Return to Thailand

It’s now nearly 3 weeks into my arrival in Chiang Mai and a hell of a lot has happened. The first few days were a bit of a rollercoaster. While it felt nice to be back, arriving at the peak of tourist season in a town that’s changing constantly does have the effect that some things had become a good bit different to how I remembered them from my last visit. Also having been completely tired out by my flight from Germany and a nine hour stopover in Phuket didn’t really help either.


My impressions were at first quite different to my previous times, as this time my plan was to stay here a bit more permanently I wasn’t looking out for the cool touristy things that I used to and instead had to organize a lot. It also came a bit as a shock to me to see quite a rise in some of the prices. Due to a huge influx in tourism from China, now my favourite guest house has become too expensive for me and I had to spend a quite some time looking around for an alternative. Luckily I found one that did the job quite well for the first months. This was also the place where I met Lena who I had become more than just a friend to me.



At this time the Sakura (Japanese cherry) trees were blossoming on top of Doi Suthep. This sounded like a great idea for a day out. So Lena rented a motorbike, took me as a passenger and we conquered the mountain. It had been crowded with tourists on the way up, but we made it to a proper adventure by taking a great downhill track that I discovered on my last visit.

Motorbike

Despite the day out, I was still in the middle of organization. The biggest task was to buy myself brand new Motorbike. My first new Vehicle!
It’s been a bit of a hassle as Honda struggles to keep up with demand for the model and colour I wanted, but now I’m the owner of a Honda Wave 125i.

Burma

With my bike sorted out and a bit of free time Lena and I thought it would be cool to do a trip up to Burma. As I have never been there and it would only be for a few days we thought: Why not?
So Lena rented an extra bike and we got cracking. It felt awesome to be touring again. We rode via Chiang Rai to Mae Sai right at the border of Burma. This turned out to be one of the most surprising town’s I had been to in Thailand. From there we did a daytrip into the Burmese town of Tachileik. We were on foot just walking around the entire city trying to get a feel for this country. Already when crossing the border it's hard not to notice that this is a much poorer country: There was less advertisement on boards and the town seemed a bit more worn down. Personally to me it had a lot of similarities with Cambodia but a lot friendlier and calmer.

Return Trip

We stayed in a guest house in Mae Sai which was run by an American expat. He gave us a few Tips for our return journey back to Chiang Mai. As we had a bit of time left we decided on taking a detour through the scenic mountains. Quite by accident we encountered what I would describe as the best road I had been to in Thailand.


I added a lot of commentary to the photos, so hop in my gallery for more info

Back in Chiang Mai

Now back in Chiang Mai my time to start working on my company has come. Ash has been working hard on getting some contracts, so over the coming days I’ll finally start with the work I had come for in Thailand. There will also be a bit of further change coming. Sadly Lena is leaving to her own job in Bali, also in the middle of February my Thai course finally will commence. I will probably also need to lookout for a different guest house as the one I’m staying in isn’t ideal, but that’s another issue. On a different note: I'll also try to upload my itinerary from my time in Europe, so staying busy busy busy

Review 2013 and what's to come

First of all, apologies for not keeping up with my promise to write my updates more frequently. The past few months have been really busy and tiring.

2013 has generally been a very busy year away from the adventures that I have now become used to.

A quick review

Despite the lack of hard-core travels, a lot has happened in 2013. I visited my parents over Christmas and later went to stay at Laura's parents in Spain. There I started to work on some projects and through Ashley decided to go down the self-employed route. It's all still in its early beginning but eventually we promise ourselves that we will be able to make a living of it. Apart from that as lot of things did look very uncertain however. First Laura and I wanted to go to Canada, but then the Visa situation started to become a bit messy and this plan slowly went downhill. We also thought about applying to work as foreign aid workers but also this idea never really caught on.
So somehow we were stranded in Spain for a while thinking on what to do. Hence the work on becoming self-employed.

In the mean time we did a few short trips. After over a year I re-visited my good friend Ash in the South of England and got to know some of his friends, we did a trip to Laura's brother in Holland and I got to see my sister in Valencia.

Sadly though, not everything went that rosy somehow. I enjoyed my stay at the house of Laura's parents which are some of the most hospitable people I have ever met and we also got along really well (we still keep in touch). Between Laura and me however things hadn't been as good anymore though and eventually ended in us going separate ways.

Time to think

All this has thrown m around a bit. A lot of travellers fall into a sort of depression for some time when they return from their trips. Me having a bit of a pessimistic view on Europe didn't help either (particularly in Spain where signs of the recession are clearly visible). I had plenty of time to think over what to do.

Since quite a while I wanted to move to Australia but there the Visa situation is painstakingly difficult and lengthy. I even found someone that could potentially sponsor me, but with some recent findings regarding the Visa process I’ll have to wait and see what the coming months will hold. Going on another working holiday in Canada or New Zealand to live like a backpacker doesn’t seem right at this moment. I see it as a Plan C for now

Decisions Decisions Decisions

Eventually I did come to a conclusion: Already when I first landed in Chiang Mai, I thought that it would be nice to live there for some time. This thought hadn't changed during my 3 further visits or ever since, so eventually I decided that I want to do just that and booked a flight. With such a long distance to fly away from Europe, I decided to visit my family in Germany. As they started to work on house renovations there was plenty to help with. So much in fact I prolonged my stay by two months to add Christmas and New Year’s eve to my time there as well.

I have now arrived well and dandy Phuket and as I am writing this post I’m waiting for my connecting flight to Chiang Mai. My plan is to live there and work on the Business I got running with Ash, doing IT and programming work. Maybe there will be some new development in regards to Australia. My next steps will be to get myself setup, buy a Bike and start some Thai lessons. Time will tell how things will go - but I'm quite optimistic

Tribute to Jimmy

On the 11th of October 2012 it finally happened: My campervan has found new owners in the shape a lovely couple from Scotland.
I guess it’s like a lot of good things, my time in Australia sadly did have to come to an end. A country that has sort of become a home for me and touring in my little camper was a secret dream that had become true. Revisiting spots that I already had come across over a year earlier added to the melancholy. Our final trip ended in Brisbane where Laura and I got the Jimmy back to his former glory.


To many it will probably sound strange how you can get this emotionally attached to what is basically nothing but a machine. However this was so much more. It was my gateway to freedom, my home, a lifestyle and a dream come true. Furthermore this van had something that I respect in a vehicle, it had very strong character.




It felt warm and welcoming just to be inside, when lying in bed it didn’t feel like a metal tin box. On a personal note I think, a lot is down to the time I spent with and in this car and a lot of time brings with it memories and experience. It’s this experience that united me with Jimmy. After so much use and abuse it needed to be looked after and by servicing, repairing and upgrading him myself I learned to know every corner and cranny, every squeak and rattle. What I will probably remember the most will be my position behind the steering wheel.


It certainly wasn’t the easiest car to drive: If the lack of modern driving aids such as ABS, ESP or even Power Steering wasn’t enough, a height of 2.4m meant it was quite top heavy, susceptible to cross winds and while to short wheelbase made it agile, in combination with rear wheel drive it was also quite tail-happy. Furthermore the aerodynamic properties of a brick wall and a lack of sound proofing meant that driving any faster than 90km/h was only possible with a good set of speakers and exceeding 130km/h was only possible on a step downhill run.


This lack of luxuries did have a couple of upshots. It made the whole car very light, simple and in turn gave it a very mechanical and pure driving feel. With little between you and the ground you could feel the slightest of changes in the roads through the steering wheel. This came in quite handy on my favourite surface, loose gravel. With its extraordinary high ground clearance, rear wheel drive and the ruggedness of a cockroach it was a very capable car indeed. So in 2 ½ years we encountered every road surface imaginable: Tarmac, snow, ice, gravel, dirt, you name it. In total we covered over 6000km of partially rough, corrugated roads and crossed countless creeks – some of which were more than 60cm deep and even defeating some purpose built 4x4s.


I would be lying if I would say that nothing ever broke. It was nonetheless an aged car and traveling these huge distances through difficult terrain simply asks for things to go wrong. So, of course I did have to do few repairs. But, this is what made me love this van so much and defined a lot of its characteristics. Not once has it been unable to continue under its own power. I had sheared through washers that support the shock absorbers, had a stuck throttle, a rattling brake, worn wheel-bearings, flat tires and a few more little calamities, all of which I either managed to mend by the side of the road or continue until I found a place to fix the issue properly. It gave you the impression that it wanted to keep moving. I could adapt something that Richard Hammond once said: “There might be a more comfortable car to get you there, but a Toyota will always get you home”.


Maybe I should have given it a different name? In fact I have had a number of names for this amazing van: “Jimmy”, “donkey”, “mountain goat”, “the old war horse”, "the Trance Van", someone once suggested “Mary Poppins Handbag” (because of all the things that were inside). If only I knew what I would be up to with this van when I initially bought it in Melbourne, especially after all the worries and problems I had in the early beginnings. What it would look like inside and out towards the end, what kind of adventures we would encounter, where we would be and what sort of people we would meet. You have been a car, tour bus, delivery truck, people carrier, recovery vehicle (I did tow a couple of others), offroad machine, electricity supply (I had a 600W power inverter + battery on board), workshop, shelter, home, office, kitchen, viewing plattform, dj-set, rave truck, cinema, but most importantly a reliable companion.

Back in Time - The last few weeks in Oz

In my last proper article I had stopped just about one year ago when Laura and I finished our trip up to Cape York. I guess it’s fair enough if I continue where I stopped last.

An emotional Ending

This marked the end of our hardcore offroad trips. Back into civilization, where amenities are plentiful, things are clean and people everywhere you look. It was a very strange realization and a feeling that I struggle to describe as it involved a lot of different emotions.

I later watched Charley Boorma’s and Ewan Mc Gregor’s “Long Way Round” (great documentary by the way) and got reminded of it when I saw their arrival in Magadan.

On one side we were quite relieved that the worries would be over and could relax for a little bit: No more worries about breaking down, sophisticated showers absence of the ever-present dirt and dust. However arriving in the urban environment of Cairns felt quite odd indeed. The sheer volume of people and the way of life that we consider as normal suddenly felt a bit alien and makes one question the priorities we have in our life. All seemed so fast paced, unnaturally pristine and artificial.
Ewan McGregor has made a similar comment when he was in the road of bones in Siberia. There is something very pure about traveling with very little indulgences through these tough and remote places. You forget about most of everyday-life’s worries like, appearance, bills, work or money. Your sole focus is purely set the continuation of the journey and the current moment.

• If something breaks: How do I fix it?
• If there’s an obstacle: How do I get round it?
• If hungry: What should I cook?
• If there’s a chance to get supplies: Should I get some? (For Petrol, usually the answer is yes)
• If there’s a nice spot: Should I visit it? (usually yes as well )
• If the day is ending: Where should I sleep?

With no-more tough offroad sections left, I realized how much I enjoyed this lifestyle and how much I will miss it.

The last few weeks

However it wasn’t all entirely over yet as we still had a few weeks before our planned departure and a good distance to cover till Brisbane. Our route went along many areas I had visited in 2010 in the campervan convoy with Jan and Ash. And being toughened campervan veterans we made the best of it by concentrating on the highlights and some more alternatives places to visit.
The route took us along the Top of Australia’s Great Dividing Range, an area that posed of a huge diversity in landscapes: Ranging from beautiful coastline, into tropical rainforests and through the mountains into the start of Australia’s outback. I will particularly never forget the scenic national parks at the Border of New South Wales.

Long time no see.

First of all I really have to apologize for the unbearably long absence of new entries. So far this year has been a bit of a roller coaster ride. A lot has happened and life hasn’t always been easy. Consequentially my motivation to keep blogging had stagnated. However, this blog has also served me as a personal diary where I reflect on events, experiences and thoughts. For this reason and because this has been running for such a long time I thought it would be sad to just abandon it. So I have decided to catch up on previous events and restart writing.

What happened so far?

Long story short: a lot. After my arrival in Germany I’ve spent some time with my family and moved on to stay at Laura’s home near Malaga in the south of Spain, where I met her lovely and most welcoming parent.

Staying here for a while was a bit of a breaking point, to some degree literally as Laura and I now go our separate ways. However, a lot of good things have happened. Our original plan was to go to Canada, but after Visa application delays and change in priorities it somehow fell through. With no dedicated target I had plenty of time on my hands. Consequentially new ideas came up and I began my re-entry into programming and started my first large project with Laura’s dad. A project that enforced an idea Ashley suggested to me a while ago, which was to open a business.

Future plans

I’m currently in Devon in the south of England where Ash and I are in the final steps of registering our company. The idea is that we both look out for projects whereby my focus will be set on software and web related work. This allows me to work independent of my physical location, which goes hand in hand with my sense of adventure and preference for warmer climates.

After all my travels, I had plenty of places to think of and thought what better spot would there be than Chiang Mai in Northern Thailand?
It’s one of those parts of the world I just fell in love with and where everything seems right and achievable: Starting from the Visa situation, moving on to things to do while living there, the welcoming attitude of the locals and the warm and friendly weather. Furthermore Thailand’s low living expenses will allow me to tinker away on my ideas until I find some that will provide me with a profitable income. All in all it sounds rather good and I’m looking forward to my arrival in beginning of December. Until then there are still things to do back here in Europe. Amongst which is a one month visit in Germany, where I want to spend some time with my family and catch up with friends.

Back in Time – Blog Entries

Way to much has been going on to write it all down in this one post. So coming up in the following weeks will be a few posts where I will go back in time and continue my story where I last left it