The additional recovery day yesterday seems to have worked, or otherwise it was really that heavenly ice cream! Today, we were both fully back to normal, and we made it a long, challenging and incredibly gorgeous day!
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| A dragonfruit plantation (without fruit though) (only dragon then?) |
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| Early morning scenery along road 2013 |
It was cold this morning. So cold, we both even needed a (thin) sweater for breakfast and to start cycling. It didn't last long though: a few of those short but steep hills, and the intensifying sun, meant that we were back to t-shirt in no time. The first 25km were undulating terrain, with regular hills, usually not too long but quite steep. Just before the real first climb started, we found an amazing place: a rest stop beside the road, with free self service tea and coffee, clean toilets, benches and tables, all well maintained. No idea who takes care of that place, pretty sure it's a government area, but 2 thumbs up!!!
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| Our morning coffee break at the amazing public rest area |
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| Some gentle friends around to help with coffee making |
After our break at that amazing place, we first had a "short" challenging climb, then some decent up and down, and then the longest and highest climb since we started our journey. A few days ago, while the body was not fully ready, this would have been a real challenge, today it went very well. After in total roughly 1,5h of uphill riding we got rewarded by a fantastic downhill ride into Dan Sai town. Dan Sai itself looking like a nice and interesting place by itself, and before we left today it was an option to stay in Dan Sai for the night. But as things were going very well, we just had lunch and carried on. To where was not clear yet; direction Mekong, and if needed we had all we needed to camp anywhere.
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| The start of the first, more gentle climb |
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| Ah, the scenery! |
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| Down (down down down), what a reward! |
We continued our way on road 2114 into Ban Pak Man (found no relation to pacman), where the road 2195 starts to follow the Hueang river - a tributary to the Mekong. This river is also the border between Thailand and Laos: Laos was literally just a stone's throw away! I thought this road would be mostly flat, but oh no, more up and down with some good climbs in it again. As we were still going well, we just kept going until we got to a place called A Hi (after 112km of cycling!), where we knew there would be a resort to stay - where we could actually pitch our tent.
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| A typical village view for today: nice place, good road, blue sky as a plus |
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| A Hi, another scenic village |
The entire route today was absolutely gorgeous. It was goosebumps material. From beginning to end, so stunning. Charming villages, mountains, good and calm roads, nature, and beautiful weather with a deep blue sky. One of the most beautiful days of our trip so far without any doubt, and it had been a long time since we had such a fantastic day anyway!
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| Laos on the other side of the river! |
Once we arrived, we set up camp, took our shower, and then ate, ate and ate. How much you can eat while tour biking, just crazy, and I'm still losing weight (probably already lost around 5kg or so!). Now it's relax time, soon we'll dive into our tent for a wonderful night of sleep, and tomorrow we won't need to leave very early. We plan to do around 60km, it should be easy cycling, and the weather is not too hot anyway. Tham sabaai, the Thai way!!!