Day 1 Chiang Rai to Pong

Our charity ride kicks off with a southbound ride to Pong, a small village in the Yom River valley.

Pong is the first stop on this 1600 km ride to Ubon Ratchathani province in souther I-san, following roads as closely as possible to the Mekong River.

In the Thailand’s tourist rankings and geographically,  it sits in the middle of nowhere, on the rural road 1091, close to the Yom River. I had never heard of it until we poured over a northern Thailand map and decided it had to be our first overnight stop at 100 km from Chiang Rai.

That was our first mistake on this tour. Phu Phiang Dao Resort turned out to be 122 km from the starting line in Chiang Rai, a little more than we concluded was comfortable for a first-day ride.

Yet, as we cycled through the long narrow valley with the mountains of Payao province and Nan hemming us in, Pong district surprised us with spectacular landscapes; yellow-tinged rice harvest, almost ready to be reaped and the slightly bluey haze of mountains ranges covered in a healthy coat of forest.

The resort with just four two-room villas, with shared balconies, surprises us on two counts. No one knows about it and when you arrive here you wander around wondering why anyone would want to build a resort in Pong anyway.

It stands amidst a typical cluster of farming villages that make a living from rice and corn cultivation, fruit orchards and an annual crop of tobacco during the cool season and nothing else of note.

None of the popular hotel booking websites knew about Pong. In the end, Thaivisa.com turned out to be the information channel on this little gem of hotel keeping.

Oliver, a Swiss businessman who owned a hotel in Switzerland that was in his family for 140 years sold out and retired in Pong 15 years ago. He was 40 at the time.

He saw our call for help on Thaivisa.com and posted the resort’s details, where I am now tapping out this blog in a very comfortable room with a view.

It comes with air-conditioning, TV, mini bar and all the trimmings of a three-star hotel in Bangkok, but it is tastefully decorated. It makes you feel at home and has a great view of the mountains. We don’t have that at home. A two-room villa sells for Bt1,600, and about Bt2,000 in December.

Peter Brierley, my cycling colleague, is in the room next door and we have a shared balcony with chairs and table where we sip our first icy cold beer of the evening to celebrate our baptism on Mekong Odyssey 09.

Oliver and his wife (that’s the reason why he built his retirement home in Pong) dropped by and hosted us a couple more beers and ordered a great selection of Thai food from the resort’s kitchen.

I had to ask him why would anyone would build a resort here? There are no tour buses passing by, and I reckon a local resident would go out and buy a lottery ticket if he saw a tourist sauntering around the village.

But there are a few expatriate residents in the area who have settled here and built palatial teak houses. One was knocked off his bike, last week, Oliver’s wife tells us, when we tell her we are riding for 21 days to Ubon Ratchathani and Pakse. She explains the gory death in vivid detail.

“Do you think the British Embassy should know that one of their citizens has died and been cremated in Pong,” she asked.

As for the little resort, it was never really built to open up a new tourist route, or be a serious business proposition. Should we call it a labour of love by a rich Thai factory owner in Lampang?

But I like to muse over what it could be with a little imagination, lots of work and patience.

Pong happens to be on the quietest route from Chiang Rai, way off the main routes and close to a few “unseen” attractions such as lakes, a massive cave and waterfalls.

Oliver has a six-metre boat he sails on some of the lakes around Pong. He has a trailer so he can lug his craft from one spot to another and get his motorised vessel floating in no time. It has a respectable cabin that can seat up to four persons. The six-metre dimension is important. It allows the owner to sneak under the bar of restrictions and rules that apply to larger boats.

So you could go sailing on freshwater lakes, or if you read Thai, you might be able to source a book that explains the history of Pong.

Oliver reckons there was a railway line to Pong up from Den Chai and 80 years ago loggers used it to ship out the best Golden Teak in the country.

There were also enough tigers in the area, post World War II, to see off 15 of the loggers in one dreadful year for a British owned company that cut down the forest in Pong district.

All this is hearsay, but it made for an enjoyable dinner conversation.

Over breakfast mulling over the challenges of hotel keeping in Pong without a hotel booking website to send a few clients your way, I reckoned I would have nailed up a sign roadside saying, “cycle friendly.”

I would build a place to wash bikes, secure them under cover and offer a free wash-and-lube service. Then in the restaurant I would post a few detailed maps with a list places to stay within a 50 to 100 radius and details of the off road trails to waterfalls for mountain bike specialists.

I might even post photos of all the Thai national team and other cyclists who have won medals for Thailand in this sport.

In time, I would be sitting on a pretty enjoyable business serving cyclists on tours in the north. They would want to avoid main highways. Cyclists are a funny bunch. They hate hills, but they cannot stop riding up and down them like lunatics. Put a cycling friendly lodge in the Alps in Europe and it’s a passport to a steady profitable business, mainly from a crazy fraternity who want to follow in the footsteps of Lance Armstrong.

I suppose we could invite Lance Armstrong to the next Tour de Thailand or revive the Tour de Lanna  and get the cycle lodge idea up and running.

Chiang Rai and Payao’s golden days in specialised tourism will arrive one day. The road to China through Laos will ensure that the northern town will eventually be recognised as a premier province for tourists who love soft-adventure.

Thailand is a magnificent destination for the touring cyclists, who can follow a network of quiet rural roads in the North and enjoy a cool spring-like climate from November through to late February.

The only mistake is to believe you don’t have to work on the product or quality. Just because we are here doesn’t guarantee success.

Tale of the Tape: Today’s distance 123.8 km; average speed 21.3 kph.

Our ride will raise support for the Prostheses Foundation of HRH the Princess Mother. You can pledge support based on total kms we ride during the Mekong Odyssey, or offer a flat donation, which is ever is convenient.

Email details to the Mekong Odyssey 09 email mekongodyssey09@ttreport.com attention Don and Peter.

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