It’s time to get back to cycling, and we both couldn’t be more ready! It’s been a really lovely two month break in Chiang Mai, meeting some great people and eating too much incredible food, plus doing a lot of decompressing. But now we are both itching to get moving again.
First, we are off to Laos for a quick trip to the Thai Embassy to get some more time on our visa. This will give us enough time to cycle to Phuket for Steve’s birthday celebration.
And then next week we hop on the bikes and start cycling south. We are avoiding the touristy spots as much as we can to enjoy the Thai countryside and coast and slower pace of life. Although Chiang Mai is pretty laid back, it’s still a bustling city, and we are longing for some peace and quiet away from traffic and tourists.
Putting the bags and gear back on our bikes… A local bike shop replaced my cable housing and cables, and we’ve got some new shoes and cleats. Otherwise it’s pretty much our same setup except we are mailing a lot of cold-weather clothing and spare parts to Phuket, so this segment of our trip will be really ultra light, no handlebar bag, just the frame bags, bikepacking bag under our seat (see below), and very minimal clothing. Food and hotels are so easy and affordable in Thailand that we won’t need to worry about those, and there’s a bus or train we can hop on if we have mechanical issues that we can’t fix ourselves.
Added a little extra message in Thai on my bike lock… excuse my penmanship! It says “going from Chiang Mai to Phuket”.
We’ve been doing some training rides with some friends we’ve made including to this nice dam lake.
One of our favorite training ride stops for a late breakfast or early lunch.
Two of our cycling buddies, Aaron and Dell, strong cyclists and great company.
A local florist helped me make an amazing arrangement for my excellent Thai teacher, on our last lesson together. Highly recommend TSL in Panthip Plaza if you are interested in learning Thai in Chiang Mai!
Only a few more days to indulge in northern Thai food so we’ve been ordering the sai ou-a and Khao soi whenever we can…
Need to figure out which snacks are good for cycling; these cuttlefish crisps are actually really tasty and weigh nothing.
I gave in and tried a few flavors of the seaweed sheets. The wasabi ones are awesome, like a little bite of sushi. I don’t care too much for the other flavors though.
We probably won’t get much Western food until Phuket so we’ve been enjoying the smorgasbord available in Chiang Mai.
Expect more posts soon as we get off our lazy asses!
i am looking frwd to more of your travel adventures. thanx for doing this app for finding other riders in the vicinity. as i mentioned, have thought of that myself. as i am sure have others. enjoy as you go.