2014 - Greg's Cycle Tour Thailand and Laos: Day 10: Fri 31 Oct

Day 4: Roi Et to Khon Kaen (79km). Breakfast at the hotel. We transfer about 30 minutes from the busy part of the town, then set off our bikes to cycle off the main road along the beatiful rice fields. This part of Surin and Khon Kaen are the biggest part to produce rice where the road to Udon Thani has more farming of sugar canes and casava. We stop for lunch about Km 50 and after lunch we cycle the last 29km to our hotel to relax at the pool. Dinner and overnight in Khon Kaen. (B,L,D)

Cycle Tour Day 4, 95km average 25km/h. Hot - 33.3deg and humid.

Bacon and eggs to order for brekky, (although they said "no bacon" when they bought the plates) kicked off a great day. Rode away at 8am back into the extensive rice growing area. One stretch took us down a vegetation tunnel through typically Thai (try saying that after a couple of beers) villages. Flat and straight on a mix of very smooth and very rough/potholed roads till the 65km mark where we had lunch; Thai again! but it was very nice.

The rice paddies surrounded us all day; a heck of a lot of rice in Thailand.....and China.

Another bus ride (35km) to avoid a very busy road to the motel. All 17 bikes went into a Hilux ute. A master-lesson in packing.

The hotel was very flash and the indoor pool was perfect after a hot workout. So the afternoon was spent cooling off in the pool then wandering around a mega shopping centre.

One thing they have plenty of in Thailand is temples and they are glitzy beyond belief. The ones in the cities have the added coloured lights for effect. Western societies have their huge cathedrals so no different I suppose.

Dinner in the motel was the worst this far, very beautiful setting but it did took 2 hours for them to serve me an open burger, which was made out of shoe leather.