(well done Bear :wink: )
Great shots - look forward to the stories behind them Mathos
Reading along with everyone else. Welcome back Mathos.
Thanks for posting this here Mathos. It's really interesting- the pictures show a place that looks just like I would have imagined, but I'd never have imagined all the political and social and cultural circumstances you describe- a real learning experience - thank you.
Many thanks Dutchy for placing the pics up for me, I'll have to get around to mastering the art! Much appreciated.
Aidan and Farmer, glad you are reading the input! Trust you enjoy the same. (Nice to see you both btw)
The first photograph shows the town of Chiang Saen as we first saw it from the highway above The Mekong as we rounded a bend high up in the mountain. I stopped the bike and my wife took a few photographs. Actually it's quite good to have a stop once in a while to stretch the legs, we both noticed this year especially that we were aching more than normal. Whilst there is the initial pleasure in riding a bike, and reflecting on the freedom of the body and soul, there are many restrictions which you only tend to consider as the novelty wears thin.
Vulnerability is the main issue, especially when you have a close call or two, e.g. Other drivers, (especially truckers), pot holes, land slides (there are many landslides in the mountains of Thailand) and of course breakdowns, punctures do not afford the ease of replacing a wheel with the spare, and blow-outs could have really bad consequences. Another important factor is the lack of communication, it's an impossibility holding a conversation and lets face it, driving a couple of hundred miles a day without a conversation can be quite tedious.
We had this conversation as I recall at this particular spot of our trip and made a decision then that we would change the bike for a four wheel drive once we got back to Chiang Mai in a few days time. Again, a large bike does not give you access to off road unpaved routes, the ruts from vehicles using the routes in the wet season alone make riding any form of bike less it be a scrambler type, an extremely difficult if not impossible task.
The second photograph simply shows a meat counter in Laos the pig looked a sorry mess and every piece of meat counts. They also use the blood as you can see in the bowl. The general science of cleanliness means absolutely nothing and it quite amazes me that there are human beings on the planet who have so little, in oh so many ways.
I have some photographs I will let you have sight of in the coming days, of rat being cooked for human consumption, and a few snaps of an entry I made into an opium den, which was quite an achievement in its own rights.
The third photograph is actually a street snap of Chiang Mai showing part of the moat which surrounds the inner original city. The moat is presently undergoing a total refurbishment and once I get the hang of publishing photographs myself I will make a point of putting many on the thread. I don't want to overload Dutchy with everything, it is extremely kind of him to assist me as he has done.
The fourth photograph shows my wife flying through the air in the rain forest jungle canopy, we had quite an experience here which I will let you have some detail on shortly.
I have a tendency to meander from one topic to another, I'll get back to Chiang Khong, Chiang Saen, Laos and The Namkhong Riverside Hotel, which was quite an experience in all aspects; first of all let me tell you about the rain forest and an absolutely amazing day in the upper canopy totally inaccessible from the ground.
Biologists will confirm that we share 99% of our DNA with chimpanzees. However, whilst I (especially as a younger man) have always been good at climbing or swinging about on ropes or such like, I have never been able to fly from branch to branch in trees like the monkey family is capable of, and it absolutely fascinates me to watch them. Mind you, if we could simply spend our days swinging about in the trees, eating fruits and living the animal lifestyle of a monkey, we wouldn't be enjoying powerful motorcycles, Bentley Cars, and flying from continent to continent in Air Bus and Boeing aeroplanes.
Charlotte Uhlenbruek first attracted me to the vision of being able to view the jungle via the canopy and a series of strong wire cables, sky bridges suspended between the trees and the various platforms associated with the same and suspended hundreds of feet above ground level.
Lets go for it Flobo, I remember saying to my wife when I read of such an opportunity existing in Laos. Then whilst in Laos,(experiencing a great amount of difficulty in getting onto the treadmill for this experience I heard there was a brand new canopy experience in the rain forest of Thailand about an hours drive north of Chiang Mai. We had passed so close to the same on our way to Mae Sai, it was unbelievable.
After donning body harness's and being given a simple set of pointers from our professional guides, we were driven to a cliff top with a deep ravine and a steel cable stretching across the same to a platform on an old stout gigantic tree a few hundred yards across the deep ravine.
I don't remember shouting 'Geronimo' I never could remember that Indians name anyhow, but it was an amazing feeling to be flying above the tree tops with only an angled piece of bamboo to act as a brake on the steel cable which we were flying from via a harness on wheels attached to the same and secured to our bodies.
Remember the pointer to keep my legs up, "Otherwise you will smash into the platform and break your legs".......... You don't forget instructions when they are explained to you like that! Do you !
Once on the platform I was equally thrilled to see my wife leap off the cliff top and come gliding towards me without a pause or sign of hesitation.
As we passed for over two kilometers through the canopy and visited fifteen different stations, we rapped down enormous trees with the aid of friction ropes, this was mind blowing, the views were spectacular, glimpses of wildlife, including monkey's were implanted as images into our brains for the fleeting moments it took to absorb the looks on their faces as much as our own must have been to them as we swooped by their natural habitat. The experiences were remarkable and outstanding.
The adrenalin never seemed to stop, the thrill of leaping into space is renewed with each jump, there are space bridges made up from timber and steel wire rope, they swing in the upper branches over ravines as you walk through them to a further station, and then another leap into the tree tops, as free as a bird you might well acclaim.
The last two stations are really special, a longer walk along a higher and more swaying sky bridge, then a leap and soaring through the air towards the highest tree platforms on the run, finally the two long drops to earth via two staged rappels, and the anti-climax of the loss of the adrenalin rush.
I'll send Dutchy some additional photographs of this experience! They are quite remarkable.
Hiya Mathos.
Nice to see you back. Sounds like you had another wonderful trip. You always have such cool adventures and great pics too
Look forward to hearing and seeing more.
Hi Stormy, nice to see you and good to know you are enjoying the thread. There's some really good stuff to come with this trip.
You too ehBeth..
I'm gobsmacked!!!!
Goodstyle.
How anybody over the age of five can find this drivellous and boring farrago of badly written, incoherent and patronising praise of the self interesting is completely outside my comprehension. It's flapdoodle.
Why doesn't Mathos post a picture of himself for you to worship? Has he no bottle?
Imagine a Thai tourist, one who won a trip to England on a TV game show, or stowed away on a tanker, talking about Mathos's daily life in this insulting and condescending manner, as if he is the Duke of Edinburgh, after a short visit to his ambient milieux involving vast quantities of carbon dioxide being pumped into the atmosphere for our darling descendents to deal with.
What a load of solipsistic wonderkind hagiography.
The big joke is that he was in a posh hotel in Harrogate all the while and amusing himself composing tracts of gullibilty for dummies between when the effects of the Viagra had worn off and when the next pop hadn't kicked in.
Let's face it folks, Thailand is a dump. None of you lot, given your status in the hierarchy, would go near the place. We are engaged in a project of showing them how to live properly. They have electric light now don't you know? Hire companies. Teaching them how to turn the scenery into ready cash will take a few more years.
Next time you have a puncture all you need do is pretend there is no expert advice within 200 miles.
Finally I apprehend that Mathos and Spendius are not the same person (laughs).
Wonder-ful trip and terrific writing, Mathos.
It represents a total betrayal of our way of life.
We have spent hundreds of years, and much suffering, in freeing ourselves from such banal and painful modes of existence and emerging into the sunny uplands of watching the footie on Plasma, drinking cans of beer, John Smith's Extra Smooth for preference, and dialling up help when we need it and you groupies of this drivel are all nostalgic about going backwards.
Bloody try it.
osso wrote-
Quote:Finally I apprehend that Mathos and Spendius are not the same person (laughs).
Actually osso, given the state of English teaching here, you have no real evidence for that assertion.
It is true though.
You should take on T.E. Lawrence sometime if you like terrific writing. Or Rider Haggard. They weren't on a theme park trip.
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Mathos writes almost like dialogue, whereas Spendi writes lloosely connected bumper stickers, and in a stream of consciousness manner. I always thought that spendi was doing crack rather than quaffing John SMith's Extra Smooth..
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You assume I haven't read Lawrence.
I'll choose the writing I compliment without interest if I am seconded.
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Compare and contrast. And there's no dog or rat in view.
fm--
The only crack I have ever seen looked nothing like that stuff they show on the idiot box. Dry white powder it wasn't.
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