Even though Trang is 40 km (as the bike travels) from the coast I’ve managed two weekends in a row to visit an island and now a peninsula that I’ve never seen before. These locales have been much further (150 and 90 km) from “home” but do offer the warm Andaman Sea vistas and waveless water.  Winds for half a year are predominantly East to West and then West to East when we aren’t in Thailand.

However we don’t always get in the water, since it’s often only a highlight of the ride.  And in my case bringing the swimming kit (extra shorts and a sarong) on my road bike isn’t always practical and I don’t often like cycling in my padded cycling shorts wet with salt water.  Not that I haven’t done that, but generally where there has been fresh water to rinse.  And on these longer rides, even though it dries sooner, chafing is common.

This Sunday’s event (again, I never quite know what, where or why – just a distance number and type of bike recommended) was another rally of sorts to plant trees near the coast.  It was one of three national rides sponsored by the Thailand Tourism Board, the local Province Tourism Commission (State) and a willing Sub-Department (County).  In this case the location was just about as far north in the Trang Province you can ride so it had two starting points: one in Trang (80 km away) and one in proximity to the tree planting site (15km).

As with all these Thai events, participants all relish the souviner T-shirt featuring the event and it’s sponsors. (Printing a T-shirt in Thailand must cost less than a dollar because even when one must buy one [without sponsor logos] they only cost $3).  And with the ubiquitous advent of Facebook everyone is snapping and posing the entire time. They expected 500 planters and if you add the riders from the local start point and the local school kids to the 120 riders from Trang, they must have filled every T-shirt.  They only had 600 trees and the planting only took a few minutes per rider.  I got to plant two since I was a novelty (actually they wanted more photos of the only foreigner).

Whether this was symbolic (we planted 24″ mangrove slips next to the road on a vast peninsula of mangroves similar to where in November 1956, Castro and 81 revolutionaries sailed from Mexico aboard the Granma, crash-landing near to Los Cayuelos [wikipedia]) or they really needed to revegetate this narrow strip along the road on this remote peninsula doesn’t matter, it was fun being part of this mass tribute to ecology, cycling and Green Tourism.  I did ask three different English-speaking Thais (including a reporter) and never quite got a suitable answer how this effort benefited tourism as this half-kilometer bare strip certainly wasn’t a blight along this otherwise desolate road.

I just like the interaction and the off-the-beaten-path experiences my Thai cycling friends expose us to each weekend.  The tree-planting was over, just about noon.  We had started from Trang at 6 AM, the cadre of Trang cyclists I ride with said they were going to hang out until the heat of the day was waning (3 hours) and would I be interested in seeing a fresh water well right on the beach.  It ended up being in my estimation a spring along the rocky limestone cliffs in a sandy cove.  Never-the-less it proved to be an even more interesting cycle to the bitter end of this peninsula thru several tiny fishing villages built on stilts in the tidal mangrove swamps.  Our splinter group of five made an even more remote detour and went right into a beachside village and I’d swear one of the riders asked a Muslim lady in one of the nicer cinder block homes if we could rest and and have water on her front porch.  Shortly thereafter we were drinking green coconut water and scooping green coco meat from trees in her yard and chilling on the cool tile front porch.  A very pleasant way to spend an hour or more of our “beating the heat” delay.

All in all it was a 13+ hour day and 154 km on the Strava log, but like backpacking, when you spend all day going that distance it’s surprising how easy it is.  Thai cycle touring includes lots of rest stops, food and diversions.  Most the riders use a mountain bike and cycle in Crocs.

I’ve gone somewhat “native” in that I’m trying riding with a tubed head scarf like many of my friends wear.  Made of polypropylene you cover your face up to your eyes and down into the neck of your jersey.  I’d alway sworn that was way too hot for me to try, but the last two long afternoon rides in 36 to 37 C (98° F) heat it has felt remarkably cooler.  Mike Taylor reminded me that all the desert camel jockeys wear a head scarf, and I even have one I got from a Tuareg back in the Sahara in the 70’s.  

Stanna says I look like a cycle terrorist, but at least I’m not wearing the black tights my Thai cycling friends all wear.  I hope to try this in the Southwest backpacking. That will bring out all the stares, but first I’ll have to weigh it, and see if it qualifies as Ultra Light.  They come in all the Dirty Girl Gaiter patterns if you’d like to order one.