One Week in Ban Ton, Isan culture.

Happy Christmas. (see story: Mr Homchenjai and his team).We had arrived in Ban Ton, a small rural village in the northern Province of Khon Kaen, home of Isan culture I was coughing and feverish, downed some paracetomol and went to bed. B enjoyed the hospitality of our extended family and suddenly it was Boxing day. Tiger bike had a seized engine. One option was to buy another bike or find another Engine. As Christmas Day and Boxing Day are not part of the Thai culture we knew all the shops would be open. Today’s mission, Monday, was to resolve the bike issue. Luckily for us the rural taxi stops outside the gate of our house with a loud toot-toot every half hour throughout the day for the 40 minute drive into the city of Khon Kaen. The taxi bus is an open aired vehicle where you climb in the back via some steps, with 2 rows of seats either side. It requires a bit of head ducking to get in. I got in first with B following and went to sit down when I heard a loud commotion from the three ladies already in the bus. Oops, they were trying to tell me that I couldn’t sit there, it was next to a monk. So B and I swopped places. At the next stop another monk climbed aboard, there was more noise and pointing. This time I moved across the passageway and sat with all the other ladies. B and monks one side, girls opposite. The monks can look at you but not sit next to you. We trudged around to a lot of Honda, Yamaha and Kawasaki showrooms, me trailing behind and sitting on every plastic chair available, energyless. The option to buy and replace the engine had been abandoned. And then he saw what he wanted. The same bike that he had sat on in Phuket nearly a month ago. Just a few problems, though. “ It needs a bit of modification to turn it into a Tourer for 2up” said B. It had a cafe racer type single seat and at 150CC was a bit low on power, we needed an upgrade to the 135cc Tiger. Otherwise it was perfect. Dual purpose tires for road and off-road, touring type upright handle bars, chain driven and carburettors. And it was a lovely mint green. “ We do a 200cc version”, said the nice saleslady. It was dull matt grey, the tires were inappropriate vintage look-alikes from the 50’s, clip on low sports handle bars, but it did have twin front disc breaks, a single back break disc and an oil cooled engine. Twin rear shocks and 400 x 17 front tire, 450 x 17 rear tire, together with a 6-speed gearbox and an 11 Litres fuel tank with an accurate petrol gauge. The front upside front forks it means less unsprung weight and less flexing of the front forks, for better handling. The fuel tank is 3 x the capacity of the Tiger so route- planning can be more random and not such a fuel- stop worry. We can now do 350 kms instead of just 100kms. The seat height is 790 mm. B needs to mix the 2 bikes together for everything to be absolutely right. The bike is manufactured in Thailand and best of all has a stainless steel exhaust system. B successfully negotiated swopping the tires from the 150cc onto the 200cc but he failed to persuade the lady to swop the handle bars. The deal was done and we arranged to pay and collect the bike the next day. Online banking confirmed that there was enough in the daily withdrawal allowance. We caught the taxi bus back to the village of Ban Ton, stopping en route at a massive Tesco Lotus to stock up on muesli, fruit juice, bottled water and paracetomol. I slept until Thursday and this is B’s story as told to me.

On Tuesday 27th December, we became the owners of a LEGEND, made by GPX racing, who had also produced the Tiger some 10 years ago. The engine is essentially the Honda air-cooled XL250cc, sleeved down to 200cc. It weighs 135kgs. It cost 2000 euros. The modifications began. Tiger bike was stripped of the seat and mirrors. B found a local kerbside motorcycle repair with metal working equipment. Under B’s guidance, a carrier to fit the Tiger seat and a mini luggage rack to carry the beach mat was fabricated. This carrier also became an indicator and rear back light protector guard to stop the rear set of slingover panniers from curving inwards over the back wheel. He also made a set of crash bars attached to the engine mounting to keep the re-engineered day-packs (now tank slingovers ) away from the engine, allowing sufficient air flow around the motor. When I was a bit better I unpicked the stitching and removed the velcro straps from the oldest set of panniers and had found a sewing shop to attach them to the day packs. The day packs are long and slim enough to fit over the tank and under the low handlebars, the soft panniers were wide and chunky and did not fit. Even the baggage got modified. With the Tiger seat on, this Legend is now almost ready for 2up. The magical Green Log Book will arrive in one month, hopefully January 27th or before.

As we want to tour outside of Thailand a visit to the Land Transport Department to get the required stamp was another trip into the city. I left B and Linda (Thai family) to do the necessary and carried on sleeping and coughing and gurgling. Always bearing in mind the all important visa expiry date which was January 6th, we needed to think about getting an extension. We were planning to be in Chiang Mai by the 6th and could get an extension at the Immigration there on the 5th, but that would be cutting it very fine. The penalty fines for overstay are not within our tight budget, which had now gone out the window with the bike purchase. On Thursday, when B and Linda were in the city at the Land Transport Department a long conversation ensued in Thai, the outcome of which was that all Government departments were closing until January 4th. It was December 29th. That added to the negative of the potential visa extension plan in Chiang Mai. I was aroused out of my slumber by a shrill from the phone and B explained that I would need to catch the taxi bus on my own into town with all the papers, to join him and Linda, to go to the Khon Kaen Immigration office immediately to apply for our extension visas. Carefully avoiding all monks, I got them to within the hour. It took another hour to find the offices and another hour to fill in forms, and have passport photos taken. In my dash to catch the taxi bus and still being a bit washed out, alert thinking cap definitely off, I had forgotten to bring all the spare passport photos that we carry around. Never mind, we just stand in front of a white wall, get snapped with a smart phone and 2 minutes later have a fully computer generated and processed sort of passport picture in our hands, totalling 3 euros. No need for fancy booths. Its getting near 4pm and the long weekend party mood is increasing as various people in fancy dress saunter in and out of the office bearing huge baskets of cake, cooldrink and sweets for the staff. Group poses and photos take place. We sit and wait, clutching ticket number 426. At last, smile, nod, and the forms are checked, stamped, 4000baht (100euros) handed over and more stamps and more entering on the computer and more writing in a big book and with a big smile we have an extension to our extension, because of the holidays. The new visa runs out on February 5th. Only one extension is allowed so we MUST aim to cross a border out of Thailand by at least the 3rd of February just in case anything goes wrong. I write the date in Red in my diary and hope like hell the magic GLB arrives before then.

To ensure that all the welded metal bits of modification blend in with the bike, they are all coated first in a zinc primer, then sprayed gloss black. The final bits of drilling and polishing are done to the modifications, the new bike is re-assembled. Feeling better, we go for a test ride and find a KFC.

B loves it, but has reservations about the low bars as it is a very different riding style, and also the shock absorbers; would they be man enough for the dirt roads in the Golden Triangle? An early night for New Year’s Eve, the bike got loaded and a week after we had arrived, dirty, exhausted and sick, we had bought a bike, done modifications, got our visa extended, modified the panniers. We wave goodbye to our lovely family and head off early in the morning exactly due West along Highway 12.

The aim was to take 4 days going in a big loop West to the Burma border, then North along the border, then back East to get to Chiang Mai by 5th January and celebrate B’s birthday with fellow Adventure Motorcycle Travellers at the Horizons Unlimited mini-meeting ( see story : a week in Chiang Mai) .