(Thailand) Special riding with local cycling group at every local village and town

There was a welcome sign in a big arch after crossing the border. Thailand was my third country in South East Asia to cycle.

Every country had its own things. So what Thailand thing is like the picture that there was a shelter with seat and roof on the road. There was shower often that Thai roof was really helpful.

When I passed Dansai province, I heard there was a festival coming which people wore something like goblin mask as the picture. But I missed it.

I had more problem with the rear wheel than the front wheel.

Thai hotel was really cheap usually in a small town or village. It was only $15 with a big swimming pool plus air condition. I took a really good rest after hot cycling day.

I’ve heard the food in Thailand was cheap. But what I had realized that the quantity of the food was too little. So I had to order usually two dishes and in the end, it was not cheap. Later someone told me Thai people eat small amount but eat often.

Thai food was delicious but the problem was it was too spicy for me. I asked Korean I’ve met in Thailand and they told me Thai food is not spicy at all compared to Korean food. I really couldn’t know what happened to my stomach while traveling away from my home country for the last five years.

When I passed a small village, I saw young guys hanging with their cool motor bike. One of them had a really unique one and he let me try it.

Thai rice terrace
The weather was really hot and humid. It seemed it was the raining season that I had a shower almost every day. But the rain cooled down the hot day.

I met one cyclist group in the small city. And then they introduced me to another cycling group from the next town. And it had continued to next towns. Sometimes they cycled all the way to the next town or they cycled to half of the way and the other group waited there to cycle with me to bring to their town. It was a totally new experience.

One of them let me stayed at their family resort which was a really good one.

Such a luxury morning at the resort.

It was really amazing that cycling group was waiting and taking care of me at every small village, town, and the city. I had enjoyed so much cycling and hanging out with them. The best part was I’ve learned about their culture while staying close.

I also stayed at one of the cycling group’s members in Sukhothai, a historic city.

I arrived in Chiang Mai, the third biggest city in Thailand. There was one weird thing that no any cycling group welcomed me in this huge big city. On the way to Chiang Mai, even very small village had a cycling group welcoming me. Maybe I shouldn’t expect a warm welcome in such a big city.

When I was in Chiang Mai, I cut my hair to donate at local hospital. I hoped it helps someone.

When I was in Laos, I made the video to celebrate 60,000 km of my total cycling distance. The video went viral that it had 2 million views on Facebook. It gave me the chance to connect with more people. Then Zafigo, the website to empower woman to travel, invited me for speech and workshop, three days event.

I rented a flat to stay for a month in Chiang Mai. The time went very fast. When three weeks left to the event,  I started to write the script. Two native-speaking English friends helped to modify my poor English writing. I researched about how to remember the speech. It said “Don’t try to remember every single word. Only remember keywords with the picture.” So I put the photos on the wall. But it was really not possible to speak properly with only keywords. Definitely to have a speech in another language was too difficult. So I just decided to memorize all words. I felt I didn’t practice enough well that I regretted when the day came to catch the flight. I left my bicycle and bags at a friend house and flew to Penang, Malaysia for speech.