The promo for the documentary from Filmografik - “the power of the wheel”
Keeping up
Bureaucratic procedures are mostly the same all over the world. They can just be done without thinking too much, waiting and running from one office to the others, being sent in circles awaiting the good will of one or the other pencil pusher..
With the last money it was possible to take the bus to leave Bangkok again for three days. We went to Ko Samet, a beautiful island, some 200 km east of Bangkok. Sand is white, water warm and blue, the best place to let my mind catch up with new situations and start to return. We went across the whole island, cycling and cycletrekking. We had the chance to snorkel on a beautiful spot and I saw at least once Thailand underwater life with colourful and eclectic beings. Sleeping outside these days was very nice, but without mosquito net in and next to the jungle more lasting memories.
My appetite for more after these months is exceeding the state before, but fate teaches me lessons and recalled rationalism tells me to finish leftovers and proceed this other life for a while. Moving on also needs new funding. I have so many new destinations in my mind, you can have a brief look on the map. For me, my way of travelling can never be different again…
Adventurous preliminary end of this journey
We had a dream, after passing so many places where kayaking, rafting or tubing was offered Malte knew that this place was supposed to be the right one for his so long planned idea. Not too bad animals that would swim up your weenie or eat you with one bite. We even asked two weeks ago at the best outdoor sports office of Laos if a route we had in mind would be possible and the answer was yes. We then slowly moved north for the next couple of hundred kilometres and two weeks later we reached our planned destination to start this different adventure and water level sank again at this point.
It was even quite difficult and costly to organize the right materials and afterwards it took us three days to put the parts together in the right position. The result was astonishing , a huge bamboo raft in three layers with place to put a tent on or just sleep under the after built roof with mosquito net. There was room for our two bicycles, all the rest of the equipment and six truck tubes for safety reasons. It was like a dream, Tom Sawyer became reality, living on a self-built raft and going down beautiful scenic rivers for about one week, starting on Nam Phak close to Muang Khoua, afterwards floating down the Nam Ou and finally we should reach the Mekong for the last kilometres. We had a lot of supply and a very innovative water filter made with bamboo and sand for the brown water from this river. We had new ideas all the time for making anything even more convenient and trying to have good output. We found oranges, bananas and papayas on the riverside which upscaled our food a lot. We had some scary stowaways on board which we convinced after a while to leave; would be some beautiful pictures I think, but just imagine a close up from an eye of a green mamba like snake or some huge hairy multiple coloured spider.
We slept sometimes on the raft itself tied on a liane for example and other times on sandy beaches at the riverside. Full moon made rafting at night possible where some of the most beautiful impressions of my life took place. Going down a silent river with smooth motion, hearing night birds talking to each other and big stony and jungly steep karst mountains with big caves rose up in the dark sky. I will keep this impression for the rest of my life and we named the raft to “Moonshine Lion” because of these scenes.
Some days later about one day before our destination Luang Prabang again we underestimated one situation quite a bit afte
r we got used of crossing white water with this well built raft. There was a rapid like so many times with stones a little downstream and we where in front with the current going on the other side and we even poled away but rocks underwater and the anchor made us do an unexpected manouevre and we finally hit this big rock with all this pressure from the water flowing in this big river. We could climb up the raft and safed us on the rock but the raft was more underwater then above, turned around and tons of pressure on it with no possibility to move. All my thing’s were taken by the strong current immediately. Jumping and collecting them was not possible due to circumfluent water conditions. The stream also took more than half of Malte’s things, luckily one SD Card survived the moisty conditions with the last few impressions and even a video taken not long before the end. The raft was still there tight so well that just cutting the ropes one by one after some hours of trying was the only way to safe at least the rest which were our bikes. Native people on small boats with engines came after quite a while to rescue us and we found us bargaining on this rock in the middle of the river about the short boat trip to the shore with a few things. It’s easy to make good prices if you have no other choice. At this point my impression of Laos changed quite a lot, they are not any more the smiling and greating people but seeing in every tourist one big bag of money. Even afterwards searching for some things found by villagers downstream was impossible since they all wanted huge amounts of money for the two extra small things they found. This was a finishing of this journey I would not like to have seen or better to have felt. In so many parts of the world even if no real capitalism-invaded places it is still all about money and this makes me look forward to go back to my capitalistic place where at least I will not be treated as something liquid.
More Pictures of parts of my travel this time in Laos can be seen on this part of Carlo’s website and prior postings about Iran for example. Angelo’s web appearence is to recommend as always and even moved pictures are shown as he is preparing some beautiful documentaries.
Travelling by bicycle is still the best way to travel, contribution to world peace is in my heart, but being so different or recognised as, like a monkey in the zoo or a walking sack with a dollar sign is not always easy to cope with. A decision being made by something you can call destiny is interesting to experience so many times recently. I have to accept it and I feel much lighter these days. I was confronted the first time with real buddhism, this one that is inside everybody, helping out in situations of need, considerin the materialistic part and letting go. Everything goes its way and I know what I shall do. I will even have the opportunity to harvest autumn’s fruits and be back to normal all days life with interesting work and studies. It’s just interchangeable objects besides the details from people and places in my diary and of course some beautiful pictures. It was a limit exceeding adventure and walking the line means sometimes to pass it, I guess I learned once more my part, but life would be boring otherwise…
My journey has not finished yet, there are still three parts missing which I will definitely do, but not this time. Angelos also really enjoyed travelling with bicycle and I think we can share some of our future impressions in moving at a speed where everything can keep up.
