After a late massage in my room last night, I was grateful to be lulled to sleep by the sound of the ocean and not air conditioning. Slept so soundly, until 5.30am when it was time to begin again and in addition take on the responsibility of the Team Captain.
I was greeted as “Captain Darling”, but I told them they could just call me darling. Trevor, Team Captain from the previous day, had gone undercover due to the fact that he managed to lose ten riders on one leg!
In the back of my mind, I was very aware of what might go wrong, knowing that any accidents or indiscretions that happened on my shift would result in a fine that night at dinner.
A committee has been formed to hand out fines for dropped water bottles, any accident (small or large), lost riders, lost property and other indiscretion. The find is only 100Baht but I know that the over-zealous collected close to A$1000 on the Northern ride, all money of course going to the kids.
I didn’t stand a chance!
I set off with the team and Khun Mae Thiew, who was struggling slightly today. This lady has terminal cancer and rides to provide inspiration to the HIV children at Home Hug that she cares for. Mae Thiew has been determined to do BOTH rides i.e. the full 1600kms on her own. She never complains and is so inspirational and strong. I know she was in pain today.
We rode out into the cool morning through the air base and into the edge of a forest where we were greeted by Dusky Langurs, gorgeous and very gentle little monkeys, native to Myanmar, Thailand and Malaysia. We spent a lot of time with sharing peanuts and playing. There was one baby which was a contrasting golden colour, although they lose their brilliant colour by 3 months old.
We then continued in the shade through some spectacular scenery, everyone progressing well and complimenting me on my great job as Captain Darling. Then suddenly one of the riders slowed, another caught his wheel and down went John and Tony. John split his helmet, damaged his bike and left some bad cuts on his knees, head, buttocks and elbow. Tony also has some grazes and cuts, but thankfully no one was seriously hurt.
We were to visit a beautiful temple before lunch but the stop meant lunch would be quite late. The temple was worth the very steep climb up to it, only the fittest and bravest of cyclists making it to the top. Most of us had to get off and walk about two thirds up.
We ended up in a small town called Ban Krut at a restaurant run by an American and gorged ourselves on pizza and lasagna. Food had never tasted so good!
Later this evening, Peter and I were interviewed on Radio Jones in Spain (my little sister)!
No comments:
Post a Comment