The Road Trip of Xgrind and AngKuGuay: Day 6

Today, we have the biggest "hor lan" adventure since we touched down on Thailand. However, it is also thanks to this hor lan adventure that we saw some of the most beautiful scenery I've encountered so far.

The path we took today

We are supposed to go to Mae Taeng by the end of the day for accommodation to prepare for our 1864 turns to Mae Hon Son on the following day and in worst case scenario, we will stay over at Chiang Mai (which we are doing now) and head off for Highway 1095 the next day.

Weather is fine, traffic is minimal, and the ride is very smooth. So we had planned to go to Mae Taeng via Highway 1089 by going to Mae Chan and turn towards the highway. Highway 1089 is not the typical big highway but rather more like a 2-way single lane highway. However, traffic is scarce so we don't really have a hard time riding thru. Just about 5 mins into the highway, AKG indicated a hot spring nearby and we decided to dropped by to take some shots.

One of the shots taken at the Hot Spring

After that we moved on towards our destination and about 150 km later, we stopped at a petrol kiosk for fill up. However, it is a different kind of fuel pump, something more primitive and it's something I've never seen in my biking life before. And it just happened that the boss of the petrol kiosk know how to speak in mandarin and he is very hospitable to invite us for a short chat, treating us with tea and mandarin fruit, which is very sweet and nice.

Very primitive way of filling up your fuel tank

After that, with the boss giving some directions, we decided to change our course to go on straight to Pai, halfway village to Mae Hon Son. so we pressed on and while at the town of Fang, we came into a cross junction. According to the map, we should just keep going straight without turning so we will eventually hit Highway 107 that will lead us southwards towards Mae Taeng, where the intersection to Highway 1095 lies.

Unfortunately, we WERE wrong.

As we kept going straight, the road got narrower and less of a highway type but we thought that may be one of the lesser highway, hence the narrow road. So we kept going and going and going...until we found ourselves in front of a military outpost. We thought that it may be some security outpost so we asked for some directions from the soldiers and we moved on, as we moved on, we got some of the most beautiful mountain sights I've ever seen while riding and of course, we stopped by the roadside and took some shots. Envy right? keke...

Shots taken at the mountain area

As we moved on we started to find ourselves riding along the mountain road, which is only a car width wide. The words to describe this road are: exciting, tiring, cold, dangerous, balls dropping, breathtaking, fun, shiok. According to my N95 GPS, we have climbed a maximum altitude of 1975m above sea level! We bumped into another military outpost and after some direction asking, we continued on. As we go higher and higher under we found ourselves reaching another military outpost. This time I knew we were already way off course. We began to realise that we are at the Pha Hom Phak mountain which partly separates Thailand from Myanmar. In short, yeah, we are at the Thailand/Myanmar border again... by chance. Nevertheless, according to the map, we will revert back to Highway 107 if we continue to ride on round the mountain. However when we reached the third outpost which is the highest point, AKG suddenly stopped. In front of us, the mountain road had collapsed and there is a VERY narrow path for motorcycle (a kup bike size to be precise). We had thought of trying to go through it but in the end we decided that it is not worth the risk to take that kind of chance as in our mind we know we cannot afford to screw up this attempt, meaning either we will ride through or we fall in the depths of the mountains with the bike. Considering the odds, and we want to go back Singapore in one piece, we abandon that thought and U-turn back to Fang and find the right way into Highway 107.

The collapsed mountain road at Mount Pha Hom Phak

Overlooking the Myanmar mountains

When we reached the intersection at Fang, we made a right turn and stopped by the side to check our bearings. However as I stopped on the sandy side of the road, my front tire lost grip and I dropped the bike. Damn. Luckily it was only a stationary drop so only the slider, handlebar end and end can shield were scratched. No major damage is caused from the fall. Well guess this kind of incident is inevitable in this kind of crazy trip....

So when we are on the right track, we rode as fast and safely as possible to Chiang Mai before sunset as we do not want to travel in the night. So just nice, when the sky just turned dark, we managed to find a hotel near the Chiang Mai Railway station which is reasonably priced and comes with internet access (abeit a bit on the slow side)

In general, while we had gone off course way too much today, but it had brought us to somewhere so beautiful and breathtaking where I believed my Fazer and AKG's Busa are the only Singaporean bikes ever rode there.

And tomorrow, MAE HON SON!