March 5, 2018
Day 58: Trat - Hat Laem Sing
Routing: #3, unnamed side road, 3149
Trat has never managed to excite me. Neither the town itself nor the nightmarket and the food available there. All the same I enjoyed my afternoon and evening in the S.A. Hotel doing the internet business I had to do, research on my further proceedings in particular. As I already mentioned yesterday not being able to use the Pattaya - Hua Hin ferry was quite disappointing as I do not only love my boat rides but would have preferred avoiding cycling through Bangkok. I am still not exactly sure about the route up to and through the Thai capital. What I focussed on yesterday is the time frame with the decisive factors being
-the scheduled meetings with my friends Bob/Kiki, Jeff/Tik and Chris/Coleen as already mentioned
-avoiding being out on the road during Songkran
and
-arriving on Penang/Malaysia by April 27 or 28.
And the result of the calculation along this temporal roadmap is rather pleasing. I have got plenty of time in hand to take it easy and will do so, hopefully having several beach days on the other side of the Gulf of Thailand between Hua Hin and Chumphon.
Today? Decent first two hours on the #3, the typical dual carriageway with a wide shoulder. What is bothering me at the moment is the extreme humidity. The temperatures themselves have dropped down to the lower 30s C but neither the headwind nor the generated air stream didn´t give me any relief and the sweat was literally running down my bum all day long. Quite unpleasant and I had to stop for cold drinks basically every 30 minutes. I still did enjoy the 4 hours out there in particular once I was off the #3 at Khlung. Go down their high street all the way to the T-junction and turn right there. But make sure you do have lunch just before that junction in the small but most exciting little food market and then do enjoy the lovely cycling up to the intersection with the 3149 where two 7elevens are waiting with whatever ice cold drink you do prefer. For me it´s soda water and one of their electrolyte drinks in this almost unbearable heat.
The last 15 km or so are ok too but I was surprised about the amount of traffic on the #3149 nowadays. What surprised me even more is how much Laem Sing has changed over the last 6 years. Limited choice of accommodation then, plenty of new bungalow resorts today. Mostly awaiting the Thai weekend trippers and that´s why I am even more stunned that 1000 Baht for one night is not an unknown figure here. I am personally not prepared to pay that as a single occupant and with little effort and some Thai language negotiation skills I found a great, fully equipped (ac, fridge, hotwater, excellent wifi) bungalow at the Somboon Resort. Their restaurant is not that impressive but there are plenty of other options along the beach. Happy to be here, at least for two nights. More likely three....
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Today's ride: 66 km (41 miles)
Total: 4,486 km (2,786 miles)
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I looked at my journal from 2016 and my comments on Laem Sing are almost identical to yours. New, colourful and upmarket resorts, hardly any guests on weekdays and I stayed in the same bungalow in Somboon Resort.
Jan
6 years ago
6 years ago