Sarah's first adventure: An adventure on a moto

The bus ride from the islands down to Tha Kheak was interesting. It took a lot longer than we were told (as it to be expected) and we got in about 10:30pm. There was a crazy amount of people lining the aisles sitting on stools, loud karaoke the whole way, and the bus stopped every two seconds (making me feel pretty car sick to be honest).

Spike got my awesome cold (which I am still battling with) so we put off bike riding for a day and chilled out in Tha Kheak with Tom (who we first met crossing the border to Laos and ran into again on the boat to the mainland from Don Det).

The book

In Tha Kheak there is a hostel where people stay who do the loop (a four day unguided moto trip into the country) and they have a large number of books filled with advice, thoughts and stories from travellers who have completed the loop (or a version of it). It was a great read before we left and an even better read now we have returned and can look back on our own experience and compare it with others (anti clockwise was SO the way to go).

After a heap of nothing we hit the road running. Spike and I on one bike and Tom on another – learning to ride. The start of something amazing and one of the highlights of my trip to date (one of those experiences you never forget).

Some quick highlights and points of interest from the trip

Everything we took for four days

DAY ONE (Tha Kheak to Tha Lang):

Odometer started at 5440kms, day ended with a reading of 5546km = 106kms

Sticks got stuck in moto wheels

Explored 2 caves

I was attacked by a tree (first injury of the trip is a prickle)

First interesting ‘vegetarian’ experience where we tried to explain I didn’t eat meat at lunch time in a tiny town.

Same town, ‘pat’ conversation (cow pat) when we were trying to learn some Lao.

I left my camera left behind on the side of the road when we had a toilet stop and had to turn around and get it (luckily I noticed a few metres down the road).

Two gas stops 20,000 Kip and 30,000 Kip (the bikes were empty to start with).

I broke my sunglasses a the caves and lost the screw.

Only 2 ‘fun bumps’ were we hit a bump hard enough for me to get decent air off the seat.

Day one - cave one

A huge snail shell

DAY TWO (Tha lang – Lak Sao):

Lowlight – the dumb hot springs that were really just baths

29 ‘fun bumps’ (this was the toughest and a really fun riding day).

1 crash – were Tom sent himself flying into a ditch

1 concussion as a result of the crash and a lot of locals gathering around while he came to and human again. This was pretty scary, we thought he had died. Thank god for helmets.

As a result, 1 trip on the back of a truck with a damaged Tom and a still working though slightly bet up moto (only a few cracks, two broken mirrors and a bit of a bend).

Spike managed to purchase an inhaler in Lak Sao (as his was faulty) after some hunting and miming out what he was looking for. It cost the equivalent of $NZ10 (for those of you who don’t know, they are 3 bucks on prescription at home, so this wasn’t too bad considering we were basically in the middle of nowhere).

Only spent 15000 Kip on gas today (didn’t go very far – made it to Lak Sao by lunch and went looking at hot springs and then Tom crashed).

We got a flower pin from a group of children (who had a tape up blocking the road so you couldn’t get through until you brought one). I forgot to ask at a hostel what they were for, so still don’t know why.

5635km at the end of the day on the odometer = 89kms

Spike on a tractor

A pig crossing the road

A sign I love (they showed up a lot)

DAY THREE (Lak Sao – Koun Kham (and down to Konglor))

No ‘fun bumps’ (off the seat)

1 dead chicken (we hit it and the locals had a right laugh. We felt terrible of course. I guess they had chicken for dinner?)

Trip down a 7km long cave on a boat. Totally awesome. Huge cave, cool boat, wet feet (from pushing where it was too shallow).

We got some more of those flower pins

Spent 20000 Kip on gas

Came across lots of animals on the road –water buffalo, cows, goats, pigs, chickens...

5789km to the end of the day = 154 km (80 of which was the trip down from the little town to the cave and back).

Getting Tom's bike fixed

Buffalow

The outside of the cave

DAY FOUR (Koun Kham – Tha Kheak)

1 ‘fun bump’

5963km to end the day = 174kms (and we were back in Tha Kheak by lunch time)

The last bit was a tad boring - 100km (of 142km today)

We stopped from a drink (as we do) and there was a table of locals, probably around our age or a bit older chilling out. They took photos of me on their camera phone, thinking I wouldn’t hear the sound of it going off.

Spent a total of 22000 Kip on gas