Motorscooter Diaries

...And we race together, we can ride forever...

My buddy Chris Stewart said it best, "Whoa, dude, don't ever confuse a moped for a scooter. A moped you straddle. A scooter looks like you're cruising down the street sitting on a toilet." So, given his caustic outlook on the scooter, how do you make a 125cc Honda Wave with a wire basket look tough? Easy. Ride that bitch solo to the Burmese border while the junta is running amok.

Kiew Pha No, that's the name of the border town I rode to the other day after renting my flashy red motorbike. It's like any rural border town where the opium and heroin trade used to flourish. You have the tired old remnants of a refugee camp and soldiers tooling around in humvees. According to most sources here in Chiang Dao, only the drug cartels can afford humvees so I more or less was weaving my way through some nefarious activities on a dirt road en route to the checkpoint. I kept my visor down and my tan is on par with the local coloring so I felt fairly safe. It's my immense size, though, that's the giveaway. Oh, and the Lonely Planet Thailand guide book in the wire basket.

The great thing about having the scooter was all of the freedom I had to explore random roads and villages. Lots of rutted dirt roads where I had to Fred Flintstone down the steeper parts. But more often than not I was rewarded with great views or a hidden Buddhist Wat that was off the map.

Yesterday, I went in search of more hilltribe villages including the Karen Longneck. Unbeknownst to me, I actually rode right by their village and down a treacherous jungle path that eventually carried me back to the main road. I ended paying a guide 500 baht today to essentially take me exactly where I went yesterday. Stupid, I know. But at least today, I got to talk to some of the villagers and take pictures.

Now it's back to Chiang Mai and possibly a side trip to Ko Samet before going to Nepal.

Leslie, tell Sammy I'm ready to make the jump fropm 125cc to 900cc. When I get home we are buying Ducati 748s.

...Wrapped in horsepower, riding into fury....

TL/4PS