MicahJohn

I jumped the gun with Joy to the World. This should have come first. Christmas is all the greater celebration when we take the time beforehand to enter into the waiting, the longing, the crying out that is Advent.

Sharing this video is absolutely optional.
Letting the world know it has cause for rejoicing is not.

My cousin now has the first part of our international bicycle adventure documented (with both written words and images). You should check it out.

We set off in the early morning from our place just 10 km into Thailand from the ช่องสะงำ border crossing. I had the great idea of trying to take a shortcut we had heard tell of. I don’t know if I picked the wrong road, or if the shortness of the route got lost in the potholes, hills, and rain. Rather muddy and wet we finally found a place for breakfast. Shortly after breakfast more rain drove us under the roof of a supply store. The owners were friendly, made conversation, and brought us water. We moved on.

We made good time along 24, stopping for a late lunch of ลาบ and ต้มปลา. After lunch we continued to move along. About the time we might have considered stopping for the day, Ubon was tantalizingly close (40km). We couldn’t stop.

My hands were quite tired of gripping the handle bars so I was riding without holding them when a large truck went by close and fast. The wind rocked me and I went for the handle bars and the brakes. I locked up my front wheel and despite all the extra weight of my bag on the back wheel I became aware of being a good deal higher than my handle bars. Before I could correct anything I was on the ground with my bike behind me. I’m not entirely sure of all the details. I do know by the time I went down I had slowed down considerably so there was very little sliding and scraping. Just a jarring of the wrists and a skinning up of the palms. Far less serious than it could have been. After a minute or two of settling we were back on the road, I with a pair of Mark’s clean socks between my hands and the handlebars.

As darkness was settling we pulled into the Warin Big C. We consumed a medium pizza, a pan of baked rice, fries, and wings. Refreshed we finished the journey in the dark (with both head and tail lights).

The extra push at the end put blisters on my seat and a tingling in my hands. Hopefully they’ll clear up quickly.

This morning we left Siem Reap at about 6:00. We stopped after 13 km for breakfast. We reached Srei Noi around 10:00. It was a little too early to call it quits, so we had second breakfast and moved on We ate a late lunch in Anlong Veng. Where we stopped the proprietors were eating their meal between serving lunch and starting dinner, so they ordered for us from the restaurant next door.

Still not ready to call it a day, we pushed on to the border crossing. The last 5 km of the road in Cambodia are quite steep. We walked our bikes. At the top of the hill I saw a much wanted sign for a restroom and made for it. In my haste to find the restroom I was delighted to find that the proprietor spoke Thai. After taking care of necessities, I had a nice talk with her. She was very nice. She was from Thailand and was very proud of her piece of civilization on the Cambodian side of the mountain.

After she had allowed us the use of her restrooms and served us free clean ice water, I thought it good to buy something (not considering the early hour of sunset). After eating some well-prepared food we proceeded through the border. Everything went smoothly.

Once in Thailand it looked like we were going to have just enough light to make it to a room 10 km in. Having gone about a kilometer, Mark, while taking a picture, veered off course into my bike. Some part of my bike (left pedal?) took off the top of his front tube’s valve, quickly flattening the tire. Darkness fell as we replaced the tube. We realized that it was good Mark hadn’t been able to bring his patch kit and so had brought a spare.

As we resumed our decent, Mark noticed that his front rim was a bit bent up as well. Between the rim and the gathering dark, we were not able to take full pleasure in the long steep downhills, We arrived safely at our lodging for the night. The toilet is a squatter, and there is no hot water. We do, however, have both a fan and an air conditioner. The beds are quite doable.