Happy New Year!!

"Oh good," I thought hungrily as we pedaled from our guest house this morning, "plentiful breakfast stalls with delicious fruits!" But upon closer peering, these were alters set up for the Buddha for the new year. Oh well.

Today was a world smelling of universal incense, sounding of jumpy exploding fire-crackers, and a-glow in golden flowers. Happy Chinese New Year, celebrated with vigor here. Maybe that's why people were lounging happily outside houses, congregations of large brown beer bottles on tables (at 9am!). Car grills were decorated with flower bouquets, paper orange lanterns stretched over the streets. Yellow flowers were everywhere, and I joined in the festivities by draping over my handlebars some flowers and ribbons I rescued roadside.

Instead of eating someone's alter for breakfast, we stopped at a traditional food stand. I was served a plate of rice, a large slab of chicken hot off the grill (sensible to check that meat comes right off the heat), and a small baggie of unidentifiable vegetables. Bamboo? Some sort of unripe fruit? "I have no idea what this could possibly be, so I shall eat it." Travel-eating is exciting, delicious, and sometimes--as in this case--surprising and disconcerting.

The chicken was not just basted in spice, but infused with it. I wasn't eating meat; I was eating a protein spice packet. While I consider myself quite eager in the adventurous food department, eating chicken for breakfast is just too far from my fruit, yogurt, and granola security blanket. The vegetables were saltier than even my sweaty biking body wanted to deal with.

Mr. Crocks-Shaped-Like-Chicken-Feet, a man amongst a group of beer-imbibing Thais at a neighboring stall, approached our table bearing another plate of chicken. "Chicken! Free!" he announced happily. I felt rude not eating it, but it too was cryingly spicy and I simply could not calm the conflagration in my face.

So instead we asked him for directions to the next town. We showed him our map, and soon we had an entire Directions Committee for ourselves, as all his friends joined in too. "Mapmapmap! Map! mapmap!" was the chorus and we had a flurry of arms waving southeast and a deluge of helpful, incomprehensible Thai. So we set out.

The riding was less bad than yesterday: no construction at least, and in some places the traffic let up. Enjoying the lanterns and the flowers certainly brightened the ride. Also passing things like an alter surrounded by probably a hundred small zebra (zebra?!) figurines...

Then! Then we rolled down a hill and the WATER, the gulf!, was visible. I made a lot of noise then. Blue water under the hazy heat, coconut trees--woo!

We're staying near the coastal town Chon Buri, at a "locals" beach. I spent the afternoon lounging in those color-party beach chairs and padding about in the sand. Currently working out our route for tomorrow. We've been riding short distances these days, to break ourselves in.

(I love hearing from you readers! I'm glad you're following!)