I have managed to cut down the material from the bike ride Nicholas and I did from Bangkok to Singapore.
When I can get to some great bandwidth I’ll upload the HD version.
On July 12th 2009 Nicholas Ward and Adam Teale left Bangkok Thailand and rode their bicycles south through Thailand and Malaysia, and after 2100km and nearly a month of riding, made it to Singapore
Here it is via Vimeo:
Dude, where’s my Jakkayarn? from Adam Teale on Vimeo.
Download the 854×480 h264 version
Could this be it???
Yes.
WE MADE IT TO SINGAPORE!!!
But what a hell of day!
I was joking about having some contracted some kind of disease yesterday. But today I felt very ill all day. But it could just be fatigue combined with lots of mosquito bites. TIme will tell.
After working out what would possibly be our last route to take we said cheerio to Batu Pahat and headed to Pontian Kechil.
Luckily as we got into the ride my flu symptoms started to go away ad we were able to get some distance covered.
(The entrance to Singapore we think we should have taken).
After 100km or so we made it to the home stretch and everything was coming up roses. The guy at the toll booth / customs to exit Malaysia let us through without having to pay.
(free exit)
So here we are, passing into Singapore Immigration. Everything looked great. Until a couple of officials came running up to us and looked very worried.
We’d joked about how we’ll probably accidently break the law in Singapore.
Before we knew it we were inside explaining why we had ridden our bikes into Singapore.
Apparently it had been 20 years since the last time someone rode in through this bridge. Why?
Well it turns out …. IT IS ILLEGAL!
The Customs officials were going to send us back to Malaysia to reenter Singapore from the Jahor Bahru entrance. If I hadn’t just cycled 120km I’d have been ok with it but I was exhausted.
LUCKILY after a few phone calls to their superiors the Customs guys let us through and escorted us to the highway (which is also illegal to ride on).
(Tiger beer brewery!)
Awesome – Nicholas and I got flat tyres within 5 minutes of each other . It felt like we were never going to make it to Singapore!
So here we are. We made it to Singapore!
It feels weird. It’s been nearly a month on the road. We’ve ridden something like 2100km!
I have felt better.
Total KM: 150km
So close to Singapore! Nearly the home stretch! That’s if can make it…
I am covered in some sort of bites, assuming them to be mosquito bites, but yes I’m not a doctor. Fingers crossed I don’t have dengue, n1h1, malaria or any other excellent disease.
We said goodbye to Steven and the Shirah’s guesthouse and continued towards Singapore eventually stopping at a town called Batu Pahat.
Got some great vegetarian food here with ‘fake meat’ (why even bother?).
BP is a pretty decent sized town but was a bit of a struggle to find a place to sleep. Ended up in a brothel but the price for the room inc. girl for the night was too high. 🙂
Ended up at the cheapest place we could find called “Fairyland” – 30RM.
Total KM: 95km
Not a bunch to say except that the highlight of the day was getting fresh pineapple and pineapple juice just as we entered Malacca.
Amazing pineapple!
Had some good luck finding a place to stay – Shirah’s guesthouse run by a guy called Steven – sounds like he’s travelled a lot!
Looking forward to checking out Malacca tomorrow.
Total KM: 66km
Left the ‘love shack’ at Than Phannara around 7am an headed down highway 41, but then took a left down highway 4195 towards the mountains and then onto highway 4015 – towards Nakhon Sri Thammarat!
Was a great morning through this area, great jungle/forest around, lots of little villages to pass through, some big mountains with clouds floating past, very green.
We crossed through the Nakhon Sri Thammarat mountains after a fairly decent accent – Nicholas managed to beat it, my lack of gears got the better of me and had to walk it. Errrrr.
But the ride down the hill was cool – pretty steep and no traffic. My iPhone says i got my bike up to 92.1 km/h!
The rest of the ride into Nakhon Sri Thammarat was nice and flat, but HOT.
Total km: 78 km
Max Speed: 92.1 km/h
Phunpin is a great . Little town in Surathani province. The train station where most tourists come to to make their way to get the bust to the ferries to Koh Samui.
Kind of a nothing day, highway riding and very hot. After yesterday’s ride I am feeling pretty stuffed!
Stopped at a roadside hotel, a.k.a a “mahn rooht” hotel (sliding curtain), the kind where folks go to shag their neighbours/others.
Total km: 62 km
Max Speed: 41.3 km/h
Left Prachuab Khiri Khun around 5.30am and managed to get on to the highway as the sun really got up.
Nicholas picked up some ‘meat on a stick’ and sticky rice to munch on later.
Riding in the rain – as good fun as yesterday.
Many little hills, not too bad. Possibly have more strength/stamina than yesterday.
Around lunchtime we stopped to fix Nicholas’ seat (would be a regular a event for today) and met an old bloke who recommended a short cut to Bang Saphan Noi. Cheers Uncle!
Very cool to ride past the farms that are so close to the sea. Not sure what the are growing there but looked like it was working.
We rode through a bunch of villages and the people are so friendly!
If you’re ever down this part of Thailand make sure you get off the highway and spend some time driving around.
Lunch – amazing fried chicken “guy tot” with sticky rice and some tasty soup. The ladies working here were really funny. Apparently one of them wanted to join us (more interested in Nicholas than myself I was told later) to Bang Saphan Noi for some lovin’ later that night! Horny old lady.
At a point it seemed that Uncle’s shortcut was not really that short but before we knew it we found out we were pretty close to Bang Saphan Noi.
I think around 2pm we passed Bang Saphan Yai and I started to flake out as I seem to do in the heat. Eventually we passed through Bang Saphan Lek and decided to ride on to Ban Boet.
As I was flaking out we luckily passed by a turn off to a waterfall and went for a swim. Hell yeah! That recharges the batteries – followed by a packet of chips, a fanta and a bottle of water.
Forgot to mention, drinking lots of water, maybe 3 litres a day – i think it is turning straight to steam!
The last hour or so we fought the good fight against some significantly steeper/longer hills than yesterday, which were made more difficult by the fact we had spent most of the day covering over 100km in the heat.
Getting into Ban Boet was a perfect ending to the day’s ride – all down hill and in the afternoon shade.
Ban Boet – next to the beach, dogs getting it on on the street, small town, big cliffs out to sea, nice food
Staying at the “Khun Thong” hotel – 300baht/night. Clean, friendly, fan rooms
Right now drinking a beer and sitting by the sea.
Perfecto!
Tomorrow… Chumpon?
Just picked up my saddle bags from the friendly & helpful staff at Vincita
1200baht seems pretty reasonable to me!
Vincita Company Limited
9/20 Chaiyapruek 9
Ramkamhang 118
Bangkok 10240
tel: +66 2 7296265
email: vincita@vincita.co.th
web: http://www.vincita.co.th
Just got back from a trip to Probike down near Lumphini park.
Decided to get some gloves and those weird looking bike pants that have the ball/ass protector in them. Got some spare parts too. Hopefully that is it for my gear buy up for now!
Talking to Ward we thought we should post up any links/locations/reviews of places that go to to get bike stuff.
Maybe someone may find it useful one day.
So here’s the first one.
PROBIKE
ph: +66 2 2533384
237/2 Sarasin Rd., Lumpinee Pathumwan Bangkok Thailand 10330
We have a blogg, thanks to Mr. Teale here the blog is going on! I’m still working at the office while he’s having the time of his life in HK!! lol anyway it’s 19.28 thailand time, and still waiting for the clients comments,Â
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can’t wait to go to Singaporee!!
