Almost a cloud

Today we bicycled inland away from the coast, to Pluek Daeng, where we are staying the night. Our guest house is a blazing turquoise, which pleases me.

Our roads today were often 4 lanes wide with blessedly smooth pavement and a few rolling hills. We pedaled into a drying wind, and there was no shade; we rode due east into the hazy golden sun. There was one cloud, which we almost got to bicycle underneath but it quickly shied away. The traffic was not overwhelming, and we pedaled past fields of pineapple, their spiny leaves a pink iridescence. Also casava and coconut, planted in companion. Drivers continued to tip-tip their horns at us encouragingly, and a window rolled down to flash us the thumbs up. An old woman on a motor bike passed us, shouting "Hull-OH!", and little children openly gaped.

After the agriculture we went through Industry Section. Expansive bald areas, orange oxisol soils exposed stretched towards tremendous ware-house structures. I spend a lot of time here in Thailand not understanding things, and these buildings were no exception. Were they manufacturing things? Storing things? It was like being on some over-sized alien planet, a little eerie.

We stopped for lunch at a family's little road-side restaurant. The little girl, in striped shirt and checkered shorts, regarded me ceaselessly with big eyes, then proudly carried us our plate of grilled chicken and noodles. When we had entered the shaded open space of the restaurant, Mrs. Food scurried to the back and produced for us a menu, amazingly, in English. We could choose from Boar, Barking Deer (?), Frog, or "Eal."

So the chicken seemed reasonable.



I was bicycling today with an entire bunch of bananas: so much for weight management. I had danced a little game of charades to explain to Mrs. Roadside Bananas that I only wanted half a bunch. So she went and produced a knife, sliced the bunch in half, and then wouldn't let me buy only one half. At that point I gave up and just decided to haul them along.

At least we haven't been hungry so far.

I thought perhaps of renaming this blog, "Bicycling with Bananas"  Another potential candidate is, "From Wat to Wat."  Because our map has more Wats (temples) listed than road names, and that is often how we have to navigate.