I got seriously lucky on this one - most people go to Asia to ride elephants!Wandering the streets of Pai, I looked up to see an old friend from Hanoi..surprise...to be honest, I looked to check out a sleek black roadbike and then my friend's face appeared.
Stix is my road tripping, Minsk riding friend from Hanoi, with his motorbiking fiend, Tom, the pair hired 650cc Ninjas to complete the Golden Triangle track.
The Golden Triangle is the area that overlaps the mountains of three countries, Burma, Thailand and
Laos..equalled to the 'Golden Crescent' of Afghanistan, it has produced the most opium in the world since 1950..today the bad guys have mostly fled and the countryside has returned to it's usual sleepy pastorial pace..and leaving it for the motorbike fanatics to enjoy!It has been called the best motorbike riding road in South East Asia, perhaps the world!
Seriously fast bikes, seriously amazing roads..and one lucky little Australian who managed to wrangle her way onto the back of one :)
Three days around the circuit through UNESCO World Heritage sites, crossing over mountain passes, north to the Burmese border and the highest mountain in Thailand...1,800 turns...yep, someone counted them.
Silent screams..from me..
170km per hour was the fastest speed I saw
- and at this point I closed my eyes -
I was told we went much faster.
Like a petrified koala, I spent two days with a death grip on Stix' belly, breathing through the turns and curves and silently screaming in pure...fear, joy, exhilaration...
At a beautiful moment, we stopped for tea in a tiny tea house on the edge of the Burmese border surrounded by hills full of history and still vibrating..it's the highest point I've been so far...the top of the world.The next day, a sudden storm at Mae Hong Son saw the skies turn black. After talking to locals, the boys decided it would be to dangerous to go on and we turned around. Outrunning a storm..you need a good bike. It was pitch black in the rearvision mirror and blue ahead..for most of the way..and then, we were cut off and directly in the path of the storm. The dry season trees let go their leaves and branches and trees fell with the stinging, icy rain and the sharp winds..intense.
Wet, and tired, we made it back to Pai the next day after a short nights sleep in Soppong. What a trip. The boys headed south the Chiang Mai and I spent the rest of the day in a daze in Pai waiting for my bus to the border..Mostly, I hobbled around taking pictures of this lovely town, said goodbye to the friends I had made, eating and drinking tea..and straight to the nearest massage palour for an hour of bliss before the next part of the journey appeared!
And it's going to be a two day journey on a slow boat to Laos...
