LEGAL DISCLAIMER - It may have appeared during my last post that I tried to claim that the 1971 John Lennon hit single 'Imagine' was written by me on a beach in Thailand and I'd like to point out that it was not written by me at all. In actual fact the 1971 John Lennon hit single 'Imagine' was written by John Lennon, in 1971. Personally I thought this was perfectly obvious but my legal adviser (Alan) has suggested I publish this disclaimer to avoid any confusion. Actually I have only ever written two hit singles myself, 'Spot the Monk', and 'Spot the Monkey' and, whilst we're on the topic, neither of these are subject to any sort of copyright at all, so please feel free to go ahead and reproduce them at will.

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After enjoying the sunrise and leisurely fixing my puncture at the beach (useful to have a whole ocean to check for air holes, much more fun than a bucket of water) I continued on my way once again back on peaceful roads by the sea. The whole day could very easily have slipped away unnoticed in this comfortable dream of gentle waves, coconut-laden palms and fantastic cycling roads were it not for one chance encounter in the middle of the day.

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There being not much traffic on these roads I generally had no reason to shout "Idiot!" at anyone, at least not until I pulled up to the give-way line at a T-junction where I needed to turn right. From my left suddenly appeared a motorcyclist who, wanting to turn down the road I was emerging from, decided to undertake the maneuver entirely on the wrong side of the road and brushed past me by a whisker. The sea air must have put me in an unusually pleasant mood, however, because I refrained from shouting any expletives at this idiotic man. It was really unbelievable, on a road with almost no traffic, to still find people riding on the wrong side of the road. What morons these people were. If only I had someone to complain about this too, someone who would understand, another cycle tourist for example. Still shaking my head in disbelief I completed my right turn and suddenly I came face-to-face with another cycle tourist. Literally. He was coming towards me on the wrong side of the road.

I felt I did well to refrain from immediately asking the obvious question of "What the f*ck are you doing?" and we exchanged the usual pleasantries. In any case there being no one else on the road except for us two and the motorcyclist one could well make the point that perhaps I was the one on the wrong side of the road. They do drive on the left in Thailand, no? In any case the man who stood before me was evidently a good soul, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed as he was, a bare-chested man, with a beard and straw hat that combined to make him look like he was born on the road. He'd just spent a month at a yoga retreat. Of course he had. Three years he'd been cycling, through Africa and India no less. But I could hold it in no longer: "And why are you on the wrong side of the road?" "Oh, just more shade on this side."

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Jochen and I pulled off the road and under the shade of some palms to extend our chat and I was pleased that we did because he was a most interesting character. He thought Thailand boring after the adventurous excitement of Africa and India, both of which he seemed to have very much enjoyed. In turn he asked me about the places that I'd been to, as he now planned to follow a similar route in reverse, back to his home country of Germany.

"What about Vietnam?" he asked, enthused.

"Oh too many motorcycles, no fun at all."

"Mongolia?"

"They drink too much vodka. Shout a lot. Don't stop at accident scenes."

"Siberia?"

"The mosquitoes are horrific. Traffic's bad. Border guards can't be bribed."

"China?"

"Oh dude, seriously, don't get me started on China."

I realised I may have sounded just a teensy, tiny, little bit negative. This was, after all, a guy that had just told me that he very much enjoyed cycling in Africa and India. He would probably find China too peaceful if anything. "Laos was nice" I added meekly. He smiled and we moved the conversation along and talked about many other things and got along very well, and even exchanged gifts (he gave me an inner tube which was useful for my tyre problems and I gave him a hi-viz vest which is useful when you cycle on the wrong side of the road) and it was really a shame that we were going in opposite directions because it would have been nice to cycle together and we both said as much. Then I went to shake hands goodbye and Jochen instead put his arms around me and gave me a big hug, which is the kind of thing a man that has just spent a month at a yoga retreat might be expected to do, but was alright because he'd put his shirt on by then, and then we went our separate ways and I waved goodbye to yet another potential hapless sidekick.