[Trip Report] Crazy Four Nation Trip on P-Plate SP

[shong]

probably the most amazing trip story i've read.

 

btw, sgd2000 is quite a tight budget for such a trip... did u meet it?

 

Okie maybe i shall breakdown the cost abit,

 

Hostel - 10 sgd per night, from may to nov it is low season in the whole area, so you could bargain for quite a lot, usually go for those recommended in Lonely Planet or we would ask some fellow travellers we met on the road. We nv go for aircon room anyway.

 

Food - We nv go to any restaurant. Local markets are our choice. When you go to the restaurant you will still find them serving same food out there in the street, but the price will be anyway always remember to bargain. If you find a stall serve nice food, u can always go back there again and get larger portion with no extra charge, they sure remember you!

 

Petrol - Malaysia petrol is the cheapest, the rest is around 1 USD or slightly higher. If you run out of petrol in the wild, private 'station' would charge you 1.5USD. Depends on your travelling distance, my SP need to drink around 25 SGD per trip for 500km, 2t aside...

 

We manage to keep within the budget though train and boat ride were quite a rip off...

 

My advice for train in thailand:

If you got enough $$$, get a sleeper class. any sitting class will leave you face full of ashes and its not tt comfortable for any overnight ride. If the train station person never charge your bike according to its CC, it is a scam. And the train will always delay except for the 1st station...

 

My advice for slowboat in laos (between huay xai to luang prabang):

Rumors has it that water level is dangerously low. YES, ITS LOW! Be warned some boat had stuck and capsize. and some boats were delayed and the passengers had to slp on river bank overnight. Anyhow, I would suggest you to take the upstream (LPD to Hua Xai) than otherwise. Simply because less people taking upstream ride and the trip is equally long, both stop at Pak Beng for overnight. If your bike is heavy, spend 300 baht get some people carry for you, dun be like me so stingy. Always get the ticket at ticket booth to avoid getting conned.

[shong]

Krabi is a nice quiet town by the sea. Most tourist came here just to use it as a base for island hopping around the area. We don't have enough budget for that many islands. In our plan, we are going Koh Phi Phi. But before that, we gonna explore the town and fill our stomach.

 

The "jus dunno how to decribe it" nice beef noodle

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some custom ride belongs to an ang mo

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[nikk0]

This is cool!

[gunshead]

best report with explanation

 

world class biking attitude

 

i shout

 

waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhh

[v-max]

powerr lah bro..any pro riding in laos n cambodia alone?

[shong]

We stored our luggage and bike with the hotel in Krabi, bought the ferry tickets and went to our most relax part of the trip, Koh Phi Phi!

 

Tip: Get on the ferry early to secure a good spot to avoid getting toasted under the sun later.

 

the trip was accompanied by swarm of jellyfish (my photo skill didnt allow me to catch most of them)

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Though it is the low season, we were still a bit overwhelmed by the number of tourists and people who wanted to sell all kinds of things. When we reached the harbor, it was like a pasar malan over there. As we walked along the busy lanes and regretted why we never go Koh Lanta which supposed to be quieter, a long tail boat driver recommended us a beach called "Rum Tee". According to him, its quiet with a good view and nice beach. We just cant wait to leave the crowd behind, but before we make any move, we will bargain.

 

We board the boat happily after cutting the price from 600baht to 350:angel:

 

To infinity and beyond!

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No sh*t, the boatman did not lie to us. Rum Tee beach is indeed quiet. There are only 2 hotels on the beach, each having 3 bungalows (the term is used for all kinds of stand alone structure in Thailand). And we found out we were the only guests in the beach!

 

Private beach FTW!

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It is a great place to do snorkeling. During low tied u could just walk into a garden of beautiful corals and if u dare to swim out further, u could see the coral cliff, a whole wall of huge corals stretching all the way into deep sea. My gf was lucky enough to spot a shark there! A one metre long reef shark which zoomed out of view before I take a good look at it.

 

Oh crab!

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The staff was great! Basically they built the bar and bangalows themselves. We received quite a lot of freebies from them. They also have so many amazing stories to tell! To show our appreciation, we did a Chinese translation for their menu, so that if any Chinese tourist dropby they would stay here without having trouble ordering stuff.

 

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Edited July 4, 2010 by shong

[papabread79]

Amazing. Respect.

[PaLmEr]

good to see others are sharing their trip experiences.

[Jundeang]

respect! the max i tried is up to melaka.. was ok on the way up, cursed and sweared on the way back.. =x

[Pplater]

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover." - Mark Twain

 

Thats the rest of the quote. Cheers

[rezz_shaz]

respect bro....

[fir_chan]

Well done... when there's a will.... there is a way....

 

Keep going!!

[racingter]

makes me wanna get a SP!!! touring spirit rocks and shock the world!!

[lwfc]

i never regret getting my sp too..

 

brought it up to thailand twice. but not as far as laos/cambodia due to lack of time.

[shong]

makes me wanna get a SP!!! touring spirit rocks and shock the world!!

 

just buy one from the garage sale la haha..jus sayang it, it will run all the way for u!

 

i never regret getting my sp too..

 

brought it up to thailand twice. but not as far as laos/cambodia due to lack of time.

 

Amazing thai food!cant wait to go again!

[zpjohnny]

WOWOWOWO, Admirable!!!

 

1stly, detailed explanations that i somehow can felt i was there on ur trip. ur explanations have souls.

 

2ndly, explanation of your encounters, experience, feelings of giving up and then gained motivations really reflects what we encountered everyday.

 

this is not a journey anyone can possibly do, besides physically iron butt, also mentally prepared and adventurous, surely ur born to be a tourer once you get to higher cc too.

 

i also just passed my 2B like 4 months ago under Probation and u have more courage than me. 万事起头难。 totally agreed it.

 

will be following ur thread closely.

[ninjapura]

wah upss for u on SP... somemore pillion a charbo too... think she also must be tiring la... good good...

[wait4me]

shong u bring how many bottle of 2t ?

[kmax]

respect for u bro...

 

it's the rider (and pillion) not the bike.. to achieve such journey..

[shong]

shong u bring how many bottle of 2t ?

 

i went with full 2t tank plus extra 2 bottles of mobil1 full syn. but that last me till somewhere before BKK. I always try to keep 2 litres in the luggage and get 2 more before they run out. didnt manage to find any good 2t along the road, so the best i could get was shell's advance vsx in metal bottle. somehow there were more bikeshop selling 2t in laos than thailand. in cambodia its difficult to find, unless they got old stock. I would suggest any 2t bike that wan to go into cambodia that, try to stock up at least 2 bottles before any border town.

[shong]

Having to bid farewell with the island and delicious food, we headed towards Hua Hin.

 

As we getting familiar with road and the weather was on our side, it seemed to get easier travelling few hundred km in one day.

 

Fried sweet potato, and extra piece of something else from the loving auntie

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Surprisingly, Hua Hin was quite happening when we reached. We soon learnt from the news that, Bangkok residents were flooding into the south to avoid the red shirt riots in the capital. Our plan was at stake again. We still hoped to go to Amphawa to see the floating market and then visit the railway market around the area but not going into Bangkok.

 

Anyway, we soon found our pit stop of the day, Pattana Guesthouse, a budget guesthouse built with teakwood, and its near to all the night markets, which were our favorite.

 

seafood bbq stall, yea, Hua Hin is another town by the sea, used to served as a summer villa for the thai king

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food food and food

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Street vendors

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our favorite beef soup and chicken rice!!! this is where we discover, the more you come back to same stall, the more they give you!!!

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a leather shop, with all kinds of leather and skin...

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cute bikes and dogs..

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We retired to our room and prepared for more local food and market the next day! As the chain of my bike seemed to have funny sound and jerked once in a while, we got to find a bike shop to get some chain oil. Speak of this, I got to complain a bit about girls...they would just allow themselves carrying bottles and bottles of chemical or some organic stuff for the face or what so ever, but they don't even allow a bottle of chain lube in the bag...and there was always arguments when I wanted to stock up 2t...

 

Anyway, on the way to breakfast, I found the cutest bike i ever seen...remind me of Dr Slump the cartoon!!

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the cute Hua Hin sign, everywhere in the city

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ah ma and her breakfast stall

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After breakfast, we located this bike shop called 'Bike Point'. Unfortunately we were unable to communicate with the shop owner cos she does not speak English at all. Luckily there was a passerby who helped us with translation and the 老板娘 was generous enough to gave us half bottle of chain oil for free!

[shong]

Bad news from the paper. All front pages are covered with chaos in Bangkok. We had to make a quick decision, because we feared the road may get dangerous. We decided to take the night train and go to the border by train transfer at Bangkok. I was reluctant to move out from the nice and cheap guesthouse.

 

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our room

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if you notice, there was a water bottle tied to tail fairing. its ugly but it saved the saddle bag from burning at the exhause. there was also duct tape 'heat shield' on the pipe. it was just alot layers of duct tape haha.

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me lubing the chain

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So we checked out, left the luggage with the guesthouse and went out to explore the local market (why it's always the market?)!

 

We found anther food heaven in a wet market!

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mix organ soup, with my favorite pig/duck blood pudding (dun worry, there are still plenty of halal stall for muslim brothers and sisters)

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some noodle with red sauce, yum too!

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An antique bikeshop

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when night came, its time for another night market!!

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noodle salad

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bbq chicken

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To be well prepared, we visit the train station first to enquire about ticket price. The person in charge take a look at our bike, '700 baht'. Oh well it was a acceptable price, so we retrieved our luggage and waited for the train, as no one can buy ticket until 30 minute before arrival of the train. Funny rule.

 

It was quite a nice station.

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As we waited until midnight, the train was delayed, for almost an hour. However, when we approached the counter again trying to buy the tickets, the person just raise his price. '900 baht, cannot lower, your bike very big.' I smelt something fishy. I thought it was priced by the capacity of the bike and how can one just rise the price? We tried to argue and bargain. He just kept repeating, '900 baht, your bike very big.' We just left the station and found somewhere to sleep for the night.

 

Next morning, we planned the route to border, avoid all possible road blocks and bangkok. But before we pack up, my gf receive a call from her parents urging us leave Thailand asap. So, we decided to give the train another try. After burning our time in a mac for the whole afternoon, we reached the same station again at night. We thought that paying 900 baht and that's the end of trouble.

 

"1000 baht."

"WHY? It was 900 baht last night."

"Uh...My friend say 1000 baht."

 

WTFWTFWTF...

 

He even showed me his friend. A bunch of people slacking around in office. And he just deny that they are charge by capacity. Oh well, with not much choice, we accepted this price, pushed the bike up and waited again to pay in midnight.

 

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Midnight, the train came, later for an hour again.

"Uh...You can board the train...but the bike have to wait."

"Wait what?" I was so shocked.

"Train full. You go up first."

"Then my bike how?" Puzzled...

"4am train."

"I thought I just saw some bikes on the train?" Dulan already...

"You bike too big..."

And before he finish, I can tahan no more. So in the middle of night, I shouted at this guy in a total foreign country. Yea, it was loud enough to wake u some old thai ah beng from train that wanted to come down and challenge me.

 

If the train does not allow us to go, then we will go ourselves.

[androm3da]

I am glued to this thread~ Wish I could do the same soon~ Anyone interested to do a slow trip up to Thailand?

 

[tom cool]

nice photos and report

[CaptainSlow]

I am glued to this thread~ Wish I could do the same soon~ Anyone interested to do a slow trip up to Thailand?

 

 

wat bike u riding?