Mr. Homchenjai and his team at Pharlap Transport

The sleeping staff at Chilli House tell us that the room will only be ready at 2pm. It is 7am; We are quite desperate for a shower and sleep, but never mind, we have things to do to keep us occupied until 2pm. After freshening up in the left luggage room, we type Burma consulate into Google maps. It opens at 9 so we have a few hours for breakfast. We had come to Bangkok, en route north for two reasons. One to get visas for Myanmar, and for B to visit the audiology specialist, an appointment already made from their clinic in Phuket for tomorrow. A two day stop over in Bangkok would be enough time to complete these tasks. Another breakfast of rice and soup, before arriving at the Consulate ( see story : To Burma or Not to Burma). 2pm eventually arrives and we eagerly fetch our luggage out of the locker room to go to our appointed ‘apartment’. This time for 450 baht we get a room on the 4th floor. It measures 3 x 2 metres. The sleeping section is a wall-to-wall mattress on the floor, the shower has barely luke warm water and the toilet flush is broken, but is operated by the tap. The luggage just fits into the passage way to the bathroom so every visit is an obstacle course. The AC works. It is stiflingly hot and we lug the baggage up the 4 flights of the concrete block. I wash some clothes, underfoot as we shower, then hang them on the communal balcony overlooking more concrete blocks. They are dry within the hour. We sleep and sleep with the alarm set for an 8am start, ready for the specialist at 10am. We know the 5kms ride to the clinic will take a full hour in Bangkok’s all day rush hour.

The phone alarm gently sings us awake, B leaps up, gets dressed and heads off down the stairs with half the luggage. Tiger bike has been loaded with 2 sets of panniers, 2 day packs and & beach mat. We have developed a system now of how to carry half each to make carrying easier. I slowly stir and get dressed with my eyes still half shut. When I open them I am a bit surprised to see that it is still dark. When we had arrived in Bangkok yesterday morning at 7 am it was already light. If it’s 8 am now, why is it still dark? I switch on my tablet and check the time; What! It’s only 5am. I flop back on the floorbed, turn over and wait for B to work it out for himself. Sure enough a few minutes later I hear him clomping up the 4 flights of stairs wondering why I haven’t come down to help. “ get back into bed”, I say. “Its only 5am.” The alarm had rung on yesterday’s setting. So we catch another 3 hours sleep. At least we are already dressed.

Dejavu. The phone alarm sings us awake at 8 am, we finish loading the bike and head off to the audiology centre. Sure enough it takes exactly one hour to ride the 5kms. I hang on to the phone with one hand , tapping Left or right turns with other and shouting in ’B’s good ear. He has woken up with a throbbing swollen eardrum. I have a sore throat and am feeling a bit shivery.

Another breakfast of rice and vegetable soup with chillis then we get to see the lovely specialist, who can of course not test B’s hearing because he has an ear infection. We arrange to catch up with her at another centre in Chonburi on our later travels down South. Medicine for B, paracetomol for me. Photos of the Tiger, the Hearing centre and the charming Specialist. We type Khon kaen into Maps and start the 470 kms ride out of Bangkok. Google maps has car, bus and walk options, but not motorbikes. In Thailand motorbikes are not allowed on the Toll highways so its a constant re-routing as we ride under the Tollroads, trying to find our way out of Bangkok. After a few hours the cityscape disappears, giving way to a more rural landscape. Its getting hot again so we stop at a roadside stall to strip some layers off and buy a coca cola. B’s ear is painful and I am coughing and gurgling. We wash the painkillers and medicine down with coca cola, take some photos, rest in the shade of their awning, then start again.

Google maps took us thru some delightful traditional villages, over bridges, past golden Buddha temples, but after 4 hours I called for a stop in the bustling down of Khoksamrong. The young man at the Yamaha showroom drew a wonderful map to get us the nearest hotel, which was shut. More enquiries and more riding around eventually found us at a brand new motel complex. This time for 450 baht we had secure undercover parking, a luxury room, grand superkingsize bed and fabulous bathroom, hot shower and a wardrobe, with a bright pink leather couch to complement the silky curtains. I collapsed in a paracetomol induced heap, and stayed there for 2 days. B went off on various foraging expeditions to eating places and market stalls, enticing me to eat with fresh papaya and mango. The sweet fresh fruit slid down my throat effortlessly. I’m not sure what happened to the days, apparently we stayed there until the 24th December, but now it was time to move on. Feeling a bit better we awoke at 6am, left by 7am and rode on through charming countryside, eager to complete the last 320 kms asap. It would still be a 2 day ride and we might make Khon Kaen by Christmas Day Night.

The early morning ride is always the best, before the heat and traffic. The traffic in the countryside this morning was big trucks with trailers overloaded with sugar cane, travelling at 90km/hour, making it difficult for overtaking. The road condition was quite smooth tarmac just an occasional pothole, but our steel wheel rose to the challenge. The paracetomol was working and the day was almost perfect except for the very slight exhaust blow noise as that was the one thing that was still original. “I think we might have to replace the exhaust in KK”, said B.

“Oh, look, there’s an oil rig pumping oil. That’s strange. In the middle of a sugar cane field?” Its big rocker arm was slowly moving up and down. At about the same time as we slowed to watch and wonder B mentioned that the possible problem with the exhaust. B is riding along listening to this noise thinking it was the exhaust flange gasket that was blowing. Shortly after the engine started to slow, B rolled back the throttle realizing that the engine was seizing and then slowed down and stopped. No starter motor, neither did the kick start move the internals. The engine has seized 100 kms into our 320kms journey. On a previous trip to Laos when this had happened before, we had the engine re-bored to maximum oversize ( see story: It’s all about the Bike, the Bike, the Bike ).

B now knew that this was the final end of Tiger. Its 10h30, we are in the middle of vast fields of sugar cane with huge trucks trundling past. We are on the edge of the Si Thep National park surrounded by sugar cane fields and an oil rig, and lots of blue sky; not much else. We dismount and stand gazing blankly into space hoping for a miracle.

A bent old lady with red teeth from chewing tabac shuffles by, leaning heavily on her stick. We smile and greet her in the traditional manner of hands together and nodding . “Sawadde kaa,(from me), Sawade Kap ( from B).”

Shrugging our shoulders we point to the bike to indicate it is broken. We stand and smile, a bit stuck for anything else to do. She waves us up the road with her stick, nodding keenly. With little other choice but to do as she demonstrated we push the bike 100 metres, turn left into a side road and through a gate, where the Pharlap Transport company services the tankers taking crude oil to the refineries.

The overalled service men stroll over and congregate around the bike. Again we indicate it is broken, with no common language other than B standing on the kickstarter to show it is seized. We made train noises to try and ask about the nearest railway line, and then the headman came across and understood our English. There was a lot of discussion and suddenly the bags were off the bike and 8 blokes lifted it onto the back of the pick-up. It dawned on us we were being given a lift the station. How amazing, how wonderful, so thankful, smiles and nods and deep gratitude. We sit in the double cab pick up and are driven with great care and safety through lots more sugarcane fields for miles and miles. The whole journey took more than an hour; we have since checked on google maps that they drove around trip of 100 kms to help us. And would not receive any payment. How amazing, how wonderful. We were deposited at the Lamnarai Railway station 50 kms away from their depot, bike offloaded and a long story to the station master.

The station master in very good English explains that this station is a small one and the next train in which both us and the bike can get to Bangkok will be at 1 o’clock. That’s good, we timed it well, about an hour from now then; “No , 1 o’clock in the morning.” “Oh, 13 hours from now.”

You know what, we are happy to be here, what’s 13 hours wait anyway?

OK, what shall we do for the next 6 hours until nightfall? We leave all the luggage in the signal room and head off in to town, walking stick at the ready to poke at any misbehaving dogs. Its Saturday morning market and the whole town is swamped with stalls, roads closed and great swathes of canvas stretch across pavements and alleys to protect the goods from the intense hear. I buy a hat with a large brim, a Tilley copy, for 2euros.We buy cooked corn-on-the-cob for lunch and I fall asleep on a bench; B goes off to buy a spanner. I have definitely got some bug and find a pharmacy for immodium and more paracetomol. The Honda dealer has a lovely clean toilet which I visit a few times, while B hovers over the bikes. We know we have to buy a new motorbike, but which one.

Whilst we were in Phuket, we had browsed a bit and even sat on a few bike. The same company that built the Tiger 10 years ago is now building the LEGEND. We had promised each other that if the Tiger broke then buying another bike was the only option. So here we are in Lamnarai looking at bikes.

It’s so hot we ask where there is a hotel with a pool and walk a few more kms out of town to a rather posh place. We enter into a cool lobby decorated with beautiful carved furniture and sit down thankfully. We asked if we could have a beer by the pool and go for a swim, yes if you buy a daily membership of 2000 baht. The lady receptionist felt a bit sorry for us, all hot and me not looking too well, so she called a tuk-tuk to take us to the municipal pools. By some stroke of luck these were back next to the station, so that saved us a walk, but they were closed. The afternoon dragged on and on, we found a place to eat supper and need to get back to the station before dark at about 6pm. We watch some kids play a kind of foot volleyball and as night falls get back to the station. Only another 7 hours till the train arrives. We were told to buy the tickets at 10pm, so that is the target time to aim for. I spread the beach mat on the platform, cover myself in mosquito spray, pull my sarong over my head and go to sleep; B is next to me on the station bench and the alarm is set for 10pm.

There’s a sign over the ticket office paygap hole, all in Thai. We wait. It’s 10.30 now, we peep through the gap behind the sign. The 3 station men are spread out in various poses of slumber, legs dangling off the couch, draped over desks, all snoring. Like a movie from a hold-up scene where the guards have been drugged while the bank is robbed.

At 11pm we get brave and knock on the window, “hello, hello”. With a lot of effort they wake up, stretch and remove the sign from the paygap hole. We buy a ticket for 2 people for the midnight sleeper train at and a ticket for the bike to go on the 1am cargo train. Before we can hand our money over another man is called in. The Green Log Book is checked, passports checked and we are told that we must travel with the bike on the cargo train. We try to convince the man that in Bangkok we travelled ahead of the train, it will be fine, we need the sleeper train and the bike needs the cargo train. He was not having it. We must also travel cargo. The sleeper train comes and goes and we watch the lovely bunkbeds disappear down the tracks. It is a beautiful warm evening, the stars are out and the signalman is cavorting with his girlfriend in the back of the signalhouse.

The cargo train pulls in, the bike is loaded and we climb aboard. Shock, horror. A vile smell invades us and there are sleeping bodies strewn everywhere. On the floor, under chairs, in the passage, some standing holding on with eyes closed. Well, I’m obviously a bit drugged up and see a large lady under a blanket spread over 2 seats; I jiggle her foot. “Wake up, move over, give me a seat”. Bloodshot eyes and a fearsome growl emerge from under the blanket as she sits up and then flings herself back down again. I take it as a NO. Some folk are embarrassed and a very nice man gives up his seat, so B sits down and I sit on his lap. We nod off together until his leg goes numb. People have changed places and another seat becomes available. The tiny lady next to me has somehow folded herself up into a 18 inch cube, sitting cross legged with her toes jabbing my thigh. I turn sideway, drape myself over the arm rest and fall asleep, head dangling in the passageway, the paracetomols are in full swing. B is nodding away a few seat down and so this horrible, horrible day is drawing to an end.

It’s Christmas Day, 4am and the stinky cargo train arrives at Khon Kaen Railway station. We throw our luggage out of the train, get off as quickly as we can, grab the bike and push it out to the front parking area. We patiently wait for our extended family to collect us in their pick-up. The most welcome sight ever as the pick-up arrives at 8am. With skillfull instructions from B, we both lift the front wheel onto the pick-up then the back wheel, tie it Tiger down and enjoy the 40minute drive to their home.

Happy Christmas wishes all round. Please can we shower and sleep now.

Thank you Mr. Homchenjai and his team at Pharlap Transport for getting us here.