Koh Samui (Hua Hin) trip 2001
But shouldn't it be "Reduce speed"?
(written 4 April 2000)
Another story about Thoon and I going with motorcycle through northeast Thailand (Isan) down south to Koh Chang. We choosed to take this route since we didn't want to spend too much money and I wanted to see more of Isan. Isan is the least developed part of Thailand and the least visited of by tourists (about 2% of all tourists coming to Thailand visits Isan.
This can be boring reading since nothing special happened during the trip.
Check out the links for pictures. I can also recommend a story about Koh Chang from Bangkok Post.
Photos from this trip:
Isan
Koh Chang
15/3. At noon we left Ban Huay Pla Do, turned east at Nong Mek and went route 22 to Sakhon Nakhon. A quite flat and boring section of the trip. Sakhon Nakhon is, among other things, famous for having a minority of people eating dogs.
Nicer road though to Nakom Phanom, some mountains, curvy asphalt road in good condition. At Nakom Phanom we checked in at the River inn guesthouse.500 Bath/night (negotiable down to 400 B) for a dirty room with A/C, cable TV (HBO movies), 200 B for a room with a fan. A run down, boring place but with a great view over the Maekhong river and the mountains of Laos.
Besides the river position, Nakom Phanom is an ordinary Thai city (as always, great, cheap Thai food). You can sit by the river in the sunset, look at people going ferry or longtail-boats over the river as you are eating a tasteful fish from the river.
16/3 Left Nakom Phanom in the morning, drove south (route 212) among the Maekhong river. Beautiful views from a little bit bumpy road. We stopped a couple of times for taking photos of the Lao riverside. After 53 km we stopped for breakfast at That Phanom, a small city with a big temple (Wat Phra That Phanom) and two border-markets.To the "Lao market" Lao merchants comes with longtail-boats in the morning to sell their stuff; herbs,roots but mostly (cheap) clothes.
The temple in That Phanom is in Lao style, some parts are as old as 1500 years, it has many buddha images and a nice park.
Further on south after eating and visiting the Lao market and the temple. Another 55 km on route 212 took us to Mukdahan. Great Maekhong-scenery and also here, a lot of Lao-Thai trade. The town has two main markets. The "Indochina market" along the river and the "Danang market" inside the town.
We stayed at the Hong Kong hotel. The Lonely Planet (a guide book) decribes the hotels in this town as adequate. I can't recommend this hotel for snobby people, but for us; 160 B was OK. We ate lunch and looked at the "Indochina market". In the afternoon we went to "Haw Kaew Mukdahan", a business- and shopping centre with a 66,5 meters high tower built 1996.It shows historical items, antiques from the province, a buddha image and it has a viewfloor with binoculars where you can look at the town and it's surroundings, the Maekhong river and a bit of Laos (Savannakhet is the town on the Lao side of the river).
After looking at that, we took the bike 6-7 km south, up on a mountain along a rocky path (250 kg MC + 2 persons + some luggage). At the top of the mountain there is a temple and some holy footprint. A young monk guided us around, I took some photos of the temple and the great view the mountain offered.
As many Thai cities Mukdahan has a night market, mostly for food. Thai food, of course, but even food from Laos, Vietnam and China.
17/3 We left Mukdahan and the Maekhong river as we went route 212 south towards Amnat Charoen. Giant trees and beautiful gardens along a road in bad condition. The morning was quite cool (+23 C) but the sun turned the day to hot as hell as the time passed by.After Amnat Charoen the road was better and the speed increased. Some police roadblocks were passed with a smile and the city of Yasothon without notice. We crossed the Mun river, passed Surin and came to Prasat
Earlier we planned to visit the old Khmer-temple Phanom Rung (a temple in Angkor Wat-style from the 12 'th century), but Thoon had caught a cold and the temperature in the afternoon wasn't sightseing-friendly (+ 38 C) so we skipped it. By the way, I've been there before. Worth visiting, if you've not seen it.
Route 348 took us south, it's a great road among lakes, mountains and ricefields
Police and militar roadblocks were more common as we approached the Cambodian border. We were only stopped once, though, as they were mostly looking for illegal Cambodian immigrants. A police asked us where we came from and where we were going. Other controllants only waved us to pass. In the afternoon we ended up at Aranya Prathet, a border town that during the Pol Pot-era was a refugee center with a lot of UN and volonter workers precense. Nowadays it's a quiet, sleepy but picturesque town.
We slept over at Aran garden 1 hotel. We payed 150 B for a room with ceiling-fan and wc/shower. Fresh and clean. (200 B for room with A/C).
We strolled around in the evening and, as always, ate great tasting Thai food.
18/3 We left Aranya Prathet in the morning to see the border market near Poipet (the nearest Cambodian city). After that, west to Sa Kaew and south along a flat part of route 317. About 40 km (?) south of Sa Kaew there was a couple of mountains thrown out on the plateau that made us curious.
We turned of the road and into a garden that appeared to be some buddhist location. The mountains had caves with buddha images inside. We ate brunch and continued south (good road, high speed). Decreased the speed before Chantaburi as the road turned to be like a roller coster. At Chantaburi we turned east on highway 3. A sudden rainfall persuaded us to stop for lunch. After that the bike woldn't start (a common problem on this kind of bike, appears when it's run hot). As I didn't want to wait until the engine were cooled off, I loosend the starter engine and put it back, and we were on the road again.
Through Trat to Laem Ngop, waited 30 min for a ferry that took us to Koh Chang, the main target for this trip. Koh Chang (elephant island) is the major island in the Koh Chang national marine park with about 50 islands. About 70 % of the original rainforest is untouched. It has great opportunitys for jungle trekking, fishing, scuba diving, snorkelling, swimming, sun-bathing and recreation. It's not a place for comfort demanding people, they have Phuket.
A concrete road took us to Hat Sai Khao (White sands beach). A concentrate of bungalows and huts in various standard. We ended up at Sunset bungalows, Thoon were too tired to look further. It was hot and it has been a long ride. But the place was a real dump. The very small, ugly room was hot as hell, the fan was a joke, shared shower/wc outside the room. Noisy drunk Thai and Germans outside the paperthin wall. The beachlocated restaurant was great, though, as the beach and the sea.
19/3 After a sweaty night we went exploring the west side of the island After Hat Sai Khao the road were in a terrible condition. Some Thai company had got money from the goverment to pave the road, but did a lousy job. The pavement went away (the constructers, aswell) with the rain after only a couple of months.
We went to the south end of the island, looking for the perfect place to stay. But, if the beach was great, there wasn't any good place to stay and vice versa. It was damned hot and when the "road" turned into a deep-sanded path, Thoon had have enough.
The females are the stronger sex, so we turned back north. I turned off the road at Hat Klong Phrao (Canal coconut beach) A path took us to KP bungalows. Yes folks, here it is! A calm, isolated place. Great beach, soft sand, coconut palm-trees. 28 simple huts, half populated by a mix of Thai's and westerner's. Good, grass-paved space between the huts, 300 B/night on weekends, 200 B off-weekend. The hut has WC/shower in Thai style, werandah with great sea-view, quite big room, wooden floor, straw-roof, plaited walls and electric power 6 pm - 6 am. A 63 cl Black tiger-beer; Swosch! Sun and swimming, collecting sea-shelles, Halleluljah!
KP has an attached restaurant with good Thai food, closes when people goes to bed, that is around 10 pm. A Thai man, "Nut" (!), has a simple beach bar on the beach, where you can drink whatever, looking at the sunset. The sunrise is delayed because of the mountains, but it's great.
KP offers snorkel-trips, half or full day, to nearby coral islands. 500 B for full day, incl lunch and rent of snorkel and mask. You can also rent MC and speedboat here. I didn't see any jetskis, thanks god. The cell phone is useable here.
For more services you can go to White sands by MC or pick-up taxi's ("songtaew").
I can really recommend this place, in spite of the simple huts.
We stayed four nights. Here we also met Ivan and Eli, a lovely, retired couple from Norway. They were on a long Asia-trip (China, Phillipines, Malaysia, Thailand...).
Koh Chang has got Malaria! The local health center recommends, at the moment, that you don't take any prophylaxis, since the side effects can be serious, and there are not any 100 % protection against malaria. Use mosqito-neat, repeallant, long pants at evenings/nights.
23/3 Left Koh Chang with the morning ferry, went to Rayong. Thoon wanted to go back home by bus, and there is one going strait to Udon Thani from Rayong. We stayed at Asia hotel downtown, 180 B for a very filthy room with spiders, cockroaches and dirty bed linen. Huuh!
24/4 Thoon took the 7 am bus and I left by bike at the same time. 2.30 pm I was in Udon Thani.
Photos: Cha Am/Hua Hin Ranong Phuket
Thoon (my wife) and I decided to go on a trip to southern Thailand. So we packed our bags, to much of course as I'm married to a woman. We left our home, Ban Huay Pla Do, in the morning and went to Udon Thani city. I'd like to spare my wife the very boring road to Bangkok on the back of my bike so I put her on a bus and I went after the bus.
As i said; boring, straight concrete roads. Road-constructions slowed the speed down sometimes but otherwise the average speed was about 100 - 140 km/h .
As I've been driving through Bangkok before (I can't recommend it, the traffic is a hell) Thoon and I agreed to stop at Saraburi for sleep.It is a sleepy town, seen with tourist eyes.
We took in at a 140 Bath hotel, ate dinner at a restaurant that offer locals to sing along some music videos as dinner entertainment. It's not seen as polite to speak about what it sounds like, so I will not.
Next day we drove through central Thailand, more beutiful sceneries with light green rice fields (north east Thailand, Isan, is burned out this month and does only get one harvest a year because it's so dry after November).
We took small asphalt roads and ended up in a small weekend holiday resort, mainly for locals, named Cha am. It has kind of a nice little beach strip, big trees gives shadow to the non-sun-bathing thai's. They even got their clothes on when they are swimming in the sea. But mostly they like to sit in the shadow, eating and drinking.
We met Thoon's sisters daughter, Tjiep, 16, at the beach. She went there with her class. Small world.
Next day further on south to Hua Hin, a holiday resort for a lot of westerners, mainly scandinavians. I've been there a lot of times before and I really like it. It' calm, quite clean, not as noisy beach as at Cha am. The vendors at the beach are few and not pushy at all.. But Hua Hin has grown a lot since I went here first time -95. I'm afraid it's going to loose it's charm.
In Hua Hin we met a swedish family. Janne met his wife, Dang, at work in Sweden. They have got two lovely daughters, Cassandra and Natalie.
Dang was born in Sakhon Nakon, a province not far from our home. This was Janne's first trip to Thailand, not the last I belive. We spended a couple of days togheter.
After a few days Thoon and I entered the bike and drove south. A boring, but fast road took us to Chumpon, we turned west and came on a great road for MC-driving going to Ranong. Great sceneries from a curvy asphalt road in good condition, caves and waterfalls near the road.
Ranong city is a fish-smelling city with little to offer the usual tourist, but there is some beautiful islands outside, great for scuba-diving, deep-sea-fishing, sun-bathing and recreation.
Toon have a sister, Phook, normally living as a neighbour to us, but had at this time worked 3-4 months at a coffee-plantage in the mountains between Chumpon and Ranong. We hadn't announced our arrival to her (there was no point since she could never belive we would find the way and there where not any phones there) but we knew the name of the village she stayed at.
So we (I) took a deep study at the local map and went back east and off the main road up to the mountains. Aspalt at first, later dirtroads, the clouds in chest-height. We asked people, went right through rivers, sometimes over walking bridges of bamboo. I thought that my heavy bike would brake through those cracking bridges, but it didn't.
Finally we found the village, mighty happiness and joy. Her sister and the villagers was really surprised when we arrived.
Party (they do actually have a small place for karaoke there!!!), jungle-trekking, catching small river crabs, a lot of talking .....
The villagers said I was the first white man visiting this particular village as far as they knew. I don't know if this is true, but thinking of those roads,so......
Sister Phook came home two weeks later.
Next day back to Ranong, visiting the hot springs (65 - 70 C), further down south through a sometimes scenic road along the coast to Phuket island. We stopped at Patong beach, a noisy, dirty, ugly place at a otherwise beautiful island. The vendors were pushy, arrogant muslims, not the soft thai behaviour I've got used to.
Next day further south to Kata and Karon beach. Beautiful, clean, calm and just a few annoying vendors. Some sun-bathing, swimming in the sea, good eating and drinking .
Phuket is much more expensive than the rest of Thailand, but I've heard that the prices will go down after the peak-season, after Februari. We paid 1200 Bath/day for a moderate room at Kata beach, A/C, no TV, refrigrator with mini-bar, hot water,clean and nice...
At Karon "city" we ate at "Dino park". One small steak each with some untasteful potatoe-gratain, a glass of beer for me, Coke for Thoon, 850 Bath. Can't recommend it...
But there was several cheeper and better places. And, of course, thai's make better thai food than western food, but sometimes I want to eat western food since I otherwise eat thai (excellent) food every day.
After 4 days at Phuket we started our journey back north. We stopped at Phang Nga, there is an island there known as "James Bond island" famous from a movie, "The man with the golden gun". A "scam-lady" treated us bad and went angry when we didn't want to pay 1500 Bath for this short trip to the island. My wife who understands the thai language told me this was a "very no good lady". "No go - Bye bye" I said to this lady.
We drove to Chumpon, spended the night there. Chumpon is nothing special, but there are two beaches there and you can go to Ko Tao from there, an island famous for good scuba-diving.
Next day back to Hua Hin, a couple of days recreation, sea-swimming, visiting a buhdda-mountain full of monkies (and monks, of course).
Two days later on the faithful bike again, now to Ayutthaya. A city known from being burned down by Burmese warriors at the 18'th century. Looking and taking photos at the ruins, and one photo of one of them very ugly tuk-tuk's (3-wheel taxi's) they have there. It's not the same as you can see in Bangkok.
Nightsleep in Khorat, then back home.