Where I Do Not Erudiate Problem Number Two But Instead Write About Riding Our Bikes.

We are about two minutes from crossing into Laos and since it's harder to find internet than twinkies once you sail across The Mekong, I'm updating here. I was going to write about the second problem facing us before heading out of BKK, but have since decided it would only be interesting to Jon and some guy who finds welding and metal work interesting. Since I don't know a guy like that, I'm abstaining from discussing the problem. Let's just say Surly customer service might be the best customer service department in the world. Never before have I had a customer service rep suggest, "Well you could cut our product in half and try to make it work that way." Especially when they were referring to a medal rod. Awesome Surly. Awesome!

Breckan, Charlie, Kyle and I threw our bikes, and what seemed to be a copious amount of bags, into the back of a neighborhood guy's truck and off to the train station we rushed. We quickly learned something that Charlie and Kyle had learned in Indo. Traveling with bikes when you are not riding them is the biggest pain in the whole wide world. Our bags took up aisles and bunks and we accidentally suffocated an old woman who got lost under the mess. We felt really bad about that. I mean she was really old, but still...

Once we disembarked in Chiang Mai, we got on our bikes and then instantly got stopped by some old white lady who wanted to talk about the ten miles she once rode on a bike at one time and how cool that was and how she always was traveling places and doing things and how she loved to wear baggy breathable clothes and eat like "local people." We escaped her, thank buddha and all the other things in Thai temples, and hit the road. Since our train was forever late, we only got about 40ish kilos in before stopping in a tiny tiny town, who's sole claim to fame was a hot springs. We set our tents up in the soccer field, put on more clothes than we were already wearing (since we didn't want to offend local sensibilities with our glistening and ripped out bods), and washed up good in the rotten egg smelling water.

We rose up early in the morning and headed out. The hills were tragically bad about 60 kms out of chiang mai and the going was slow... for breckan! I had zero problem and started doing all sorts of crazy tricks on my bike while riding up the hills. It's because I'm in superior shape. By 2 pm we were out of the hills and cranked a massive amount of kms before finding a reservoir off the road. The caretaker of the resovoir (you can see him below: he is the ancient Thai guy holding an even more ancient gun) was positively ecstatic to have four white people staying at his beloved reservoir. He assured us, over and over and over and over again, that his reservoir was the safest and prettiest reservoir in all of thailand, but if problems did arise, he had zero problems blasting evil doers to buddhist hell.

"Have you ever shot anyone with this giant barrel loading rifle."

"No."

"Have you ever shot it... period?"

"No."

"Do you worry that the gun is literally bigger than you?"

"No. I eat sticky rice."

Once again I had no idea how that answer related to my original question, so I once again told Breckan and acted like she was stupid for not knowing how eating sticky rice and shooting muzzle loaders correlated. "I" (that was his name. His dog was named "I dog") pulled up a mat and pretty much shot the breeze with us for an hour or two. The breeze was shot by him constantly suggesting Kyle and Charlie learn thai and then get some hot Thai wives. I found this to be pretty enlightened advice. "I" offered to find a couple of spouses for Charlie and Kyle, but both of them opted for the warmth of their friendship over the "Thai wife option." We arose right after the cock crowed, and wouldn't stop crowing for anything, donned our matching 7-11 cycling caps and hit the road to Chiang Rai. Next Time:Chiang Rai to Chiang Khong and Laos.