Jackfruit are strange, strange fruit. They’re all over Asia, growing right near the trunk of the tree, rather than at the end of the branches like most fruit. FYI – they don’t taste bad, but are no mango!
We hired a motorbike for the first time on this trip! They’re much faster and easier than bikes, but when it started raining, we realised we couldn’t warm ourselves up by pedalling faster…
You might not believe it, but we don’t actually see dogs riding motorbikes everyday!
The Thai food is some of the best in the world! Here’s why: it’s of a very high standard, you can literally expect every roadside stall or restaurant to whip up something amazing; it’s incredibly tasty… wow; and, it’s the cheapest food in all of SE Asia ($1-2 per plate)! We’re in love!
Thailand is home to these cows with incredible ears! We haven’t seen anything like them before now.
When it comes to Buddhist structures, Thailand has them down pat. There are many wonderful temples and archways littered all over the country!
We’re currently staying with Matt and Haley in Northern Thailand, who work on an aquaponics farm. They contacted us a few weeks ago via Facebook to offer us a place in their apartment! They’re on their own crazy adventure, having started in Indonesia and riding towards Europe. Check out their beautiful website: http://modernpracticality.com/
Different regions in Thailand have different mascots/statues. This photo is from a region in the north which had hundreds of these scary guys, and yesterday we were greeted with crocodiles in funny clothes!
We almost fell off our bike yesterday when we found this 150-200cm long Monitor Lizard watching us go past. Alee was sure it was a statue until it turned it’s head to look at us! It turns out they’re the 2nd biggest lizards in the world and are not as uncommon as we thought – there’s even a population of thousands in Bangkok city.
95% of buses in Thailand are painted in all kinds of amazing colours! It brightens up our day to see art pieces driving past, rather than grey hunks of metal.
Elephants are truly majestic creatures, but, more than that, they are social, loyal, playful, curious and wild. In South East Asia we are deeply saddened to see elephants of all ages, sizes and family groups held prisoner and working – carrying humans on their backs as their feet suffer on the concrete. We hope some day humans stop this selfish mistreatment of animals.
We’ve been generously gifted a hotel room for our entire stay in Bangkok, thanks to a friend of a friend! The room WAS lovely and clean until our pannier bags somehow exploded everywhere… the things we do when we have a bit of space!
It was pretty cool walking into a bike shop in Thailand, and finding ourselves on the cover of the Co-Motion Cycles catalogue!
This is a big shout out to Bright and Tay, who made our radtastic time in Bangkok what it was! They’ve helped us understand the people and politics of Thailand, showed us ’round and generally made us feel safe during the military coup (as a tourist, there isn’t too much to worry about if you stay out of certain areas). Thanks guys!
Bike tourism in Southern Thailand… weren’t expecting that!
Have you seen the Ortlieb Vario before? It’s a waterproof pannier bag, that quickly converts into a usable backpack!
Bok Bok Bike in Bangkok is the best touring shop in Asia! If you find yourself here, make sure to drop in and say hi. They do custom builds with Co-Motion Cycles, Thorn, Tout Terrain, Surly and Velo Orange frames, and stock Rohloff, Gates Carbon Drive, Schwalbe, Tubus, Ortlieb and more.
Wonderful photos as always my loves! I’ve heard you’re now back on terra Australis – am looking forwarding to seeing you both and hearing more of your adventures!