We left Kampomg Thom after breakfast, and looked forward to a slightly shorter day than the previous one, about 150km. It was also by far the most perfect one riding-wise. We started with two hours of riding on paved tarmac, which was a bit dull. We took a short break to stop to see a some sculptors carving out gigantic statues of the Buddha. I was also surprised to see a few little statues of the Hindu god Ganesha.
The next morning, we set off for Kampong Thom. It would be a 200km ride with one detour to a temple. We did mostly asphalt roads for the first half of the day before switching to dirt. The dirt riding was a little challenging to me as it was riddled with potholes and very sandy. I spent a good bit of time going thunk into each pothole and bottoming out, which got very tiring very quickly. I was relieved when we stopped for a break near a river, the first real water body we had seen in the past two days. After the break, things seemed to come together pretty well. I learned how to weave around the pot holes and power through some of the more slippery bits. I was more able to enjoy the scenery as we passed through more villages with lines of houses and banana trees in their backyards. Lots of kids stood by the road and running with us and waving. It struck me that the red mud roads that were so challenging and new to me were just “roads†to them.
We set off at 8:30 from the hotel. After a brief stop for gas and adjusting of various equipment, we took off down the streets of Siem Reap. After a few kilometres of riding, we turned onto a red dirt road. I struggled on this for the first few minutes, like I always do on dirt, as I try to get used to the feeling of the bike moving around under me, and rolls over gravel and small rocks, and negotiates with bumps in the road. Pretty soon I got used to it and started speeding up. The bike handled really well, much like the TTR125 which I had ridden in the past, and better than the XT225, the dual sport which I rode. There was something to be said for riding a pure dirtbike.
This was the dry season and we kicked up a lot of dust. We shared the road with other scooter and bicycles and the occasional car, farm truck, cart and pedestrians, depending on how populated the area we were passing through was. People on the scooters and bicycles were wearing their street clothes and wide brimmed hat, occasionally wrapping their faces with scarves to guard against the dust. I felt a little overdressed in my full riding suit and helmet.
We passed through small villages where the houses were built on high foundations, presumably in case of flooding during the monsoons. Little kids on the side of the road waved excitedly, motorcycles being a rarity here (I had yet to see a single one on the road). It made me sad to realize that many of these kids were of school going age, but they were either working or playing in the streets. We did see a few children in school uniforms, but they were hugely outnumbered by the ones who didn’t appear to have had the opportunity to get an education. Seeing this and seeing the extremely humble conditions in which so many of the people here lived made me thankful for everything I had. It reiterated my belief that travel is such an important learning experience that should be a part of everyone’s lives. The more I see how other people live, the less judgmental I find myself, and the more thankful I am for the things I have due to nothing more than circumstance.
We made a brief stop at a temple and hung around a bit chatting with a food vendor outside, who had all sorts of fresh vegetables and disembodied animal parts for sale. It made me think of how real the connection between the animal and food is here, unlike in most developed countries, where unless you live on a farm, you can go a lifetime without seeing an animal cut up for food.
From here, we rode through more flat dirt roads for about 30 more km to get to the next temple. We parked next to a food vendor in a village and first got some coconut milk. I don’t think I’ve drunk it straight out of a coconut since I was a child! After this delicious break, we set off towards the temple. It was a 500 meter walk, so I took off all my gear. I was a bit relieved to not be wearing dirt bike gear that I couldn’t take off. My boots were the only things not conducive to walking around and exploring, but I’d deal.
It was a short but very hot walk, as it was almost noon and the sun was high overhead. The temple was a crumbling ruin. As we were walking past the first one, a guide magically appeared and told us that we could climb inside. He indicated a narrow flat stone stretched across what looked like a moat connected to the building. Sure, why not? We walked over it, clung to the building wall and walked along the side to the entrance of the building. There were more collapsed stones inside the building. We walked in and clambered onto them and walked from room to room. The guide pointed out various things like intricate carvings on some stone, and thick vines that had overgrown and taken over the stone. N0thing lasts forever! In my head, as I walked down a darkened passage, it felt a little awe inspiring that I was walking in the footsteps of people who had walked here more than a thousand years before. We saw buildings that had been libraries, bridges over what had been pools, coffins, and more intricate carvings of Vishnu and his wife.
We finally arrived at the place where our guide informed us that the Lara Croft Tomb Raider movie was shot. It has been almost 10 years since I saw the movie, but the setting looked familiar.
When we were done, we tipped the guide and left. We got some delicious inexpensive lunch – I got some fried fish with ginger and rice for a princely $5 (tourist prices, but who cares at that price?).
The rest of the riding was on more flat roads to a guest house where we stayed for the night. I got to watch the sun go down in Cambodia amidst an immense vista of a completely different landscape that I’ve been used to.
My flight from Zhongguo, China took about three hours to get to Siem Reap, Cambodia. This would be the starting point of my tour of the kingdom of Cambodia. I had spent a week in cold, snowy China and was now on my way to warm, tropical Cambodia. As the plan descended and got closer to the airport, I gasped. The airport looked like no airport I have seen before. I commented to my seatmate that I felt like I was arriving in Vegas. This was a bit of a disservice to Seam Reap, although it did seem near magical to arrive at a place full of palm trees, where the airport building looked like a little villa. I got out of the airplane and was greeted by warm air, statues and chirping birds. The wait for my checked in bag was short, and I went through immigration fairly quickly.
Outside the airport, I was met by a guy holding a sign with my name on it. He led me to a scooter driven tuktuk, a vehicle where a scooter pulls a carriage where the passenger sits. I need hardly say that I was delighted, although I felt a bit sorry for the guy who had to lug my two heavy suitcases onto the tuktuk and then get the scooter off of its center stand. As we took off from the airport, I saw a girl riding a scooter while talking on a cellphone held in her left hand. Welcome to Cambodia! Women on scooters and bicycles everywhere was something I’d see quite frequently over the next few days.
Everything I saw seemed new and exciting. Different clothes, different faces, billboards and road signs in Khmer, palm trees and other tropical flora, warm, humid air. We stopped briefly for gas where the attendant helped us fill up. When we got ready to leave, he looked me in the eyes and said – “Have safe travels. I hope you have a good time in my country.†I burst into a grin. In all my travels, this was the first time that I had been welcomed into any country in such a warm and friendly way.
The tuktuk driver moved on, and as we rode down darkening streets, two wheeled scooter and mopeds kept whizzing past us on both directions. We eventually came upon an intersection where the left arrow pointed to the famous Angkor Wat, while the continue arrow pointed to Seam Reap. Sadly, we continued. Through a turn of circumstances, my flight to Cambodia had been delayed by a day, and I would be unable to see the famous temples like I had planned.
The tuktuk turned right onto a rougher road riddled with pothole and gravel. Before long we turned into the courtyard of the Central Boutique Hotel where I had been booked for the night. The hotel grounds resembled a botanical garden, filled with all kinds of tropical plants and flower. The two swimming pools looked very tempting, but I was too exhausted and I needed to get together with the group to discuss logistics for the next day. I proceeded to check in, and ran into Nicole, the gal from Australia with whom I had been exchanging emails for the past couple of months, trying to plan out this trip. She was accompanied by the two other guys who would be doing the tour with us, Chris and Brett, both Australians, our tour guide Chia, and Pich, the guy who would ride sweep, who didn’t look much older than fifteen. We got together for dinner and chatted a bit. The logistics turned out to be – “Show up here at 7:30AM tomorrow.” *groan* How I wish I’d had at least one rest day.
But first – beer!
How did I end up riding a dirtbike in Cambodia? Here’s the story so far.
Two months ago, sometime in mid-December, I had found out that I’d be going to Beijing for a week on business. I started scouting around for something fun to do at the end of the trip, since I had some time off saved up, and I would be on the other side of the world anyway. January would be cold enough that any extended travel in China or Japan would not be much fun, and motorcycling certainly wouldn’t be. I looked southward at the warmer countries, like Vietnam and Cambodia. Thanks to a Top Gear special I had watched, Vietnam sounded like it would be an incredible place to ride in. I included Cambodia in my search, even though I knew very little about it. I searched the internet for motorcycle touring companies in the area, and halfheartedly sent off a query to a company that looked like it had the best looking website. It was called Dancing Roads. I didn’t hear anything back for a few days, this being the busy Christmas season. Then one morning, I woke up to a reply from Sonia from Dancing Roads in Cambodia, who said that they didn’t have any rides scheduled for January, but they could put something together for me if I was interested. I think I can honestly say that this was the happiest day I had last year. I replied excitedly to let her know that I was very much interested in a beginner level dirtbkiking tour which would let me experience the country in a unique way. I spent the rest of the day dreaming, and hoping that this would work out.
I had a few qualms about doing any sort of organized tour, something that I have actively avoided, as it conjured up images of overfull tour buses groaning with the weight of bored tourists ferried between scheduled stops and unloaded at regular intervals to take in a bit of culture while insulated from the local people. It also went against the grain of self-sufficiency and independence that had led me to do my previous motorcycle rides on my own. My decision to go with a touring company in this instance was influenced by many different factors, partly on account of my experiences during my solo rides.
I didn’t have much time to plan out the details of such a trip, which would include finding a bike to rent, getting spare parts for it, research routes etc. There was a certain kind of freedom in being able to have someone else take care of all the details and just ride your bike and enjoy the ride. In the past, finding accommodation at the end of every day had always been a bit of a source of stress, especially in countries where they didn’t speak English. During many of my rides, I had been consumed with the minutiae of travel, like food and accommodation and hadn’t had the time to check in any of the sights. Another important factor was that since I didn’t have much experience with dirt riding, it made more sense to have the company and backup crew.
A month later, everything had been finalized. I would fly from Seattle to Beijing for a week, the fly to Siem Reap for a seven day tour. The tour would go from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh during the first four days, and a small round trip south to the beach area during the last three. There would be a good mix of sightseeing and riding. There would be four of us on the tour, two women and two men. Since we were all beginners to dirt biking, the tour would cater towards our skill level. We had the option to start out easy and build our skills us as each day progressed. We would ride Yamaha TTR230s. All we had to do was wait until the day arrived…
Since I shouldn’t be all doom and gloom and remember all the work I’ve put into getting my bikes running, here’s a somewhat positive post about all the fixing and maintenance I managed to do over the past month or two (with major thanks to Mark Price without whom I might have dragged this out by another month or so). :P
My initial sentiments about not bringing the bikes to the shop to get all the work done and being stubborn enough to want to do it all myself – the good part is that I learned a *lot* about how my bikes work, the kind of knowledge that you cannot get from books alone. The bad is of course that I lost out on so much riding time. Ideally I’d have had one bike running and been working on the other, but things didn’t turn out that way. I think I’ll be relieved when I can finally stop futzing with them and just ride.
SV650
I prioritized doing just enough to get it roadworthy. Keep in mind that this bike hasn’t run since that little incident at the Canadian border last July.
– Replaced hosed regulator rectifier with one from a Honda CBR – saw the idea here, bought replacement regrec cheap on eBay, swapped out connectors, hooked it up and it just worked. I had a daft idea of mounting it somewhere in the front of the bike so that it wasn’t restricted under the tail section with limited airflow, so we hooked up four feet long cables for it, only to find that there weren’t many convenient locations up front, and mounting it near the engine to prevent it from running hot was ummm… not very smart. So I now have four feet of cable wound up in my tail section. LOL… it works though, which is the important thing.
– Replaced battery
– Oil change, replaced oil filter
– Cleaned K&N air filter
– Replaced handlebar
– Replaced bar end mirrors
– Replaced cracked headlamp glass
– Mounted Givi windshield correctly (one side was missing a rubber grommet so that there was a gap between the windshield and the headlamp, which I suspect had a lot to do with the rattling sound I kept hearing)
The only thing we didn’t manage to do was to put the handguards back, leading the to the inevitable quips of “How many engineers does it take to figure out how to mount a pair of handguards to a sportbike?”
Things remaining to do:
– Fix ignition key problem – it takes on average three tries and bucketloads of patience to get the key to turn in the ignition. I will either need to re-key everything or bypass the starter circuit with a switch or something.
– Lube cables
– Replace coolant and oil
– Replace front end with Gixxer front end if I can find it cheap
– Replace exhaust
Things I’d love to do:
– Fix dented tank
– Get Sharkskinz fairings, paint and mount them. I am tempted by the thought of getting my bike to look totally new on the outside instead of actually coughing up the $$$$s to buy a new one.
– Replace seat covers or seats if I can find some cheap and used from a crashed SV
XT225
– Took out carb and inspected it to figure out starting issue
– Straightened out bent brackets on both turn signal indicators
– Charged battery (I hate taking out the XT’s battery and fiddling with those tiny screws)
– Oil change
– Cleaned oil filter
Things remaining to do:
– Fix fuel issue so the damn thing actually runs
– Replace starter cable (the hack from last fall works fine, but I’d rather just have a new cable)
– Put Acerbis handguards back on after I find the elusive long bolt that I lost from off of one of them
– Install new Clark tank
– Sell tail rack and order tail plate and SU rack from here, giving me the option to add either hard or soft luggage
Things I’d love to do:
– Add kickstart
– Add centerstand
Today was supposed to be the “first day I rode to work” this year (I wish I was kidding – first major gap in riding in the past 5 years). I had fixed up both bikes last weekend and got them running, so I was pretty confident. All geared up, I decided to ride the XT. My excitement died about halfway down the block along with the bike. Same problem as the last time – it starts up fine and idles okay, twist the throttle and it dies. This time I was able to get it started enough number of times to ride it back to my parking spot, rather than push it. For logistical reasons, I wasn’t able to ride the other bike, so it was back to taking the bus for me.
It’s definitely a fuel issue, but I did take the carb out two weekends ago and didn’t find anything amiss, so I’m not sure what else to look at. From trolling online forums, I guess my next bet is to check the float bowl to see if there is any water or debris in there. I might also try draining the gas completely and putting in fresh gas (although I added fresh gad two weeks ago too). This is aggravating.
The May issue of American Motorcyclist is finally available online. Unfortunately, you do need to be an AMA member to be able to view it. Here‘s a direct link.
One of the images I took in my cross-Europe ride in August is featured as the headlining photo in a MatadorNetwork photo gallery today about “What Have You Seen Outside Your Window While Traveling?”: http://matadornetwork.com/trips/photo-gallery-what-have-you-seen-outside-your-window-while-traveling. I had originally posted about it here.
When I saw a request for photos under this theme, this seemed like the only fitting one to me because it’s one that is forever in my mind. I recall the Hotel Colli owner ushering me into this delightful room, which seemed practically palatial after days on the road staying at hostels by night. He opened the balcony doors with a flourish and I gasped. I had been riding through the Dolomiti all day of course, but it still seemed like such a luxury to get a room with a gorgeous view like that. I think I took this picture the next morning after a well-earned night’s sleep when I stood outside and gazed at those magnificent mountains again, longing to stay there an extra day. Part of me wishes that I had, but looking back at how things turned out, it was probably a good thing that I headed to Ljubljana that day because I escaped the torrential rains and snowfall in the Slovenian Alps that followed just a day after I had ended my ride.
This is still my favorite place in the world though, one that I think of wistfully when things are going rough. I feel fortunate to have seen and experienced it. I know I will return there someday, maybe spend a couple of weeks in those mountains, riding a motorcycle, hiking WW2 trails, gazing at the craggy peaks that changed color with the changing light, eating casunziei and other local delicacies, and drinking wine and at one of the small cafes that line the main street, where all the locals know each other. I felt warmth, love and caring amongst the people here like I had rarely felt with strangers on the road for most of that trip. And the mountains – oh those mountains! – engulfed me and made me feel like I had finally come home.
…. and practically the centerfold too. :P
The good folks at the AMA contacted me a couple of months ago asking if I would write a 700 word piece for them about how to plan and execute a successful road trip. Since I know a couple of things about the topic, I agreed and sent in a write-up. The most difficult part was really trimming it down to the required word count seeing as I wanted to speak volumes about the subject. I think I managed to get it down to about 900 and they did the rest. I think they did a great job with the editing as they kept the essence of what I wanted to say, especially with respect to leaving your gadgets at home (sage advice that I’ve never actually taken) and having a good attitude while on the roadtrip (images of bawling my head off and coming to blows with my co-rider Sarah when stuck in the mud in Slana come to mind).
When they requested the article, they mentioned something about using some pictures from the photoshoot they had commissioned last year. I didn’t think much about it, until a friend pinged me on Friday saying something to the effect of – “Holy &^&@#^@, I came home from work and saw you on the cover of my AMA mag.” This being April 1st, I was going to reply with something to the tune of “Haha… yeah right, nice try.” until he sent me scanned images. Cue shock, delight, shock, surprise, shock, and then finally acceptance. Yes, there was a lot of shock involved and not a few thoughts of feeling like a complete tool and poseur seeing as I haven’t ridden a motorcycle in the past three months (it’s a hiatus!). Oh and the SV featured in it hasn’t run in 8 months since I got stranded on the US-Canada border. Looking at the magazine cover, I felt like I was looking at someone else that I knew way back, and not me! I know that I should just chill out and enjoy my 15 minutes of fame though. And maybe I will. I’m especially delighted with the inside photo accompanying the article, which was taken on a street close to where I live, with downtown Seattle in the background – my own beloved city! It’s a shame the Space Needle isn’t in it.
Yesterday evening, I finally got my own copy in the mail, along with a stack of free copies, same as they did last year, bless ’em. It’s too bad that they are subscription only (even if they do have a distribution of 250,000 or so), so most of my friends won’t be able to buy a copy on the newsstands and have to settle for PDFs. I’ll be able to send one to my mum though, who after last year’s article finally figured out that I don’t really ride a scooter. :)
Oh and I cannot wait for outraged letters to the editor start pouring in, about how they could feature a squid sans motorcycle jacket, pants, helmet or gloves. What can I say – vanity won out over setting a good example for today’s youth. ;)
Here are screenshots of the images and article:
Cover: Link to hi-res PDF
Page 1 – Link to hi-res PDF
Page 2 – Link to hi-res PDF
(Major thanks to Gary Meyering for sending those to me!)
