Nai Yang - Bang Thao: A rude awakening - Touring in Thailand, Cambodia and China 2007/8

February 24, 2008

Nai Yang - Bang Thao: A rude awakening

I thought we were going to have some pleasant cycling along the coast. Then came the rude awakening. I equated 'along the coast' with 'flat'. I should have known better. First of all, our map has little detail and is inaccurate and second of all I might have guessed that all those pretty sandy coves were going to be hemmed in by hills. We get lots of short and steep climbs. Janos calculated something like 16 - 19 percent. I can't ride 16 percent and I am not very good at pushing a loaded bike up a 16 percent grade, either. We've already left a lot of sweat on those hills. We wanted warm weather, that's why we left China, and we got it.

The beaches aren't completely deserted but they are far from crowded

I was very pleased to get the herons, constant companions of the water buffalos, in the picture. They usually fly away as soon as you stop your bicycle.

It's a short ride today. We stop at noon and decide our plan to ride around the island isn't so hot, we need to work out a new route before continuing. Looking for a place to stay we take a side road leading to the coast. We discover that the beach is only accessible through the large resorts, almost villages in themselves, which have been newly built. And where are we now? It looks like Florida, I could swear we are in Florida.

We have a late lunch at the 'Sandwich Shoppe' with fast, free Internet and Johnny Cash as background music. The place also has great bread and cake. While we work on our journals dark clouds are gathering, and then comes our first tropical downpour. The rain is warm and lasts only 20 minutes but afterwards the streets are flooded, we see we are going to have to wait a while before we ride our bikes back to our room.

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