A Lucky Brake

 

My hands desperately reach for the brakes, I pull hard but it's too late, I swerve right but my left handlebar makes contact followed soon after by me as I hit the back of the vehicle hard. I quickly come to a complete stop, my main concern is my bike at this point. One of the j-bars hangs by the handlebar tape, the mirror is gone. In a bit of shock I speak to the driver before getting off the road. I find the broken mirror on the ground some meters away.
The tail light on the truck is smashed, I point it out to the driver and try to figure out how much I should pay him. 500 baht? Not enough? Hmmm, ok, $20? No, he indicates 3000 baht. Finally we settle on $40 and 500 baht. Only then does the driver point out blood on my arm and leg. It's nothing major, I realise how lucky I am, could have been worse.
Racing across Thailand at about 25km/h, I look down for a second as a pick-up truck pulls in and stops in front of me, a perfect recipe for disaster.
With less than 2 weeks of cycling left to reach Phnom Penh, I start to feel that I'm reaching the end of this epic journey and the realities of normal life creeping back into my consciousness. But there are still 1000 km of road ahead which I will enjoy every minute of!

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Lizards and Ladybugs

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"Falang, dey lib dis howd..." My brain works overtime, falang means foreigner so that would translate to be: "Foreigners, they live this house."
The old mans bare pot belly wobbles as we walk slowly in the direction his stubby first finger points. My mission to find the home of a couple who invited me to stay some days earlier has been successful, but they are not home.
An hour or so earlier after a 115 km day I set off the centre of Vientiane to see what I could make of the poorly hand drawn map in my notebook. It wasn't long before I was lost, I had all but given up when a building that could only be of Soviet origin appear, as the Russian Embassy was THE landmark to find on my map, I circled to building to find confirmation. Sure enough this huge monstrosity, perhaps the biggest embassy I have every seen (apart from the US consulate in Istanbul) was, in fact, the Russian Embassy. Right, where to now? An ex-pat couple out with the dog walked me the right road, just 150 m to go according to the map, perfect. Not so easy, I quickly realise that the 3 building on my diagram are in fact 3 of at least 100 house in the street. By now the last light has faded, I must try to call. A girl prepares something on a small wooden table by the roadside, I stop and ask (or point in such a manner) if she's colouring her hair, no, stupid question, she's bleaching her skin. I ask after foreigners, a close examination of my map later and a phone appears, the number is called but no answer. I search myself some more, a motorbike appears next to me and the boy indicates I should go back with him.
The pot bellied man, along with a swarm of kids, appears explaining how he's studied English for 25 years, but has all but forgotten it. I understand something anyway. As I wait, they call the number again and again, a girl tries to explain with less than 5 words of English that her middle aged friend is single if I'm interested? I kindly decline. Finally, I'm taken to another place where a man speaks to me in good English explaining where I should find them, we walk in that direction.
Soon after, we arrive at the house which I thought was it 2 hours before, but wasn't sure. To my disappointment noones' home. I thank the entire street of locals for all their help and bike back towards town. As my eyes become heavy after a long day, I have a huge grin on my face just thinking about how much fun such a small thing, like finding a house, can be.

The photos are in a random order because of a virus I got on my USB key in Thailand.

 

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Luscious Laos

 

The sound of loud rock music fills my ears, I round the bend and to my surprise find a band practicing loudly in a small bamboo hut near the road. Loudspeaker, guitars, drums, keyboards and the band are all squeezed into the tiny room, in this very primitive village, it's quite a sight, especially before 8 in the morning!
As always, the children line the streets as we pass through every village to wave and shout "bye...bye...bye", the kids here are one step more enthusiastic than the Vietnamese children, they can spot a foreigner at 200 m from before they can walk, and begin frantically waving when I still need binoculars to see them. It is a wonderful habit and sure make it fun to roll through this beautiful country.
Two days of boat rides took us from the dusty roads of the north to Luang Prabang where you could happily indulge in all the comforts of home and eat like a king from the cuisine of almost any country (for quite a price I might add). The bike was calling louder than the beautiful baguettes on the street corner so it was time to again pack my bags and head for the final hills of the journey, and quite some hills they were too! Never ending it seemed, but after 10 km hanging onto the back of a truck, the monotony of 6 km/h disappeared as I hung on for dear life trying to avoid potholes and the roadside as we cruised uphill. Sharp corners would put me into the ditch so I had to let go and pedal frantically to regain my hand hold on the truck. With a soar arm and a smile I gave the driver a toot on my air horn (purchased in China, and the best thing since sliced bread) and a wave and set about pushing myself to make it up the last km's to the town ahead.

 

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