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Friends and On The Road
Saturday, September 13, 2008, 10:21
Manu, my friend from halls, and her friend Carolin visited for a couple of days last week. It was really cool to have visitors and I took them out to Erawan waterfall. I had put my bike in for one last service, so we hired scooters and the journey there was really fun - it's a beautiful road and there are mountains and scenery all the way. The way back however was a little bit of a nightmare - it gets dark very quickly in Thailand and the darkness brought rain. Lots of rain. I impressed Manu and Carolin with my Thai by pulling in to a garage and getting the lights on the scooter fixed, which made the journey safer! We finally made it home and had a well deserved beer.Quick on Manu's heels, Rick and Dustin, my mates from Brighton arrived. We did the same kind of things and Erawan got our business again. We went out kayaking the next day and then the lads left for Ko Samui. That's where the adventure began for me...
I have sold the bike to a guy down on Ko Lanta. It's a good 1000km from Kanchanaburi and a bit too far to ride. You can take bikes on the train so after negotiating the train strike it turned out I needed to make a 100km trip to Ratchaburi and then get the train down to Trang. Ko Lanta is 100km at the other end.
I am currently in Ratchaburi in the loudest internet cafe in the world, jam-packed with Thai teenagers playing LAN games. It's an experience! It has been raining all day and the trip from Kanch to Ratch was not the most pleasant, but it was fun! I got pulled by the fuzz and played the dumb foreigner - it's benificial to learn when to show off with the Thai and when to just act the Englishman. I was safely on my way (with no fines!) after spending 20 minutes comparing Thai Police ID cards with my driving license, and having them all laughing at my passport photo.
I pulled into Ratch and proceeded to give myself and the motorbike a shower with a bottle of water and a pack of tissues, much to the bemusement of the local motorbike taxi posse. I asked them where to get food and they pointed to a restaurant across the road. It was huge when I got inside and I was the only one there so I had five waitresses all fussing over me. I'm now waiting for the train at 2037 having arrived a little bit early (4pm), but it's better safe than sorry.
Once I hand over the bike tomorrow I'm going to meet Rick in Ko Samui and make my way back up when they leave on the 22nd.
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