Ride #9: Bang Ben Beach to Khuraburi

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hmmmm, again too long since this ride, drawing a blank. After leaving Ranong the roads had become a lot quieter. There was a lot less traffic on the roads and hardly any trucks. Ranong is the last major town on the west coast with approx 200,000 people. All the towns after that are pretty small. The cycling became really nice, quite roads through jungle. The ride today was most flat expect for one hill at the 25km point. The hotel owner at bang ben beach had warned me about the hill but his warning was a little understated. What a hill (I'll repeat that statement several times through these blogs). It was straight up then a slight bend and then straight again. About 2 km in length, so not very long, but the whole climb above 8%. I don't think a person has ever sweated as much as I did. I must have lost a litre of water getting up that climb. A steep climb will flatten out a bit after the corners before getting steep again but this climb didn't have any corners so it was 2kms of steep climbing, ugh. After that the rest of the ride was flattish. Nothing springs to mind about the rest of the ride so it must have been easy going. nice flat riding through jungle scenery.
Arriving at Khuraburi it was a typical thailand town with a main road and houses/shops on either side with nothing much heading off behind the main street. I rode up and down looking for some bungalows that I had read about but couldn't find them so I pulled into the first hotel I could find. I was pretty hungry at this point as I hadn't had anything substantial on the ride. I showered and headed out. Walking up and down the town the only place selling food I could find was a street market. I didn't want to eat there as I felt like sitting down and have a decent meal. In this part of thailand it seems being a white guy is still a bit of a rarity. I am sure westerners stay here as a stopping spot to the island but I don't think many hang about the town. As such you get lots of kids running up to see you shouting "farang" and waving hello. They seem really excited when you wave back to them. Well, not only the kids, some of the teenagers do the same. Not sure how well it would go down if you were in australia and started shouting "asian, asian" as a thai person walked passed.
I spent a good hour walking around trying to find a place to eat but there was nothing so back to the street market. Hunger was really kicking in at this point. All the stalls were take away food with nowhere to sit down. Each stall sold something small but none of the stalls sold a whole meal. The closest I got was a stall selling chicken and rice. I got a leg and two bags of rice and walked back to my hotel as fast as I could. When I got to my room I shoved the food into my face. At 4pm does that count as lunch or dinner? I watched a movie on my laptop before heading back to the market for more food. Sometimes the meat on the street stalls just doesn't look appettising so all I got was a banana pancake and some fruit. Back to the hotel to eat and sleep.
Ride #9 done

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Comments

[bo]

bang ben beach
you stayed in WASANA RESORT in bang ben beach where the most BIKERS are staying. have a good trip.

[Ewan McGregor]

Feeling pale?
Greetings ThyBry. Just having a quick read between sets and I noticed in your story the experience of the young kids calling out 'farang' everywhere you go. Charlie and I picked up on this too in our recent wrong way round from Dingwall to Nairn, taking us through Bang Ben Beach (DVD out soon). Anyway turns out in some of these regions, depending on the intonation, farang can sometimes mean one looks so white that they appear as if they may dangerously ill. After a big night in Ranong Charlie and I were feeling completely ratted the next day. After forcing ourselves on to the bikes that morning to keep to schedule, we soon enough had to pull up down the road for some air. Anyway as Charlie was bending over, these young guys, mid chortle, shouted out 'farang', 'farang' in a slightly strange manner. Our cameraman wanders over to ask some questions and they revealed this local colloquialism. So it got me thinking that this might be the same for you, esp with those late night sessions with the dutchies throwing back all at lousy irish ale you 'western' (irish) guys cant keep away from. As a side note some friendly local also put us on to a good trick to get a laugh out of the kids. This was to respond to the 'Farang' call with 'Farang key knock'; which I think means something like white man that flys. Anyway always gets a good laugh back in reply. Well we should try and hook up while I am down this way. I just happen to be near Phucket at a mo doing a bit of work on 'The Impossible' and would be keen for a pint and pie if we can find a half decent scotish pub. Better get back to it, have an action shot to run though and need to pull a few stretches first. Let me know if your are free in the P for a p and p. Your buddy Ewan.

[wasana]

bang ben beach!!!! ranong
wasana resort bungalows with airco,fan,tv.and wi fi , good place to explore the beach,mangroves and the islands we have also boattrips to islands bung. 300/600b. have also some bikes FREE to look around. do not have to pay if you go to the beach laemson n.park. free pick up if you come with the BUS... stop in SAM NAK police box and phone [phone] and ask for BO.