Chiang Mai - Northern Thailand

It is now 8.30pm on Tuesday night. We have been in Chiang Mai since late on Saturday night. After some drama getting to accommodation we finally meet Damien and Claudia (See link to their Bangkok to Beijing by Blog on my website). It was a real effort getting to the Guest House because of the Lo Kratong festival (2 days celebrating the end of the rainy season). Very busy and no taxis available. Also no one knew were it was. We started walking into town at 10pm in a totally foreign place. Thought it was just a few ks. 10mins after walking at Tuk Tuk pulled over. After much trepidation and worrying especially because Bridget was not to happy with the idea we hopped in. All was well and 10mins later we were there. Many stories exist of literally and figuratively tourists being taking for a ride by the Tuk Tuks and getting into strife. All was well though much to my relif thinking I would get Bridget into an undesireable sitiuation.

It was great to meet Claudia and Damien and spend time with some people much more accustomed to living over in these parts. It was great to start eating street food and just being less paranoid with health and food (with caution still). We are yet to get sick and many meals we have though sometimes small are only about 40B. About $1.5. Very tasty to for the most part. Rottees a great. For about 15B you get a yummy chocolate one cooked in front of you. Hard to pass no matter what the time is when you walk by. All 4 of us love them.

The Lo Kratong festival was great. Heaps of parades and colour. Everyone lights cloth lanterns with a meths burner underneath. Much like a hot air balloon and let them rise into the sky from the street sides. A wonderful sight when there are hundreds in the nights sky, many getting well over a couple of ks high. The idea is that the releasing of these balloons lets the bad spirits and such you many have go out of your world and you get a clean start. Well it goes something like that.

On the Sunday we went to the Chiang Mai Zoo. It was really good and we spent most of the day there. Had a yummy lunch and enjoyed the weather and sights. Well and truly worth the $4.5 entrance fee :-). Penguins, monkeys, snakes, turtles etc. That evening we were all tired but hang out in town looking at the large and very cool (lively) Sunday Night Walking market. So much to buy but no room. Mum, you would love this place.

On Monday we all jumped in the back of a songtaew (Ute with bench seats in the back) and headed up through the mist/fog/haze and smog that seems to envelope the place up to Doi Sutep. It is about 1400m above the city and has a lovely Wat situated there. 308 steps later we reached the top from the road. Took a bit longer than usual with film star Bridget being dragged into multiple family photos of visiting Thais. Good to see, and she was getting very good at the poses standing about a foot higher than the rest of them. Chiang Mai was shrouded by the mist/smog and a good view was not had. One can only imagine it if it is every clear. New Zealand really does have amazing visibility and great vistas. The rest of the day was spent looking at another small Wat in town and generally relaxing. Due to the relaxing nature of it all I splashed out and booked a Mountain Bike tour for today.

At 9.30 I was picked up by Chiang Mai MTB Adventures. I was always a little dubious about MTB tours. I choose the hardest downhill route for experienced expert riders not really knowing what I was getting myself into. Anyhow got to the top of Doi Poi (1650m) ready for the 2hr 25km 1200m decent back to Chiang Mai. I got them to setup my brakes on my Mongoose (Black Daimond Double) to the moto style used by NZers. They buggered it up and the pin holding the leaver on fell off. They finally found a bolt to fix it. 10mins into the ride I crashed. I was coming up to a fast loose left hander. Went for the front brake and it was not there. The leaver had popped out and was forward 90 degrees. With to much speed I washed out and smashed up my left thigh. A massive bruise and lump is starting to appear now. (Formula brakes are no good). So they had no idea how to fix it. I found out they had zip ties so that is how I held it on. (Vic, bring back memories of some of your Hayes brakes). Anyhow keep heading down the hill and had some fun but was worried about the bike. The back end was squirming all over the place Vic like your old Mongoose. The pivots were shot. Anyway overall it was an ok day but will not do a MTB adventure unless I have a personal recommendation from someone I know or can take my own bike. Bush was cool, and I saw the biggest ants I ever have. I was also having fun with an America Pro BMXer and we had to wait so we could get a 30 40 sec clear run to reallt roost the trails. The guide was a bit slow too :-)

Tomorrow Damien and Claudia are off on their bikes heading north towards the border with Laos to continue their adventure. It has been a great few days with them, sharing many meals, sites and experiences around Chiang Mai. All going well we will see them again in Vietnam just after New Years. Bridget and I are off also. We are renting a small Suzuki 4wd and plan to explore the towns and mountains of Northwestern Thailand for 5 days. I really look forward to it. A road trip in a pretty crazy wee place. The traffic worries me though, especially in the city. I will need to learn to recognise that the hundreds of scooters and motor bikes zooming around look after themselves and just concentrate on what I am doing. Also using the horn will become a big part of my driving skills. Especially on blind corners. A favorite place for locals to pass. I have yet to see an accident however and hopefully I will keep it that way.

Sawadee Kah

Straight into the hustle & bustle of BKK

Well guys here I am in Chiang Mai writing my first blog from abroad. I am thoroughly loving it to far. Especially the weather and the cheap prices (for the most part). It is about 26 odd degrees right now. Not too hot, spot-on really. It is the coolest day so far. Well what have I and Bridget been up too...

Our first day was nasty. We had to be at the Welly airport by 4am, with the time differences, travel and stopover in Sydney, well by the time we got to bed in Bangkok we had been up over 29hrs. Sydney was rushed. Took the train into town for 7hrs, did some last minute shopping, had a look around then got back to the airport for our flight to Bangkok. It was long and uncomfortable. Too tired to watch movies, too uncomfortable to sleep. Moan Moan :-)

We arrived at Bangkok airport at 11am. It is enormous. Biggest building I have ever been inside in terms of floor space and overall massiveness I am sure. Wondered through immigration and customs with no issues at all. Quite surprising I thought. Good though. Got ripped off by a taxi/limo thing. Paid about double what we should have. Still it was only $28 for a 45min, 160kmhr, 39km taxi ride. Quite an experience when you are stuffed. Hotel was great though, a small relief.

Got up the next morning after not sleeping well for the provided buffet breakfast. It was great. Very scrumptious. On our first day in BKK we headed to the temples and Koh San road. We spent the whole day up this way. Took the river taxi. The temples were very impressive. Went to the Grand Palace and the Wat (temple) of the Emerald Budda. This palace was enormous, though one is a little pretentious to step through the gates with armed guards and their AK47s. We then went to the Koh San road district. What an amazing street market setup. Very cool I must say. You can buy anything here, mostly rips offs but none the less some good quality clothes, not to mention the California drivers licences for 20 bucks :-).

We found a wharf after getting lost to catch the river taxi and headed to Riverside, where we were staying. Got our first proper meal, very yummy and went to bed. We were stuffed.

On Saturday we planned to look around Siam (centre of BKK if you can call any part of this enormous place the centre). We went to 4 huge Malls. 1 mall the flashiest I have ever seen. Nothing in the States I had seen compares, even in Vegas. 8 odd floors by general theme with a massive sea world on the basement floor. Ferrari, Maserati, Porsche shops on the 5th floor. Branded electronics stores on anther. Everything was very expensive. There is some serious money in BKK. 2 more Malls next door were both bigger than all the malls in Christchurch put together but not quite as flash as the Siam Paragon Mall. Across the 8 lanes of madness was the MBK centre. Basically and indoor permanent market. I have never seen so many stores/stalls selling cellphones and small electronics. Good prices, probably because every 2nd store was selling the same thing. Heaps of competition.

• Skytrain was great way to get about BKK
• Smog like I have never seen before. They say Chch is bad. People who say this have no idea. You feel this in your chest, especially near the major roads
• Traffic congestion was out of this world
• Golden Buddhas were great. Most were gold plated and very large. Like well over 20m high.
• Taxi drivers are crazy. We thought we were going to crash at 160kmhr in a corolla on the way to the airport to head to Chiang Mai. Nuts. Serving at that speed through traffic like a play station.

Wild Wellington Mountain Bike Relay

Well this was my last weekend in Wellington and what better way to celebrate than to do another race. This one was a little different than the previous few however as it was a 12hr team event on Mt Vic in Welly. It is a first for Wellington and was a great event though very taxing.

The team was entered in the open men's category and I knew we would have some stiff competition as the pros were also in this category because there was no separate class for them. Our team name was the "Mainland Munters". Since the one thing we all have in common is we are from down south. I like to think that Joe, the man responible for the name is the only one giving truth to the Munters part of the name :-)

It all started out really well. Joe spearheaded our effort and on the first lap did a wicked job. He came through in 3rd. An enormous effort. We held onto this position for a long while. Getting into 2nd or very close to it at one stage. We trailed 2nd place for most of the race and were always close to them. After 12hrs of pain and 9 laps each, 1800m climbing each and 64km of sprint speed mountain biking we finished 3rd in the open men's out of 42 and 4th overall out of 100 teams.

The weather was incredible. We only get 5 days like this in Welly a year and it really made the event. People were having a great time and I was also well impressed with the setup. Having our site inside the velodrome was pretty cool as was biking around it during the laps. The music with a live band was also great, as was the company by a few visitors throughout the day. (Bridget, Fran, John, Suri Etc.) Not too mention the team we were camped with made up by Jabez, Matt, G and Dan.

The track itself, well I was worried that it would be too easy. I was well impressed by the few techy bits they had in it. Lots of great bits to hit full noise and many drifting corners. I have never had so much fun in a race with 2 wheels sliding sideways. However the track was a killer. So many uphills. I think we would have spent on an 18min lap about 15min climbing. Still it was a challenge, especially on the latter laps when the legs wanted to seize up. My last lap in the dark was heaps of fun though it was my slowest lap, though it did feel fast.

On the Sunday I spend the day with the Chch lot that came up for the event and we went for a nice walk in Belmont Regional Park in the Hutt. Had some great lunch and found a lovely old tree to climb. On the Sunday evening before they all flew out to Chch a curry was had for dinner down at Masala to see off a fun weekend. Just like old times.

After an insane morning on Monday, packing, moving, cleaning, blood tests I got to the airport to fly to Timaz only to notice that my flights had been booked the wrong way round. To cut a long story short it has cost me all up now $570 to see the folks for a few days before I leave for Asia on Thurs. The views out of the plane though nice still made little consolation to my wallet. I will never do that again. Bugger

Makara Pk Rnd 5 Race Report

Well this was the final race of this years PNP Mountain Bike series. Having already wrapped up the Senior Men's category at the last race in Belmont 3 weeks ago and because I am leaving in 11 days, well its fair to say the buildup has been less than ideal. Especially as Damien (my racing buddy and main competition is somewhere in Central Thailand on push bikes right now!!!)

I have been catching up with lots of people, going out lots, eating lots and generally not riding much. Done 1 ride and 2 spin sessions in the last 3 weeks before this race and eating tonnes of food at the GIS Conference I was at last week. Still the pressure was not really there and went out for a good, yet painful time.

Chris (2nd at Belmont) was there today and I thought he might make things hard for me. Within the first 20mins I was clearly in first and other than feeling like emptying my stomach was really enjoying the race and the tracks and the wicked weather. I could have gone faster but saw no point really and did what I needed to do to win. However near the end of the race I was certainly feeling it with a few twinges of cramp. I don't think I was drinking enough. Bugger.

For those in the know the track went as follows:

• School up St Albans
• Big Toms Wheelie
• Up/Down Missing Carpet
• Up Koru
• Up Sally Alley
• Down Missing Link
• From Pylon 1 up 4WD - loop of Nikau
• Up Aratihi to summit
• 2 loops of Zacs
• Down Ridgeline, then ridgeline extension
• Big Toms Wheelie
• Up Magic Carpet
• Down Live Wires
• Back to school along the road.

It was a great race. Loved the technical single track as it sorted the men out from the boys. I have never seen so much carnage. Especially on Zacs. It is that type of track which needs precision when going fast and I had a few hairy moments. (Hey D I rode the hard bit of the 4WD both times :-)). Lots of blood was seen and a couple of broken bones too I think. Took me 1hr 21mins in total which meant it was the shortest race of the series.

So today was a great way to end the series. Pity Damien was not there but it was all good and meant the pressure was off. So I received a medal and also the trophy for the series today. A cool little achievement and I am quite happy about it. So 1 more race to go next weekend. My last weekend in NZ before I head to SE Asia with Bridget for a few months. I look forward to the 12hr Mt Vic race with the boys from Chch. It will be an easy fast track so we will just have to see how it goes. There is some tough competition entering.

Over and out.

Kurt