Deer Park

A very brief catch-up post.

I bought my own ticket out for the day after Lucinda flies, scheduled for a week after my friend arrives.

So first we do the awesome easy thing and get a longtail to tour the canals for an afternoon. Up the river

Past traffic

And into the canals

Same as before, Ballardian

Big-ass lizard thing, maybe 4 feet long

Granny out for a paddle

Feeding the catfish

Into a lock where we waited for 20 minutes

Our suddenly pensive driver. A few minutes earlier he was being manic

Did some shopping. My friend needed a new cell phone which she got at the collosal MBK for about $20. A perfect Apple iPhone clone.

The classic Honda Grom

On that theme, motards and scooters at night. Fantastic. When I’m back I’ll do a Bangkok night ride with the big dogs

Madness at Wat Phra Kaew, home of the Emerald Buddha

…

…

…

…

…

…

Some mural details

…

…

All kinds of beautiful people

…

…

Temple security

Market shopping in the rain

…

Inspecting small Buddhas

A Buddha store

My friend’s feet. I’ll miss her crazy ways. We had some great adventures in Laos and Thailand. Safe travels M

And off, back to Vancouver

Via Narita

Picking up Lucinda the following day at YVR, after a quick visit to ICBC for a new decal. Fantastic packing job by Transpologistics. We picked Speedy Air Cargo to receive, couldn’t have been slicker. So a strong recommendation for them too. Customs at the airport didn’t even want to see the bike, just signed us through in under a minute

Then, home sweet home

A couple of beers and he’s off

Knowing it was going to be a long day of traffic in Bangkok, we didn’t stop for photos.

The track

The gruelling two hour battle through Bangkok. It’s hard to describe, different to other bad city traffic we’ve been in. It’s more claustrophobic in some areas than any other city so far, which is harder on a big bike, enduro or not.

The GPS track below is a history file, the GPS was of no use other than being a useful compass. In such super-dense gridlock of small tuk tuks, scooters, small cars, rolling vendors, you have to make decisions at every corner to try and make progress, the GPS recommendation is no good at all. Sidewalks, alleys, anything in that goes in the right direction. It’s on the borderline between fun and frustrating. But I want to do it more again, so maybe fun has the edge. One beer first next time.

The two hour track. The red road is ‘no motos’. The green exiting previously at dawn.

OK, now we’re in Bangkok, tons to do, plus our friend is arriving in 5 days from Phnom Penh.

The problem ahead is finding a firm to ship the bike before she arrives. A recent decision to go home, so we’ve no advance research. It’s a pain in the ass when there’s no rider history, like exiting Bangkok by air. So we need to find a trustworthy forwarder and check them out. Plus Canada isn’t an easy destination with a wooden crate where the materials have to be certified fumigated and a ton of other details as usual. Anyway, we get it done, and arrange a receiver at the far end who can deal with a bike. Cost including airfare was about double the big-distance flight from Buenos Aires to Aukland, which had the advantage of being direct (and un-cased, lol) on an ancient and sketchy LAN Airlines jet. The boat to East timor was cheap as she shared a container with 2 other bikes and cases of booze and cleaning supplies. Panama City to Bogota by air was a breeze and cheap. No case, no hassles. Aukland to Perth was all about quarantine which despite going relatively going smoothly was a mountain of paperwork and licensing I’d rather forget. In theory this time it should be smooth.

Here are the warehousemen. They’ll case her now, ready with disconnected battery, mirrors off, etc. all done at this point. As it happens it was about 100F and 90 humidity when this shot was taken. My sweat drenched suit plus helmet gloves and boots are in a $3 duffle under the bike to ship with her. Always a bad idea but the alternate is a big hassle

Time to pay up. Cash only, as usual.

This is JJ, the manager. She takes care of everything perfectly and she’s very funny. So a strong recommendation for her and Transpologistics, Bangkok. Use them. Negotiate your own price

This is tiny JJ on the bike. I cropped myself out of it and didn’t take the lousy shot

Then I left her.

I get this shot from JJ later. On her way to the airport. Sad seeing her enclosed like this