Tasmania, I have fond memories of Norway and let’s face it some of the roads in the mountains of North Wales are pretty good (if it’s not raining) plus you can always be sure of a regal welsh welcome at every stop ( I am with Bill Bailey on this one, there is no such thing as a Welsh language, they just make silly noises to annoy the English).Also I must admit I haven’t ridden a bike through central Europe I.E. Switzerland, Australia and Northern Italy which has been mused as ‘the best driving roads in the world’ by the lager based life forms which are the ‘Top Gear’ crew. To be honest I didn’t know what to expect touring through Thailand. The research I did before arriving suggested that there are some good roads but I did have mental images of suspension challenging pot holes, stray fauna, and random acts of driving. Don’t get me wrong, they do exist but I was not expecting the standard of roads I have encountered in the last two days.
My plan was to ride from Chiang Mai in the North West right through to Udon Thani in the east and just shy of the Laotian border. I was figuring that it was about 800km and therefore doable in a day, a long day admittedly, but a day all the same. The hotel staff said it was impossible but in all honesty according to the Thai people I spoke to, anything over 20km on a motorbike was impossible. It wasn’t until I talked to some English ex pats who said it would be very difficult to do in a day did I start to take notice.
OK, if I set of early I’ll just see how the road and time would pan out, after all I wasn’t a courier and the idea was to enjoy the journey rather than race through the country. I would head down highway 11 again back the way I came into Chaing Mai but this time head straight on at Lampang towards Uttaradit & Phitsanulok. Studying the map Phitsanulok seemed a logical place to make a decision whether to carry on or get a hotel for the night. The road between Phitsanulok and Khon Kaen was not blessed with sizable towns and therefore unlikely to have any decent hotels or any hotels at all for that matter. And once I was through Phitsanulok my bridges were burnt it was all the way to Khon Kaen which looked at least another four hour ride.
It was a Sunday morning when I set off, not to humid and traffic very light looking forward to the ride and in good spirits, I just wished the road a little more interesting. At 90 km I hit the town of Lampang and continued on highway 11 and the road really opened up and I made real good progress through some very hilly country side. A quick stop for a bite to eat and to check directions, something with rice and chicken again but very spicy. Interesting little restaurant which had very neat and tidy tables each with their own little gazebo, but the whole thing blended seamlessly into the families house. When I went to use the bathroom I had to walk through their open plan living room/ bedrooms complete with dogs and chickens. In the middle of the restaurant one of the family was repairing his motorbike.
The road to Uttaradit was glorious, very hilly and twisty which was heaps of fun but my kph was dropping, never mind. A quick caffeine stop outside Uttaradit and a text from Handle telling me the Tigers had thumped the Hawks by 40 points, OK I didn’t get it in the tipping but I’ll still count it as a result.
After Uttaradit the highway was under constant repair and some very scary driving. By the time I was reaching the outskirts of Phitsanulok I was tired and in need of a shower. I thought I’d try and find a decent hotel. Being Sunday I was hoping that the TV might have the bike racing from Brno if I was lucky. To be honest Phitsanulok didn’t look like much of a town, There were a number of signs to hotels on the right turn into town so it seemed the logical place to head, oddly enough there was a road sign for Kuala Lumpur at no less than 1800 Km’s. It is odd because an annoying convention they seemed to have is to only show signs to local villages and not major towns and cities. The villages were too small to be shown on my map which made navigating pretty difficult. If you get lost it is pointless asking directions.
Found a hotel which had a good view of an unremarkable looking city, the Pailyn Hotel for 900 Bht a night ( AUD$30 )including what is called an ‘ American Breakfast’ which is a badly made, tasteless and uncultured version of and English breakfast. Best news was as soon as I got into my room turned the Air-conditioning and TV on, the 125 race from Brno had just started - top result.
Next day after a cold American breakfast and dubious coffee I set out looking for highway 12 to Khon Kaen, this proved more problematic than I thought. I headed off in what I thought was probably the right direction but soon got the feeling I was going the wrong way. I stopped and asked directions (I know I break my own rules) and they confirmed I was on the right road, still not convinced I stopped to refuel and again confirmed I was heading in the right direction. I continued for another 15 Km until I reached a signed which confirmed my suspicion that I was heading in the wrong direction. I did bring a compass with me, but did not have the good sense to have it within easy reach, I fact I will rectify on the next leg. I have found that going with my own gut instincts in direction and checking the map against place names at junctions has served me much better than asking directions. I am not too sure what the problem is, I am sure they don’t do it deliberately, perhaps if I am mispronouncing the place name they could be thinking I asking directions to somewhere else, I sincerely think they just don’t know where anything is.
I had lost about an hour’s riding by the time I got back to the junction where the error was made which to be honest was not well signposted. But I was finally on highway 12 towards Khon Kaen and then route 228 Udon Thani. Udon Thani by nightfall was a shoe in. Outside the city highway 12 turned into one of the best biking roads in the world. Good surface, and a combinations of all variations of bends, undulations and straights in a constantly changing sequence, combine this with warm sunny weather, virtually no traffic worth mentioning and someone incredibly spectacular scenery , it doesn’t come any better. The road includes a blat through the Nam Nao national park which was just beautiful, there were numerous sings warning of elephants crossing, I think it was a bit of tourism BS ( i.e. beware of Leprechauns)
A caffeine break in the hills with and interesting urinal layout (see photo) and then onto Khon Kaen and a bite to eat. Khon Kaen didn’t strike me as much of a town either but it would be unfair to judge a place by such a short flying visit. A different variation on Tuk Tuks, these are the slowest of them all.
Another mix up in directions to Udon Thani highway 228, although I admit this time I was at fault. The road that I was directed on would have got me to Udon Thani but by a different route, I decided to turn back and take the road I wanted which was very well hidden. The road surface deteriorated quite badly especially through the numerous small towns which seemed to consist mainly of pot holes. As the timing coincided with school throwing out time which meant the roads would be crawling with the Thai version of the Dolmus ( a pick up converted with two bench seats running length ways designed to carry about 8 people but will happily carry over 20) I will attempt to find the Thai name for them. They are everywhere at school and factory knocking off time and come complete with myopic drivers.
The country side changed again, much flatter and back to paddy fields and some very heavy rain storms in the distance. I reckoned if I was lucky was heading in a slightly different direction and would end the day without getting monsooned.
By this time I realised that I was clocking up to 600 Km for the day, adding the 400 Km from yesterday makes Chaing Mai around 1000 Km, I am so glad I chose to take it over 2 days, I day would have been too much and I get to enjoy 2 days riding rather than not enjoying 1.
Next report Udon Thani
1. The lovely ladies at the Oasis hotel
2. Restaurant, house, repair shop, chicken coup all in one
3. A slow day on highway 11 oustide of lampang
4. Roadside trading
5. Phitsanulok from my hotel room
6. Last night in Chaing Mai, John, Jintana, another expat Pom and Jintana's family
(sorry flash is not to flash)
7. eddie gets a clean before heading to Udon Thani
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