Mr Potato Head‏

Assuming i've done my math correctly, which hopefully i have, as i keep having this insanely annoying reoccurring dream that i'm back in high school standing outside Mr Chipmans classroom and have forgotten to do my math homework; at which point i usually wake up repeating my high school locker combination, 21-1-47, which is also pointless as in the dream i can never seem to remember which locker is mine.  OK never mind, this story has nothing to do with high school, just a little simple arithmetic.    
1/(assuming around 5 times a day * 365 days a year * 30 years, as i figure they have always gone smoothly for the past 15 years and they probably will for at least the next 15).  That is if there was only one time my snot rocket was going to f-up in a 30 year period there was a 1 in 50,000 chance that it would be today.  That is 0.002% chance; that is not very likely.
Could it conceivably have had something to do with the thoughts i was having just prior to blasting my nose, (which were about a different story altogether; this crazy guys speaking to us like we are 30feet away only we are 3feet offers us the core of his nearly finished boiled potato, which oddly enough he is holding and eating just like it is an apple; my thought was, did he think we were deaf?  why on earth was he shouting so loudly when we were so close?  He must have been deaf himself, that must have been it, he was talking so loudly because he couldn't hear himself speaking, sheizer it would stink to just go deaf) probably unrelated but undeniably coincidental as you will see shortly.
So, we are riding along in the rain, thoroughly soaked threw and threw, Rachael is in the lead and i'm following which normally is the better of the two positions as you get to draft and rest your legs some, but not when it is down poring and you haven't got fenders as the leaders back wheel kicks up an endless rooster tail of sand and road grime which inevitable cover you head to toe.  
Any how, it was part snot i'm sure but mostly i think it was just water that had been flung up my nose.  So i bring my right thumb to my right nostril and as i go to blow, maybe i hit a bump, i'm not sure, my right pointer finger blocks off my left nostril.  The snot rocking is already taking place before i have a chance to readjust my position and because both nostrils are covered it just builds up some pressure in my nasal cavity and nothing happens.  Just like when you try to pop your ears after landing in a plane, not usually a big deal.  Except that my left ear drum makes this enormous cracking sound and instantly i'm dizzy.  "i'm stopping" i shout to Rachael.  And by the time i do i'm feeling so delirious and nautilus i drop the bike and slow motion collapse to the ground.  I feel like i have just been taken to the bottom of the sea, i really can't hear a thing (thanks potato man) and i'm pretty sure i'm about to vomit, though i don't.  Oddly just as i'm dropping my bike two cars slam on their breaks, whip u turns and return the way they have come.  hum that is odd we think but don't take much notice.  
A 10 minute guard rail rest sets me straight and we hope back on and start pedaling.  
Is good luck real?  I don't know but if it is i'd say we are in the good luck phase of things.  As 150 meters down the road, just around the bend where we couldn't see there has just been a terrible car wreck.  Going to fast around the corner on a wet road the car crossed into the other lane, about where we could have been if not for the mysterious passing out, flipped onto its side and smashed roof first into a pile of those caged granite rock bundles they use to build retaining walls.  The car is crushed, car parts, wheels and glass scatted about, the driver is bloody but looks to be ok.  
Did potato man shout in my face to make my ear pop so i would pass out and momentarily go deaf myself to keep us from getting mauled by a car, probably not but who knows; if so, Thanks Potato Man, we owe you one!
Love US
 
sorry no photos, we keep using computers with out the capability, we'll send some when we get a chance.
 
o yes, as always, replies welcome and greatly appreciated though not mandatory or course, haha!

Shargggggg‏

One might think that we arn't even really riding our bicycles at all with the number of emails i have sent this week, i assure you we are, riding riding riding.  
 
Before i forget; Thank you very much to everyone who has written back to any of our stories!!!  It makes taking the time to write and type them worth it.
 
Responces that made me laugh the most to the balloon email:
:That was a gallant offer and effort on your part to present a thoughtful gift to this ingrit (not really a word) who apparently had no aesthetic appreciation for the loony Americanized - Walt Disney – imagination. You should have kicked her or thrown a snake at her for crying out loud. 
 :don't let those kids scare you or get you down, you'll find something that will blow their sockless feet off.
 
  Fate would have it that Rachael and i are on a small island off the coast of Malaysia and at the very same time, hence fate being involved, our friend Will(who you may remember from the infamous Will and Rhian duo, they featured promently in our last asia trip jumping photos) is passing by on the main land.  Catching wind or our where abouts he pops over for a reunion.  
 
In keeping with tradition we must do something overly adventurous, something different that everyone else is not doing.  First we plan to kayak around the island, as it isn't supposed to be to big.  But we notice there are already other people doing it, there are even a couple of gays holding their paddles backwards and they have managed to make it around.  Paddling around the island is out.
 
I get this idea, the ocean is crystal clear, coral and fish abound, we've beeing doing lots of snorkeling already, 'why not swim around the island or at least half of it', i propose.  'No! Dumb idea! To far! Sounds dangerous!' come the responces.  Ok ok, it was just an idea.  But with out realizing it the seed was planted and by morning both Will and Rachael are in, 'yes, yes, swimming aound the island, what a lovely idea, no time to waste.'  And so with out further thought we are in the water kicking.  
 
And cruze we did, it was the first time any of us had rented fins on the trip and we felt like professional swimmers, the section we'd snorkeled the day before we did in a fraction of the time.  Plus the snorkeling itself was quite remarkable, tons of coral and tropical reef fish of all colors, shapes and sizes; we were having a great time.  We even passed a school of 10 or so Napeleon fish, each about 1/3 the size of us with disturblingly human like teeth plus high protruding forheads that looked as though they'd been repeatly smashed with a baseball bat.  Apparently who ever name these fish had quite a dislike for Napoleon as they were with out a doubt the drop dead ugliest fish i've ever seen.  
 
Bay after bay, beach after beach, soaking up the sun and salt we took breaks when we got tired and swam hard the rest of the time.  
 
Sharggg! Sharggg! Sharggg! Sharggg! Rachael tooted out her snorkel for the 4th time that morning, comming as quickly as our legs would propell us we always seemed to show up juast a moment to late.  Rachael and spotted 4 small black tipped reef sharks and somehow Will and i had managed to miss seeing all of them.  Finally on the 5thSharggg! we saw him, he was cute, just like a big bad mama shark, only little, about 3 feet long and said to be completly harmless unless seriously threatened, hence we were keeping our distance.  (Of course this story involves sharks)
 3 hours on we were still on the same side of the island we'd started on, that's when we started to guess that the hand scetched maps we seen probably wern't that accurate.  Hungry for lunch we sway up to the first nake couple we came to, apparently we were on what was aptly named Adam and Eve beach, 'o yes, an easy 10minute wask and you'll find yourlef on the other side at a nice little resturant.'  Plans were promply adjusted and we were off on foot.  A mango smoothy, chicken fried rice and ginger fried noodle washed down with a scavenged coconut off the beach we were back in the water kicking.  
 
With about another 3 hours to get back we figured there would be just enough time before the sun dropped behind the mountains, not that it would get dark only we'd be left in the mountains shadow and no ones likes to swim with sharks no matter how small with shadows lurking about.  
 
Kick, Kick, Kick, Kick, Kick, Kick, we were making good time and still having fun.  Feeding the fish with the left over coconut we'd pocketed.  With an underwater camera i could have made quite the funny video clip.  At first we'd just break pieces of the coconut off and throw them up ahead to watch the fish nibble as the chunks sank.  Then we came up with the idea to chew up a big bit of coconut, swim down a ways, spew the bits out everywhere and in so induce a feeding frenzy.  Basically it just looked like we were vomiting underwater and the fish were devouring our puke.  100%mature i assure you.
 
 
Of course we were having to much fun to notice how fast the sun was actually moving and abruptly we were, like we'd planned not to be, swimming in the shadows.  
 
How many sharks is cool?  Most people would probably answer zero and so would i but with the little guys seeing a couple at a time is still cool.  Until a couple becomes 5 then 10 then 20 then 30, chuck in a couple dozen ugly Napeolon fish, realize all the sharks are doing big circles around you and you've got some fast moving snorkelers.  Actually i didn't even know i could swim that fast.
 
After passing over a shallow shelf which immediatly dropped of far enough for us all to get vertigo, (didn't realize that could happen in the water but i can) we all spotted a little shark who wasn't quite so little as his budies, maybe only 5 feet long but that was the final straw.  We all dragged ourselves out of the sea pretty damn quick!  Walking the rest of the way back until we reached a sand bottom sunny section again.
 
The day was unamously declared a success, an adventure was had and everyone was still safe.
 
Love US!

possum fur loin cloth clad blind man riding a deer‏

Now answer me seriously!  When was the last time you drove by one of those diamond shaped glowing yellow road signs proclaiming; 'Deer Crossing Nest Mile', 'Caution Possum Xing' or the bizarre ones 'Blind Person Ahead' and you actually saw one of these?

I'm guessing probably never, me either.  The signs actually seem kind of pointless in a way, yeah of course you do eventually see them but never directly after passing a sign when you should be alert.  In fact you are probably more likely to come across a possum fur loin cloth clad blind man riding a deer exactly the farthest you could be from any Caution sigh, face it the is just how the world works.  I'm betting the signs don't even register in most peoples minds when they pass them.  

At least this is how I've always felt up until yesterday.......

As you know, originally our plan was to start in Bangkok and head south, sticking to the less populated and so presumably less traphized east coast the entire length of the peninsula to Singapore.  And so the riding started and went and we had great days and miserable ones and we ate exotic food and toxic food, slept in saggy beds and saggier beds and got lost and asked directions and were promptly pointed on our way.  Yet some free advice that always came with the directions and was dished out like an unwanted side of frozen mashed peas at the local cafeteria was this, 'Do Not go through the last 3 provinces of Thailand that boarder Malaysia, there are extremest blowing shit up everywhere, it is dangerous, just don't go.  Yah Yah Yah, heard it all before, everyone is scared of their neighbors we thought and so basically just ignored the un-appetizing side dish.  Though there was something markedly different about it then what you usually hear, that it was Thai's telling us to stay out of parts of their own country not someone else's. hum...

And we continued to ignore the mashed peas until maybe the 10th time they had been freely slopped in our face when we thought, 'hold on a minute, maybe it isn't worth the risk, we can still get to Malaysia and skip out on those three states if we just make our way over to the west coast.  So what if we have to cross the dividing range twice, that's what our low gears are for right?

The first crossing was pretty easy, (you may remember i did throw up) we were able to do it in one long day.  But getting back to the east coast proved to be a bit more work as the Malaysian part of the peninsula is considerably wider and more mountainous.  As in it took 4 long days a total of 440km basically climbing from sea level to 3000ft and back down again 3 separate times.  

Sooo... after our second long day of non stop uphill sweating we come to...get this...yes!  A glowing yellow diamond shaped road sign.  One like neither of us have seen before, instead of a deer riding possum clad blind man there it has got a picture of an....Elephant!  The sign looks so ridiculous we snap a photo.  But low and behold 100m on we start spying elephant droppings off the side of the road.  In its self is historical whether you are a poo fanatic or not as they are the size of you head.  "Can you imagine if we actually saw a wild elephant?"  "No i really can't, it would be........."

CRASH BOOM BANG!!!!!!!!!!!!

Over our left shoulders we witness a gigantic tree toppling over in the nearby jungle, taking out other trees on its way down.  Only the Crashing Booming and Banging doesn't stop once the tree is down...

There is absolutely no question in either of our minds as to what is causing the destruction, the question is; do we pedal as hard as we can uphill, spin 180 and fly back down or do we jump off our bikes and see if he is friendly?

Dropping my bike i run back a little ways and peer into the thick dark green overgrown undergrowth.  HOLLY FING-HAM SHITTING-HAM i mouth to Rachael while waving my arms around like a historical maniac (mind you she is still standing over her bicycle one foot clipped in ready to bolt, lets say she is slightly more hesitant then her insano husband to find out what is bashing around out there)

Unmistakably we see an enormous elephant, tusks and all, out there in the jungle, and he is battle ramming trees apparently just because he can.  The sight, though only for a couple of seconds was otherworldly, right there in front of us is and honest to goodness 100percent pure wild elephant.  Nothing like seeing one in the zoo where you feel amazed and guilty at the same time, instead we just stood there jaw dropped and grinning.  That was for about 10 seconds until we heard another elephant off the right side of the road.  I ran over, saw nothing but lots and lots of poo, decided one siting a day was plenty, so jumped on our bikes and got moving.

I could not get over it, we had just seen a wild elephant who living right there in the jungle, and his parents and their parents before them had been wild elephants all the way back to the days of the woolly mammoth and mastodon era i imagined.  Wow!  How lucky are we!

A minute of reflection passes and we approach the steepest hill of the day, there is no need to speak, we are both thinking the very same thing, 'is this Fing-Ham mountain range ever....'

CRASH, CRASH, CRASH!!!!!!!!!!!

Spinning, over my right shoulder this time, and only 10 feet off the edge of the road, i absolutely can not believe my eyes, i must be delirious, there are 3 baby elephants, lined up, tail to trunk, making quick mad dashes and then hiding in the brush.  "Holly Fing-HAM Fing-HAM Fing-HAM" comes out loud this time! "Did you Fing-HAM see that?  3 baby elephants!!"

"Ahhhhh, no" exclames  Rachael, white faced and obviously petrified, "those were three Fing-HAM HUGE Boars with tusks not trunks!  What in the Fing-HAM Helling-HAM do we do?"

'RIDE LIKE HELL' I SHOUT, as is shift up a couple of gears standing to pedal with everything i've got left.  

So...Slow down next time you see and animal Xing sign, you never know who's around the next bend

Love US 

Testing testing....‏

Hello Awesome!
Sorry if we got anyone worried with the long time no speakie.  But here we are still kicking the endless roads assing-HAM.



Pssss, Crhhh, Ggggssstt, errrttt, aaahhh, ppcccttt...the sounds coming forth could have been that of a yet undiscovered creature or they could have just as easily been that of a dying vacuum cleaner puffing it last breath of life...but inface they were neither...
Eyeballs bulging, eardrums stretched as if in the vacuum of space, snot mucous and saliva off gassing out my nasel cavity, veins bulging and purple faced i was obviously testing the limit; unsure if i would succeed i pushed harder...


How do you pack for a 2500km bicycling adventure in the tropics?  Good question, we'd been asking ourselves the very same thing up until the moment we left NH.  Shoes?  Pants? A rain suit?  How much sun block?  Is there malaria over there, should we bring 100 percent deet or just 50 percent?  If shoes, then how many socks?  What did we need for tools?  Basically there wasn't much we were sure about except that we wanted to take the absolute bare minimum as we'd be lugging everything that did land in the 'yes' pile for a long way.

There was one thing i was sure of though, i'd bring something to entertain the local kids.  Because if this experience was to be anything like motorcycle along the Vietnam/China boarder, as we'd done a couple year ago, where every town we stop in there was a plethora of curious little kids, then i needed to be prepared to make them laugh; micah style that is.  And what better way then with a pouch full of puppies, mice, swords and hats...
animal balloon puppies, mice, swords and hats that is!  I'd bring a stash of balloons from home, 'there won't be a kid in Thailand who doesn't love me' i surmised.  

Only...things were different, we were on cycles not motorcycles for one and couldn't just stop in every town we rode through or we'd never get anywhere, and on top of that the towns we did stop in all the local kids were realy friendly, screaming 'hellllllooooooo!!!!!!!!!' at the very top of their shreiking voices and waving histarically but none of them actually came running over to great us.  We weren't quite the novelty we'd been in Vietnam.

For these reasons the animal balloons quickly fell to the bottom of my panniers and were soon forgotten. That was until after a particularly tough day when I'd resolved to lighten my load by ditching anything that wasn't 100% necessary.  Shirts, bungy cord, lock, backpack, underpants...then staring up at me from the bottom of my panty-ear was the forgotten bag of balloons.  Initially then were lobbed into the discard pile.  But then while packing to leave the next morning at 6 i just couldn't see them abandoned like that, i hadn't even tried then out yet, hadn't blown up a single one.  So back into the sack then went with the resolve to blow one up for a little kid today or ditch them that evening for good.  

120 sweaty km's into the day we found ourselves purchasing a 3kg, 75c juicy watermellon from a cheerful lady at a stall on the side of the road.  Out of the closest hut i could see a small child wathing us...'ooo, this could be my chance', i thought.  Over she trotted and into the sack my hand went.  Red, blue orange? What color should i choose? Pink? yes Pink, girls love pink, right?  I gave her a little wink as i pressed the balloon to my lips.  

Deep breath, cheeks puffed tight, edges of balloon held taught.  Blowing up an animal balloon is tough yeah, in fact I've never met anyone other then clowns who can do it, but i'd been at it since 5th grade, didn't for-see any issues.  

Pssss, Crhhh, Ggggssstt, errrttt, aaahhh, ppcccttt.....................................

I'm pretty sure any normal sane person would have, after nearly exploding their lungs, realized it wasn't just their quivering legs that were tired, their whole system was exhausted, that there just wasn't enough energy left to blow up an animal balloon.  But of course i pride myself in not being know as normal or sane, and besides the little girls was there watching, so after nearly bursting a blood vessel in my brain i got the thing half inflated, wiped it into a hat and presented it to the expecting child...

What?!  Come on!  You are a little girl, and for god sakes this thing is pink!  All little children love animal balloons, what the hell is wrong with you??

Despite my poo eating clown grin she didn't display the slightest interest in my near brain aneurysm inducing balloon hat...

"Fing-HAM that!" i though, "these balloons are landfill bound!"

 
 
 

Love US



PS.
reply's of any sort are greatly appreciated!