Since last time I have left Ranong for Chumphon. I chose to go on the Highway as this was the shorter route and possibly would give me some views into Burma. Actually, there are few signed sideroads to viewpoints along the route but as they involved some climbing and didn’t indicate how far I had to go I decided not to explore these. After all, I had 130 km to Chumphon and found that plenty enough.

Chumphon is a staging post for people going to or from Koh Tao and Koh Samui so few stays longer than necessary – one day. Neither did I: with the assistance of a sketchy map with personal comments I got from cyclist Kerry some weeks earlier I explored some minor roads up along the Gulf of Thailand to get to the small, quiet fishing town of Ban Boet where I had to pay a rather steep 800 Bath for a room – ouch! Not exactly a fortune, but my most expensive yet. Next morning I managed to leave without my map, but it wasn’t to much trouble to find my way further north on small roads along the coast by just following road signs. Occasionally a thai would shout at me, when I was going into a dead end road, and put me back on track. Another 1 day stop in Ban Krud, an uninspiring tourist town situated on a pretty beach several km long. Spent the day and evening talking with a Norwegian tourist and didn’t really have a look around. Next stop Prachuap Khiri Khan appealed more to me: I found a good value room at Nung’s Guesthouse with view of the bay, aircon and a balcony- well worth the 400 Bath – so I chose to stay for 2 days here. Nice, quiet town with lots of great food. The only actual attraction in town is the temple, as usual guarded by an army of monkeys.

These days was very VERY quiet cycling days with next to no traffic. Occasionally there’s only the Highway, but that’s not too bad at all. I faced a new problem, though. The dogs are nuts in this part of the country and for some reason can’t stand the sight of a cyclist. Suddenly I have dogs chasing me regularly. I have this way learned that the max speed of the average dog is 25 km/h – that seems to be about the speed they are able to keep up with.

Marine life outside my window in Nung's Guesthouse in Prachuap Khiri Khan, Thailand. Photo: Joel Schumann, 2010

The past days I’ve spent a lot of time on my bike. Following yesterdays ride back to Khao Sok, I have left again and gone further back to the coast. After a stop in Khuraburi I’m now in Ranong – a small town bordering Burma. I chose to take a one day rest here, where I’m now writing long overdue blog updates and do some shopping (my flip flops are worn so thin that they are having “flats” … stones get though the soles). Getting here has been very pleasant, riding along a little trafficked Highway 4. Only one decent hill, but it has been up and down all the time, so it is hard to find a good rhythm on the bicycle. Pretty tiring.

In any case! It’s the effectuation of my plan to cover some ground now. I guess I have ridden a little more than 300 km the past 3 days. From here I plan to do another 2-3 days with more than 100 Km in average.

Some tour cyclist like to keep all sorts of statistics on how long they are riding, their average speed and the cadence they where climbing that last mountain with. I don’t need a computer to tell me I’m not breaking any speed records and at the end of the day I rarely know the distance I’ve traveled. To put it shortly: I’m not really into numbers and statistics.

One number would be fun to have: How many times a day I must reply a “hello” yelled by someone along the road or somebody waving at me. Sometimes I hear a “hello” but can’t see anybody. If I don’t reply with a wave or hello I most definitely get another and slightly louder “hello” and eventually spot a kid somewhere. This is a part of touring I will always remember: The interest and encouragement I receive from the Thais (and before that the Malays). Unfortunately I have never heard of such a “yellometer”, to keep track of the score. But heck, who cares about the actual number.

Speaking about numbers I can tell you this much: It’s damn hot in the cockpit where I spend my time. My computer generally tells me the temperature in the early morning is already some 25 degrees and in the height of the day it’s often maxing out at +45 degrees. Remember, this is in the sun and mowing along makes for just a bit of an cooling effect. And there’s is no variation to this picture – in this respects the weather is remarkably constant.

So it’s generally some very long, hot days at the office I’m having lately. Therefore, when I stopped yesterday to get something to drink and saw some kids having a water fight I didn’t hesitate for long, but encouraged them to consider me a target as well. They hesitated a bit, but once they got started they weren’t too keen to stop again. It was lovely to be cooled down just a bit and they seemed to have fun doing it.

Some witty head apparently nicknamed Ranong “Rained On” as it is the wettest town in Thailand. Apart from a small drizzle as I entered town day #1 was perfectly dry. Day #2 I get a decent downpour in the late afternoon just as I go out to grab some pictures. I manage to get one good picture before I seek shelter in a small restaurant, where I’m soon joined by a Burmese fellow. We chat and he encourages me to visit Burma (or Myanmar, as it’s officially named now). In fact I could go back with him tomorrow! Going now would completely wreck my schedule (having to get a new Thai visa) so I have to refuse. However, I get his address with an open invite and instructions where to find the embassy in Bangkok. It’s tempting but I’m afraid it will have to wait till next time I’m in the neighbourhood. It’s controversial if people should go to Burma or not as tourists. He argues tourists should visit the country and talk to people and promises me I would be welcomed by everybody.

My only picture from Ranong, Thailand. It doesn't really show, but it was taken during a downpour.

In my The Rough Guide to Thailand the absolute #1 on their “38 things not to miss” is Khao Sok national park and the picture that accompanies the motivation

Mist-clad outcrops, steamy jungle populated by whooping gibbons, and the vast Cheow Lan Lake all make Khao Sok a rewarding place to explore

(…) is of an early evening view of the lake. It sure does look like a place “not to miss”! Following a couple of days in the woods it was time for a new setting: The ride to get to the lake is excellent as I ride the 60-70 km on a road that runs along the national park. When I get to the lake I enter a ghost town, where the only people left are an army of employees busy making the place look neat and pretty. Lots of unwelcoming bungalows and no information to be found anywhere. When I find a place with “information and reservation” and is told that everything is “full” even though there’s hardly any other than me around I’m at a loss what to do. Going back along the way I came from I decide to turn right and ride up a small road with some sign in Thai that looks promising. I fortunately find some humble bungalows and a woman who speaks English as she is back on a short vacation from Koh Samui where she lives and works. It turns out the place is shut down as it is the end of season, but they let me stay on a homestay deal. So I’m invited to have dinner with the family. This is very nice, even though it was not what I came for – to stay on the lake.

Finally one guy visiting my “homestay” is able to tell me where to go: further back the road where I came from, go left, climb a long and steep hill. If done correctly I should be at the pier where I can charter a boat. I do so the next morning. It turns out to be quite expensive to charter a boat (I am later informed it’s politics that you cannot share the cost by going with other people) so I consider my next move and is on the point of turning the back to the whole lake thing, when I’m approached by an American. Scott persuades me to go and even offers to take me out for free as he is going anyway. Panic! I have 45 minutes to get back for my stuff, retrieve money from the ATM in “ghost town” and get to the pier. With an all-in effort I manage to do so in an hour, but Scott is still waiting when I arrive dripping with sweat. While we cross the waters to “Putawan” – a guest house consisting of bamboo huts laid out on a raft floating on the lake – he lectures on the lake and its inhabitants. Scott himself is a bit of a character, who have now settled down on the river, where he now lives in one of those small huts – each hut is probably 2*2 metres big and the only inventory is a madras. From this humble place he runs a couple of low scale businesses having odd luxury furnitures made in marble in China and then sell it to the super rich in California and Florida. And on the raft he holds a position somewhere between handy man doing various odd jobs and the master mind behind a gradual reorganization and upscaling of the whole place.

Time on the river is spent doing one of the following activities: Getting up at dawn to watch the sunrise to the tune of the morning calls of the gibbons, swimming in the lake, eating breakfast, canoeing on the lake, reading, eating some more, relaxing, considering whether to go swimming before the next meal. Shower and tooth brushing is done in the lake as well. The food is plenty and excellent and the area is immensely photogenic. I would love to go back some days and visit some of the other raft houses.

When I ask to pay the bill, I am naturally quoted a quite different amount than Scott originally promised me. Apparently Scott thought he could take me for free (the boat would pick him up in any case), but I was charged the full amount for the boat anyway. We find an agreement everybody can live with, but it was a sad way to end the stay. A bit of a lose-lose situation where everybody couldn’t be really happy with the deal.

This is more or less constantly on my mind as I go back to Khao Sok. It’s my first time here I have a feeling of being hassled. The road back is even more beautiful than going out so it’s hard to maintain the bad mood for long. Back at Khao Sok headquarters I talk to the woman in charge of my guesthouse, and she confirms that the pricing strategy for boats are “creative” and while most tourists in any case buy a “package deal” where they would never notice it unfortunately also means it makes it virtually impossible for most Thai families to visit.

A popular activity is canoing on the lake. Khao Sok, Thailand

Late afternoon on the lake. Putawan in Khao Sok, Thailand

Sunset with Putawan raft house bungalows. Khao Sok, Thailand

Getting to Khao Sok was a pleasant but largely eventless ride. The road was quiet since very few people live here and there are no actual villages. So on the road I saw only few cars. A few people where providing people with ice cream and food stuff from their motorbikes and the days most exotic feature was meeting a mahout riding his elephant along the road. Out to get some exercise I suppose.

Khao Sok is one of Thailand’s many national parks and a quite popular destination as it can be reached from Phuket and Krabi on a one day tour, but the days I spent there I saw few tourists and most stayed in the park as I did. Wildlife present are, according to my guide, elephants, that are regularly seen, tigers and leopard cats, various snakes, gibbons and lots of birds. I can add, that leeches are present in an impressive number as well and you are more likely to have sightings of them than any of the other animals – in fact they will find you so no need to look for them. I found a couple of them IN my shoes, they can get in but once they are fat with blood they can’t get out again. Silly bastards! They are not dangerous in any way, it doesn’t hurt at all while they drain you from blood (in fact that’s the problem, you don’t notice them) … but these vampires of the forest are disgusting creatures as they suck on to your skin. And they make a bloody mess of ones shoes. Gibbons are heard making “Whoop – Whoop” sounds from the early morning, but I never managed to spot one. Lizards are easily spotted. Snakes can be seen. Leeches apart, few things bothers this man of the woods so I gathered my courage and pointed a stick at the first snake I spotted. It cooperated and bit at my bait. Feeling energized by my act of bravery I left the animal to its own and mowed deeper into the woods along the trail. I must admit I got a bit of a chock when I ran into its older brother, though. I walked happily ahead when I heard a rustle in the leaves next to the trail and looked to find a fine specimen of snake only a few meters from me. The first one was maybe 15 cm long (what did you expect?) but the second was seriously big, at least 2 metres. Only later did I learn that cobras and pythons are common in Khao Sok. One kind of cobra is so poisonous that it would be deadly to an elephant if only it could bite through its thick skin. I don’t have a clue what I saw.

Apart from that I had a frog jumping onto my shoulder while eating in a restaurant next to the park. In the late evening this place was also a fine place to watch bats hunting (they are quite impressive I’ll say, and left the competing geckos looking amateurish). Oh, and I found a lizard taking a nap under my pillow.

This little fella did a good job posing for pictures. Lizard in Khao Sok, Thailand

Small waterfall but nice pool for swimming. Khao Sok, Thailand.

Finally a greeting to Sara and Jesus, two cyclists I met in the park. And a kind nod to Bill B. for inspiration to the headline.